Despite all the challenges of the global pandemic, the impossibility of personal meetings, the arrival of all involved and the organization of planned events within the project, on May 26th and 27th, a workshop was held that connected all FORTITUDE project partners, partly online and partly onsite, in the city of one of the partners, Bar in Montenegro.

At the two-day long workshop Heritage and Interpretation, in addition to partner institutions and stakeholders in tourism, lectures were given by the experts in the field of fortification cultural heritage from the European Federation of Fortified Sites – EFFORTS.

The partners had the opportunity to hear inspiring presentations that detected opportunities, challenges, priorities and ways to improve and diversify the tourist offer, visitors experience and models of tourism management and marketing of cultural heritage in order to develop better and more sustainable management of cultural assets with emphasis on digital development of cultural heritage and following the challenges of modern technology.

Previously mentioned is exactly the goal of the Fortitude project which emphasizes the improvement of the tourist offer of historic fortresses and the creation of joint cultural events as a way to raise the tourist attractiveness of historical locations and attract visitors outside the tourist season. The results of the project will be visible in the offer of visitor centers in 5 partner cities: Šibenik, Karlovac, Banja Luka, Herceg Novi, and the host of the workshop, Bar.

After the workshop, the representatives of the project partners met in Herceg Novi at a working meeting where they covered all current points, saw all the activities that have been done and agreed on those that are pending the completion of the project.

The FORTITUDE project (Historic Fortresses Intensifying Cross-Border Tourism Development) started on March 1st, 2020 and it will go on until February 28th, 2022. Public institution Fortress of Culture Šibenik is the project holder, together with the partners: the City of Karlovac, Herceg Novi county, Bar County, and the City of Banja Luka. The total value of the project comprises 1.618.438,72 Euros, 85% of which was co-funded from the Interreg IPA CBC Croatia – Bosnia and Herzegovina – Montenegro 2014-2020 program.