Well, not all days go as planned. We had a relatively light day planned for today, which is a good thing because side we woke up to a rainstorm similar to what finished our night yesterday. As we had breakfast downstairs we reevaluated our plans to make sure we took everything into consideration.

We didn’t want to get soaked again – and I didn’t want to drench my only other pair of shoes – and we wanted to find a way to maximize our time. So, after much deliberation, we decided to sit in the room for a while to wait it out. That ended up being hours while we watched the city get pounded with another round of major rain storms.

The part that bothered us most was that tonight was supposed to be our night having an outdoor dinner overlooking the city at sunset from Mount Srd. There was something about sitting up there, totally exposed, in a nightmarish storm that didn’t sound as romantic as it did when I made the reservation months ago.

To pass the time we read, played games, napped, dried our clothes from last night, almost cooked a gecko in a shoe with a hair dryer, you know, normal stuff. I also rearranged dinner reservations over the next couple days to account for a potential change of schedule.

But. Around two o’clock, it cleared up. The sun came out a bit. We decided to throw on our raincoats and flip flops – we have PTSD – and head out for a while. We walked to the Jesuit Stairs. Went through the Dubrovník Cathedral and Saint Blaise’s Chapel. Both were built in the 1600 to 1700s and they are much more subdued than some of the religious buildings we’ve seen in Italy and France even though both were built by Venetians. The focus of the buildings was more about worship than wealth which was a nice change.

We wandered some quiet parts of the Old City, saying hi to the feline residents as we found them. The city was noticeably busier with the cruise ships in town, but we didn’t have any trouble getting around or accessing anything. And eventually wandered back to our hotel.

Once back to the room, I sent a message to the Restaurant Panorama to verify that they’d be open. Part of the concern was that the tram typically used to access the restaurant was closed due to the winds and lightning. Cowards. So if the tram wasn’t running, we weren’t sure we’d be able to get there. About an hour later, they confirmed so we started getting ready. We knew it wouldn’t be perfect, but we were going to give it a try.

Which meant two things.

First, I was packing a backpack with raincoats and an umbrella. Just in case.

Second, we needed to call an Uber to get up to the restaurant. Which was less than ideal. As you’d expect the tram runs because the mountain side is incredibly steep. Which likely means that any road would also be steep and involve a ton of switchbacks. So we both took Dramamine just in case.

Good news was that the weather was holding as we called our Uber. Just a little wind to give my wife a chance to live her Marilyn Monroe moment. More good news that the Uber fare was slightly less than the ticket for the ride up for two people. We felt like we were winning.

Then the ride started. It was steep. It was a lot of switchbacks. Our driver Dario was great. Until the driver of the rental car in front of him proved to not know how to handle the one lane mountain road and oncoming traffic. My wife’s face when Dario dropped the five speed into reverse and started backing down to get to a pull out and let a car pass, was sheer terror. All was good – even through the small washed out sections that had to be navigated by his Ford Focus – and we arrived safely.

We went up early to make sure we had time to visit the Homeland War Museum in Fort Imperial at the top. It is dedicated to the Bosnian war and its impact on Dubrovnik. Largely taking place in 1991 and 1992, it happened recently enough that I remember seeing it on the news but not being totally sure where it was or why it was happening. The museum was incredibly detailed and the poetry of it being in the Fort which saw some of the most ferocious fighting wasn’t lost on us. Fort Imperial sits right at the border of Croatia and Bosnia Herzegovina, on the highest point of land around looking down at the vulnerable Dubrovnik, giving it huge strategic value. Built when Croatia was under Austrian Rule, following the death of Napoleon, by Austrian engineers and local stone masons who shuttled building materials up the same roadway we took, but using mules. The Fort has seen numerous conflicts, the last being in 1992, and the damage is still visible today.

We walked to the restaurant, early for our reservation, and went to overlook to see if the city was visible. It was. Even though the wind had blown clouds in and it was damp with a cold wind, we could see the city below. It looked like the restaurant had put away all the tables outside and was opting to put guests inside a small space indoors.

We checked in early and they explained that since we had booked a front row table months ago, they were giving a table on the window for dinner. The view was quite impressive. The whitecaps on the water, clouds racing by in the wind, and watching the city fade as the light dimmed and the lights came on. All from our dry, warm, and windless table.

The food, as we are starting to feel is the norm, was exceptional. A couple glasses of wine and some house focaccia bread started us off. I had sea bass again and my wife had gnocchi in cacio e pepe which was a unique combination. The meal was truly fantastic and we took our time to enjoy having had this day end well after all. This was one of the things we’d been looking forward to the most and we were glad we didn’t miss it.

There was a moment during the meal that the cable car sent a car down and we were hopeful that we wouldn’t have to ride the roller coaster back down. But, it wasn’t in service, apparently just a test, so we called an Uber and one was right there waiting for us having just dropped someone else at dinner. The driver dropped us a bit away from the Old City and we had a short walk down some ancient stairs to our hotel. In hindsight, we likely would’ve had to walk up the same stairs prior to dinner to take the tram, so the Uber wasn’t bad after all.

We contemplated stopping for gelato on the way back, but decided to skip it. We were full and the wind was picking up, so we headed back to the hotel. Not long after we got back the city saw a replay of the rain from the prior night, and we watched it from our window bench and stayed completely dry. The sky gave us a lightning show over the Adriatic for about an hour while dousing the city in rain.

Tomorrow is supposed to be clear all day. We have things to do, and we are going to make sure we take advantage of the opportunity. If it’s anything like today, everything will work out.