Climbing Fort Lovrijenac in Dubrovnik

While visiting the Old Town in Dubrovnik, we saw so many people climbing along the wall of the Old Town itself. This wall looked really crowded to us, and in the sun we didn’t want to actually hike up that many stairs. So, within eyeshot of the area, we decided to go up to Fort Lovrijenac, which is far less crowded, has less stairs, and still has fantastic views of both the ocean and the Old Town. This was a really fantastic decision for us, though if the weather was a little less hot, we might have ended up doing both as you can get a combination ticket to explore both the wall around the Old Town and this historical fort.

We made our way up the base of Fort Lovrijenac, following the path and stairs, which felt a little magical – like something that was out of a fairy tale. You can purchase tickets right at the entrance, though if you go with a tour guide (like most of the people there were), then you do not need to purchase a ticket. The counter person explained that there is a combination ticket with the Old Town wall, and if we decided to go to that area, we can present our Fort Lovrijenac ticket and pay the difference, which is a nice way to really get a historical trip out of the area.

Fort Lovrijenac is well known for it’s plays, importance in resisting Venetian rule, and for Game of Thrones. Historically, in the 11th century, the Venetians tried to build a fort in the same spot as this fort, however the people of Dubrovnik built the fort first, keeping their power over their own land. The entire fort was built in just three months, then reconstructed quite a few times afterwards, so that when the Venetians arrived with their building materials, they saw the fort was already made and told to go back to Venice. Later, it was used as a stage for Shakespeare’s Hamlet and for the Dubrovnik Summer Festival, before being used for a lot of TV and films. A Midsummer Nights Dream was preformed there, Kinghtfall (a tv series) was set there, and Game of Thrones was filmed inside Fort Lovrijenac, most known was the tournament thrown in honour of King Joffrey’s name day in Season two.

We both haven’t really watched Game of Thrones, which seemed to be the hot point for tours, but did find it interesting to be exploring somewhere both historical and used in a lot of different TV shows and movies. Dann and I very much just enjoyed the view. There isn’t much inside the fort itself – a few cannons and cannon ball stacks here and there, but it’s got a breath-taking view of both the ocean and the city.

You can check out our other Days Out to see what else we’ve been up too!