Dubrovnik is a Unesco World Heritage Site famous for its historical city walks, scenic views, and a "Game of Thrones" location. So it is not a surprise that the Croatian City becomes a tourist spot. But as a lot of people flock in this small town, it is now a victim of mass tourism.
Mass tourism means tens of thousands of people are visiting the same place all at once, and it is what is happening to Dubrovnik. The small town is often overwhelmingly packed with tourists to the point that it is affecting the city's attraction.
According to the South China Morning Post, the entrances of Dubrovnik's ancient walled city get often clogged with tourists. A lot of cruise ships always dumped thousands of people in the city. Stradun gets so congested that the travelers already bumped into each other.
Marc van Bloemen, a citizen of Dubrovnik, said living in the old town is a privilege in the early days. But now, it is like a nightmare. "It's beyond belief. It's like living in the middle of Disneyland," he said.
On a typical day, there are eight cruise ships coming to Dubrovnik. Each vessel is carrying about 2,000 tourists who are all excited to see the city's stone walls, medieval churches, and other famous sites, which are generally small. Bloemen said there was even a time when 13 watercraft came to the place.
"We feel sorry for ourselves, but also for the tourists because they can't feel the town anymore because they are knocking into other tourists," he added. "It's chaos, the whole thing is chaos."
Kopitiam Bot reported mass tourism is already affecting Dubrovnik. Unesco warned that the city might lose its world heritage title back in 2017 because of the continuously increasing number of tourists.
The Discoverer travel blog even noted that although coming to Dubrovnik's historic old town is the highlight of any Croatian visit, the crowd cramming to its narrow streets and small passages would give the tourists bad experience. So, it advised the travelers to visit other nearby quaint old towns instead to avoid getting swarmed by a lot of people. "Instead of trying to be one of the lucky ones who gets a ticket to Dubrovnik's sites, try the delightful town of Ohrid in nearby Macedonia," it said.
As the problem of mass tourism in Dubrovnik is getting worse, local authorities revealed the "Respect the City" plan in 2017. It is to limit the number of visitors coming to the city through cruise ships to the maximum number of 4,000 people at a time per day. However, this move has yet to be implemented until now.
