Banje, Dubrovnik

Banje is Dubrovnik’s best-known and most popular beach, a pebbled shore close to the Old Town. It lies between Hotel Excelsior and Lazareti, and offers the broad range of amenities associated with a fully equipped modern beach. Its setting makes the shoreline feel closely connected to the historic part of Dubrovnik while remaining unmistakably a beach of its own, with rounded stone underfoot and open water beyond.

The strangest episode in its recent history came during a powerful southerly storm: on the sixteenth of December 2017, an anti-ship mine from the Second World War, weighing 800 kg, was washed onto the beach. Police officers removed the mine during that day, turning a familiar bathing place briefly into the scene of a remarkable wartime discovery.