Abandoned Croatia: Belvedere Hotel, Dubrovnik

This imposing hotel is located about 2km outside of the bustling tourist city of Dubrovnik. Proudly overlooking the sea, it once welcomed visitors who arrived in the port city by ship. Today the Belvedere Hotel is a relic, showing the scars of The Homeland War in which Croatians defended their land from the Serbian controlled JNA (Yugoslav People’s Army). It has now been reclaimed by cats- the feline occupants have some of the best views in Dubrovnik.

History

Belvedere Hotel was opened as a 5* resort in 1985 when Croatia was part of Yugoslavia. It had over 200 rooms, a helipad and a private boat dock. It’s easy to imagine why the hotel was so popular – it has unrivalled views across the water to the island of Lokrum and into the old town of Dubrovnik.

Unfortunately it was only open for 6 years, as in 1991 The Homeland War began. The aim was for Croatia to become an independent Country. Dubrovnik was sieged by the JNA for 7 months whilst Croatian forces defended the city. During the siege in 1991 dozens of Croatian refugees sought shelter in the Belvedere Hotel. The JNA heavily bombed Dubrovnik to try to push out the Croatian soldiers and Belvedere Hotel shows damage from this time.

The Belvedere has been left abandoned since the Croatian War of Independence. It is estimated that Croatia’s economy dropped between 21-25% in this period, and so it’s no surprise that they could not afford to restore the hotel to its former glory. But its abandoned state has provided the backdrop to some famous scenes.

The sea-level amphitheater was used on the set of Game of Thrones. The crest of House Baratheon was painted on the floor and was the stage for the battle between the Red Viper and the Mountain. Locals have painted over the crest with the emblem of Hajduk, a well loved Croatian football team. The ruins were also used for filming of the biopic about the WWII Vogue journalist Lee Miller.

In 2014 the hotel was sold at auction for €12 million to a Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg. The Russian planned to create a 600 bed hotel with 500 parking spaces. The site was also going to house a congress hall and concert hall. The project never got started and has been on hold since. It is unlikely that Belvedere Hotel is going to be restored to its former glory anytime soon due to EU sanctions on property owned by Russians.

Explore

Before visiting Dubrovnik we had heard about the impressive abandoned Belvedere Hotel. However we had wrongly believed that it had been bulldozed since its purchase in 2014. Multiple media reports had suggested throughout the years that it was imminent.

It was only during a kayak trip when we approached the shore from the uninhabited island of Lokrum that we first spotted the abandoned building. As we paddled to get a closer look we really got a sense of the scale of the gigantic hotel that we didn’t completely feel whilst inside the building.

The Hotel has 18 floors and they all felt pretty much the same inside, but outside you can tell this was designed to impress. We kept our eyes peeled from the water for any signs of a gang of cats who had overtaken this hotel but alas we did not see them. How could we resist visiting such a place? We decided to head there the next day.

We got an Uber from the city towards Belvedere Hotel and we found it cheap and simple. There is also a local bus or you could walk for 30-40 minutes from old town. As we visited in the height of summer we opted for the coolest option. We got dropped off further up the road and walked down towards the hotel.

As we approached from the road we saw evidence of how the hotel has earned its name The Cat Palace. There were cat beds made from cardboard boxes and old cat carriers. There were hundreds if not thousands of discarded empty cat food sachets and we were greeted by a number of ginger and white cats. The cats weren’t best pleased about being disturbed but left us to it as we searched for a way in. We found a smashed low down window and fairly simply hopped up over and into the Belvedere. There were signs that at some point the owners were trying to keep explorers out but these were clearly from a while ago.

Once we entered we were greeted by a round desk, huge open spaces and floor to ceiling windows looking out on the water and Lokrum. Upon the desk was a phone directory of Croatia from 1991. The sounds of people enjoying the weather on the beach below could be heard through the broken windows of the hotel. I’ve read that other explorers have found this unnerving but I felt the opposite. The sound of locals and tourists enjoying themselves and utilising the space near abandoned buildings was a common theme in Croatia.

A highlight of the visit was seeing the famous spiral staircase, a magnificent structure that highlighted the grandeur of this decaying hotel. We ventured down a number of floors until we reached six old bathtubs all spooning each other. Each of the floors we explored were nearly identical. Each hotel room had a very 1980s bathroom in it, with green toilet suites and dark green tiling.

The selling point of the hotel rooms would have been the large balconies. Due to the Belvedere’s prime location three sides of the hotel overlooked the water, so you were guaranteed a room with a view. Along the corridor parts of the plush carpet had remained and hung on a hook was a jacket from the Belvedere uniform with HB embroidered on the breast with gold thread.

We exited the hotel the same way we entered and decided to make our way towards the beach. We went down via the stairs and some old green netting runs along the border of the hotel- clearly at one point erected to keep people out. This netting is now full of holes and is falling apart. Down in the lower parts of the hotel grounds we found the amphitheatre, outdoor changing rooms and car park.