"A Run-in with the Law at Dubrovnik " a Dubrovnik Travel Page by karenincalifornia

When we visited the Dalmatian coast during the summer of 2004, we absolutely had to stop at Dubrovnik, Croatia. Our first trip to Dubrovnik was in 1986 on our honeymoon, and we had such fond memories of the city. In 2004, we returned with our children, and we wanted to show them the city where we spent 4 days as newlyweds.

Dubrovnik is one of the most popular tourist destinations in southern Croatia, which also means extremely difficult parking. If you are driving a car and plan to visit Dubrovnik, go early.

We did not get to Dubronvik until 10:00 am, and by then the streets were crowded and all the parking lots were filled up. My husband was driving, and I was sort of navigating and sort of not doing a very good job. We somehow managed to go the wrong way down a one way street just outside the old town.

Could we get out of this minor mistake unnoticed? No, the Gods were not smiling upon us that day. We were immediately pulled over by the policija. He was such a nice officer that we thought perhaps we could talk out way out of any traffic ticket, but he was intent on writing us up.

He told us the fine was 150 kuna. 150 kuna? I asked my husband how much 150 kuna was. He didn't know either, but whether it was the equivalent of $1 or $10,000, the policija was not going to return my husband's driver's license and passport until we had posted bail.

We hoped that 150 kuna was something less than 150 Eurodollars. The officer told us my husband could pay the fine on the spot, but it had to be in kuna, which we didn't have yet. He very politely directed us to a bank where we could exchange our money. Then he took my husband's passport and driver's license and walked away. I had this ominous thought that we'd never find him again in the throngs of people and now my husband would be minus his passport.

Not to worry. The very nice Croatian police officer eventually came back with my husband's passport and driver's license, and my husband paid the fine. As it turned out, 150 kuna was equivalent to about 20 Eurodollars and 25 US dollars. As we were about to leave, the very nice officer gave us directions to little known spots where we could find parking. And we did.

Because parking was so difficult in Dubrovnik, that piece of advice was well worth 150 kuna!