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The Old Town of this ancient Croatian city maintains a precarious equilibrium between Then and Now. Few scars remain of its 15-year-old attacks by Serbian forces; its shrapnel pocks have been so expertly repaired, the city looks almost too new in places. Walk down the marble-smooth cobbled streets looking out over the jewel-blue Adriatic and you’ll feel lost in time—until you spot the Benetton and Diesel boutiques lining the medieval lanes or the pushcart vendors proffering mousepads along with handmade olive soaps. Yet it is precisely such anachronistic clashes that define Dubrovnik’s charms today.