- My Forums
- Tiger Rant
- LSU Recruiting
- SEC Rant
- Saints Talk
- Pelicans Talk
- More Sports Board
- Fantasy Sports
- Golf Board
- Soccer Board
- O-T Lounge
- Tech Board
- Home/Garden Board
- Outdoor Board
- Health/Fitness Board
- Movie/TV Board
- Book Board
- Music Board
- Political Talk
- Money Talk
- Fark Board
- Gaming Board
- Travel Board
- Food/Drink Board
- Ticket Exchange
- TD Help Board
Customize My Forums- View All Forums
- Show Left Links
- Topic Sort Options
- Trending Topics
- Recent Topics
- Active Topics
Started By
Message
Croatia Road Trip Review (Incl. Condor, Frankfurt, Croatia, Bosnia)
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:45 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:45 pm
OVERVIEW:
ITINERARY:
Day 1 (Thurs): Land in Zagreb 7:20 PM. Overnight in Zagreb
Day 2 (Fri): Spend day in Zagreb. Travel to Plitvice Lakes with stop in Slunj for dinner. Overnight near Plitvice.
Day 3 (Sat): Spend half day in Plitvice Lakes. Travel to Zadar. Half day and overnight in Zadar.
Day 4 (Sun): Day trip to Nin and Pag Island. Overnight in Zadar
Day 5 (Mon): Travel to and visit Krka National Park. Travel to Split. Half day and overnight in Split.
Day 6 (Tues): Morning in Split. Ferry to Hvar. Afternoon and overnight in Hvar.
Day 7 (Wed): Full day in Hvar. Overnight in Hvar.
Day 8 (Thurs): Travel to Mostar and visit for a few hours. Travel to and overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 9 (Fri): Full day in Dubrovnik. Overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 10 (Sat): Full day in Dubrovnik. Overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 11 (Sun): Fly out from Dubrovnik at 6:15 AM.
FLIGHTS:
We booked round trip flights direct with Condor from New Orleans (MSY) to Zagreb, Croatia (ZAG) totaling $1,436.00 for both me and my wife. This price was for Economy Class but included upgrades to the exit row for extended leg room, premium meals, and premium entertainment.
The first leg of the flight was New Orleans (MSY) to Frankfurt, Germany (FRA) on a Condor Boeing 767-300 V1 for total flight time of 9 HR and 45 MIN. We had exit row seats 23H and 23K. I wanted to point out that these exit row seats had significantly more legroom than the exit row seats in front of us (22H and 22K). The exit row seats in front of us, while still having a decent amount of leg room, were facing the bathroom wall which limited how much you could stretch out your legs. We could use the room underneath the seats in front of us to extend our legs even further. I am 6’3” and could fully extend my legs while still having additional room. Furthermore, the legroom on our exit row seating was much greater than Premium Economy class so I was glad that we had made this decision and paid less than Premium Economy tickets for the same or better amenities. The only negative to these Economy class seats was that we were limited to 23 kg on our checked luggage whereas Premium Economy could bring 32 kg however this was not a huge deal.
Although skeptical to book Condor originally, the direct flight from New Orleans to Frankfurt and the prices were attractive. We now have zero complaints about these flights. This was my first real international type flight and I was very thankful I had decided on the extra legroom after seeing others cramped in their seats. The plane seemed nice and clean with each seat having its own TV screen which could be used for the premium movies and TV shows we had paid for as well as tracking the flight information. I am unsure if it was only our exit row seats or the whole plane, but I found it to be very chilly and was wrapped in a blanket or two almost the whole time…better than being hot though. NOTE that there is a limit on the weight of your carry-on bag and we saw people’s bags being checked in both New Orleans and Frankfurt. I thankfully did not get checked coming or going, but know my bag was way over the limit packed with a laptop and lots of GoPro and DSLR camera gear. Our friends also flew Condor to Frankfurt from Baltimore in Premium Economy and their plane did NOT have the TV screens for entertainment like ours did.
The second leg of our flight was Frankfurt (FRA) to Zagreb, Croatia (ZAG) via Croatia Airlines for short flight time of 1 HR and 25 MIN.
Since we were renting a car and road tripping from Zagreb to Dubrovnik over the course of 10 days, I had to book an additional flight leg through Croatia Airlines to get us from Dubrovnik (DBV) back to Zagreb (ZAG) to catch our flight home for an additional $244. NOTE that the Dubrovnik airport apparently completely closes at night. We had a 6:15 AM flight out of Dubrovnik and opted to get there around 4:00 AM to play it safe. Little did we know we would be sitting outside for an hour waiting for the doors to open LOL, an extra hour of sleep would have been nice.
Our total all-in cost for flights ended up at $1,680.00.
RENTAL CAR:
I highly recommend reserving a rental car well in advance of your trip, especially if you are traveling during tourist season. We waited until a month or so before our trip to reserve ours and had a tough time finding what we were looking for. Most of the vehicles there are manual transmissions and I was the only one out of our group of 4 who could drive one, so an automatic was high on our list. We also had 4 adults with full size suit cases, so we wanted at least a wagon for the cargo space. Vans were much more expensive and we had read online that parking vans was much harder given the small parking spaces. I can now vouch for this as well.
Thankfully we were able to reserve an automatic wagon and ended up with a Skoda Octavia from Active Car Rental. This vehicle was the perfect size for luggage for 4 adults with a little room to spare for backpacks, etc. We had no issues using Active Car Rental, the car was in great shape with low miles. Their desk was located inside of the Zagreb airport for easy pickup when we arrived. The lot to drop off the car at Dubrovnik Airport was located across the street however and we had a decent walk back to the airport after dropping the car off. We opted to drop the girls and our luggage off at the terminal first so we wouldn’t have to carry the luggage so far. The total for this car rental for 10 days, including ferry access and border crossing (Bosnia) was $865.00 which was split between to the two couples so our portion of the expense was $433.00.
ITINERARY:
Day 1 (Thurs): Land in Zagreb 7:20 PM. Overnight in Zagreb
Day 2 (Fri): Spend day in Zagreb. Travel to Plitvice Lakes with stop in Slunj for dinner. Overnight near Plitvice.
Day 3 (Sat): Spend half day in Plitvice Lakes. Travel to Zadar. Half day and overnight in Zadar.
Day 4 (Sun): Day trip to Nin and Pag Island. Overnight in Zadar
Day 5 (Mon): Travel to and visit Krka National Park. Travel to Split. Half day and overnight in Split.
Day 6 (Tues): Morning in Split. Ferry to Hvar. Afternoon and overnight in Hvar.
Day 7 (Wed): Full day in Hvar. Overnight in Hvar.
Day 8 (Thurs): Travel to Mostar and visit for a few hours. Travel to and overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 9 (Fri): Full day in Dubrovnik. Overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 10 (Sat): Full day in Dubrovnik. Overnight in Dubrovnik.
Day 11 (Sun): Fly out from Dubrovnik at 6:15 AM.
FLIGHTS:
We booked round trip flights direct with Condor from New Orleans (MSY) to Zagreb, Croatia (ZAG) totaling $1,436.00 for both me and my wife. This price was for Economy Class but included upgrades to the exit row for extended leg room, premium meals, and premium entertainment.
The first leg of the flight was New Orleans (MSY) to Frankfurt, Germany (FRA) on a Condor Boeing 767-300 V1 for total flight time of 9 HR and 45 MIN. We had exit row seats 23H and 23K. I wanted to point out that these exit row seats had significantly more legroom than the exit row seats in front of us (22H and 22K). The exit row seats in front of us, while still having a decent amount of leg room, were facing the bathroom wall which limited how much you could stretch out your legs. We could use the room underneath the seats in front of us to extend our legs even further. I am 6’3” and could fully extend my legs while still having additional room. Furthermore, the legroom on our exit row seating was much greater than Premium Economy class so I was glad that we had made this decision and paid less than Premium Economy tickets for the same or better amenities. The only negative to these Economy class seats was that we were limited to 23 kg on our checked luggage whereas Premium Economy could bring 32 kg however this was not a huge deal.
Although skeptical to book Condor originally, the direct flight from New Orleans to Frankfurt and the prices were attractive. We now have zero complaints about these flights. This was my first real international type flight and I was very thankful I had decided on the extra legroom after seeing others cramped in their seats. The plane seemed nice and clean with each seat having its own TV screen which could be used for the premium movies and TV shows we had paid for as well as tracking the flight information. I am unsure if it was only our exit row seats or the whole plane, but I found it to be very chilly and was wrapped in a blanket or two almost the whole time…better than being hot though. NOTE that there is a limit on the weight of your carry-on bag and we saw people’s bags being checked in both New Orleans and Frankfurt. I thankfully did not get checked coming or going, but know my bag was way over the limit packed with a laptop and lots of GoPro and DSLR camera gear. Our friends also flew Condor to Frankfurt from Baltimore in Premium Economy and their plane did NOT have the TV screens for entertainment like ours did.
The second leg of our flight was Frankfurt (FRA) to Zagreb, Croatia (ZAG) via Croatia Airlines for short flight time of 1 HR and 25 MIN.
Since we were renting a car and road tripping from Zagreb to Dubrovnik over the course of 10 days, I had to book an additional flight leg through Croatia Airlines to get us from Dubrovnik (DBV) back to Zagreb (ZAG) to catch our flight home for an additional $244. NOTE that the Dubrovnik airport apparently completely closes at night. We had a 6:15 AM flight out of Dubrovnik and opted to get there around 4:00 AM to play it safe. Little did we know we would be sitting outside for an hour waiting for the doors to open LOL, an extra hour of sleep would have been nice.
Our total all-in cost for flights ended up at $1,680.00.
RENTAL CAR:
I highly recommend reserving a rental car well in advance of your trip, especially if you are traveling during tourist season. We waited until a month or so before our trip to reserve ours and had a tough time finding what we were looking for. Most of the vehicles there are manual transmissions and I was the only one out of our group of 4 who could drive one, so an automatic was high on our list. We also had 4 adults with full size suit cases, so we wanted at least a wagon for the cargo space. Vans were much more expensive and we had read online that parking vans was much harder given the small parking spaces. I can now vouch for this as well.
Thankfully we were able to reserve an automatic wagon and ended up with a Skoda Octavia from Active Car Rental. This vehicle was the perfect size for luggage for 4 adults with a little room to spare for backpacks, etc. We had no issues using Active Car Rental, the car was in great shape with low miles. Their desk was located inside of the Zagreb airport for easy pickup when we arrived. The lot to drop off the car at Dubrovnik Airport was located across the street however and we had a decent walk back to the airport after dropping the car off. We opted to drop the girls and our luggage off at the terminal first so we wouldn’t have to carry the luggage so far. The total for this car rental for 10 days, including ferry access and border crossing (Bosnia) was $865.00 which was split between to the two couples so our portion of the expense was $433.00.
This post was edited on 9/4/17 at 6:48 pm
4
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:45 pm to Mark Makers
LODGING:
We used Airbnb for our lodging on this entire trip. I’ll highlight each of the places we stayed as this trip review progresses but wanted to note a few general things here. The Airbnb process ended up being very smooth, as we stayed in a total of 6 different Airbnbs on this trip. Checking in and out was easy at all of them and all of the places were overall nice places.
One of the important things I wanted to mention is air conditioning. Apparently, air conditioning isn’t very popular in Croatia. None of our Airbnb’s had central AC. Thankfully 5 of the 6 did have some sort of AC unit, some better than others. Most of them were not turned on when we arrived and instead windows were opened for air flow. While the weather temperatures and humidity were much nicer than Louisiana, no air conditioner is a little tough to get used to when you are so accustomed to having it at home. We managed to get all of our Airbnbs cooled down to our liking with a little time closing the windows and running the units, but we did have one Airbnb that had zero air conditioner. This was something I should have looked for when booking the Airbnbs so it was my fault. At the Airbnb with no air conditioning, we attempted to sleep with windows and balcony doors open for air flow but nearby barking dogs didn’t help with the sleep. The good thing is that they don’t have many bugs at night, and no mosquitos as far as I know as I never got bit, so leaving the windows and doors open wasn’t an issue with that.
Another thing to note is that all of the Airbnbs with clothes washers did not have dryers. Apparently, clothes dryers aren’t very popular amenities there as well, so if you are going with hopes of packing light and washing clothes…make sure you allow plenty of time for hang drying of clothes afterwards.
Lastly, make sure you look into the parking for each place before booking. A couple of the places we stayed required us to park a decent ways away and pay for parking while we were there. The other 4 places had free parking on premises which was nice to have.
We paid roughly $2,000 total for 10 nights at nice Airbnbs, which was also split between two couples resulting in our portion of the expense being a total of $1,000. I’ll update this with more accurate figures.
Frankfurt, Germany - Long Layover
On our way over to Croatia, we had a pretty long layover in Frankfurt and decided to head into town for a small dose of Germany. We hopped on the S-Bahn train (S-8 and S-9) and for a 15 minute train ride and got off at the fifth stop called Hauptwache.
This put us within walking distance of a popular part of town for tourists called the Römerberg...
The Old St. Nicholas Church
Imperial Cathedral of Saint Bartholomew
St. Catherine's Church
The Dreikönigskirche AKA Three Kings Church
And after a few hours of strolling around town, we stopped off for a German beer and a pretzel on the patio of a place called Paulaner, then it was back to the airport to catch our next flight.
We used Airbnb for our lodging on this entire trip. I’ll highlight each of the places we stayed as this trip review progresses but wanted to note a few general things here. The Airbnb process ended up being very smooth, as we stayed in a total of 6 different Airbnbs on this trip. Checking in and out was easy at all of them and all of the places were overall nice places.
One of the important things I wanted to mention is air conditioning. Apparently, air conditioning isn’t very popular in Croatia. None of our Airbnb’s had central AC. Thankfully 5 of the 6 did have some sort of AC unit, some better than others. Most of them were not turned on when we arrived and instead windows were opened for air flow. While the weather temperatures and humidity were much nicer than Louisiana, no air conditioner is a little tough to get used to when you are so accustomed to having it at home. We managed to get all of our Airbnbs cooled down to our liking with a little time closing the windows and running the units, but we did have one Airbnb that had zero air conditioner. This was something I should have looked for when booking the Airbnbs so it was my fault. At the Airbnb with no air conditioning, we attempted to sleep with windows and balcony doors open for air flow but nearby barking dogs didn’t help with the sleep. The good thing is that they don’t have many bugs at night, and no mosquitos as far as I know as I never got bit, so leaving the windows and doors open wasn’t an issue with that.
Another thing to note is that all of the Airbnbs with clothes washers did not have dryers. Apparently, clothes dryers aren’t very popular amenities there as well, so if you are going with hopes of packing light and washing clothes…make sure you allow plenty of time for hang drying of clothes afterwards.
Lastly, make sure you look into the parking for each place before booking. A couple of the places we stayed required us to park a decent ways away and pay for parking while we were there. The other 4 places had free parking on premises which was nice to have.
We paid roughly $2,000 total for 10 nights at nice Airbnbs, which was also split between two couples resulting in our portion of the expense being a total of $1,000. I’ll update this with more accurate figures.
Frankfurt, Germany - Long Layover
On our way over to Croatia, we had a pretty long layover in Frankfurt and decided to head into town for a small dose of Germany. We hopped on the S-Bahn train (S-8 and S-9) and for a 15 minute train ride and got off at the fifth stop called Hauptwache.
This put us within walking distance of a popular part of town for tourists called the Römerberg...
The Old St. Nicholas Church
Imperial Cathedral of Saint Bartholomew
St. Catherine's Church
The Dreikönigskirche AKA Three Kings Church
And after a few hours of strolling around town, we stopped off for a German beer and a pretzel on the patio of a place called Paulaner, then it was back to the airport to catch our next flight.
This post was edited on 9/15/17 at 1:21 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:46 pm to Mark Makers
Day 1-2: Zagreb and Slunj
We arrived at the Zagreb airport around 7:25 PM.
We then had a 20 minute drive over to our first Airbnb to check in. Link To Airbnb. We had to go park our rental car in a paid parking garage about 7-8 minutes walking from where we stayed after unloading the luggage. The Airbnb was very nice and only had one small air conditioning unit but it seemed to cool the apartment well enough for us to be comfortable. This Airbnb was in the heart of Zagreb with pretty much all the highlights of the city being within walking distance.
After getting settled in, it was nearing 10PM and we were all pretty exhausted from the long day of traveling, so we made a short walk down a few blocks to an area with restaurants that was recommended by our host. Due to most restaurants closing soon, we had to make a quick choice for dinner and ended up at a place called Pizzeria Lira Caffe. We were pretty surprised by the menu prices with whole pizzas ranging from 35 – 45 kn ($5.50 - $7.50). We would come to find out that Pizzerias are all over the place in Croatia and while this wasn’t my best pizza of the trip, it was delicious after a long day of travel. (I didn’t do the best job of recording everywhere we ate or the names of the dishes that we ordered, but I did remember to take quite a few pictures of the different foods that we ate throughout our trip.)
After eating, we headed back to the Airbnb to get some much-needed rest. We noticed on our way back that so many people were out and about late at night. The city instantly gave us a very clean and safe vibe. We weren’t seeing any homeless or beggars, just average folks enjoying their evening walking the streets or hanging out in some of the local parks. We saw many women solo or in groups walking along the streets at night with no fear, and we were told by our Airbnb host that crime there was nearly non-existent. As the trip progressed, we truly became very comfortable in Croatia from a safety standpoint and sadly, we began to feel safer in their country than we did at home in Louisiana.
The next morning, we had decided to have breakfast at place that we had read about online during trip planning called Kava Tava. Since we were only staying in Zagreb one night, we opted to go ahead and check out of our Airbnb first thing that morning and move all of our luggage back into the rental car. Kava Tava was a bit farther of a walk from the Airbnb than we liked, so we decided to move our vehicle to some paid roadside parking a little closer. NOTE: we learned the hard way that most paid parking around Croatia required coins. Most of the parking areas have kiosks located nearby where you insert coins for a certain amount of time. A receipt is printed reflecting that time which you then must place on your dashboard. Since we only had paper money, my wife and I stayed by the car while the other two ventured into the city to find someone who would make change. They arrived back shortly with coins and we were on our way to Kava Tava for breakfast. The breakfast here ended up being excellent as well as the service.
We then spent the next 3-4 hours walking the city checking out some of the hot spots
Ban Jelacic Square
St. Mark's Church
Zagreb Cathedral
Zagreb 360 Degree Observation Deck
Later that afternoon, we began our drive to our next Airbnb tonight near Plitvice Lakes, and stopped through a scenic town we read about online called Slunj for dinner at Petro Rastoke. We spent a little time walking through the town and then had dinner. The food here was good but the service was not that great. Dinner took us much longer than we expected and caused us to get to our next Airbnb pretty late.
In conclusion, we really enjoyed our time in Zagreb. We had read online that we shouldn't spend much time here as it was less appealing than the rest of our stops. Now that we have been, we wish we would have allocated a little more time in this city, but we had alot to do in only 10 days.
We arrived at the Zagreb airport around 7:25 PM.
We then had a 20 minute drive over to our first Airbnb to check in. Link To Airbnb. We had to go park our rental car in a paid parking garage about 7-8 minutes walking from where we stayed after unloading the luggage. The Airbnb was very nice and only had one small air conditioning unit but it seemed to cool the apartment well enough for us to be comfortable. This Airbnb was in the heart of Zagreb with pretty much all the highlights of the city being within walking distance.
After getting settled in, it was nearing 10PM and we were all pretty exhausted from the long day of traveling, so we made a short walk down a few blocks to an area with restaurants that was recommended by our host. Due to most restaurants closing soon, we had to make a quick choice for dinner and ended up at a place called Pizzeria Lira Caffe. We were pretty surprised by the menu prices with whole pizzas ranging from 35 – 45 kn ($5.50 - $7.50). We would come to find out that Pizzerias are all over the place in Croatia and while this wasn’t my best pizza of the trip, it was delicious after a long day of travel. (I didn’t do the best job of recording everywhere we ate or the names of the dishes that we ordered, but I did remember to take quite a few pictures of the different foods that we ate throughout our trip.)
After eating, we headed back to the Airbnb to get some much-needed rest. We noticed on our way back that so many people were out and about late at night. The city instantly gave us a very clean and safe vibe. We weren’t seeing any homeless or beggars, just average folks enjoying their evening walking the streets or hanging out in some of the local parks. We saw many women solo or in groups walking along the streets at night with no fear, and we were told by our Airbnb host that crime there was nearly non-existent. As the trip progressed, we truly became very comfortable in Croatia from a safety standpoint and sadly, we began to feel safer in their country than we did at home in Louisiana.
The next morning, we had decided to have breakfast at place that we had read about online during trip planning called Kava Tava. Since we were only staying in Zagreb one night, we opted to go ahead and check out of our Airbnb first thing that morning and move all of our luggage back into the rental car. Kava Tava was a bit farther of a walk from the Airbnb than we liked, so we decided to move our vehicle to some paid roadside parking a little closer. NOTE: we learned the hard way that most paid parking around Croatia required coins. Most of the parking areas have kiosks located nearby where you insert coins for a certain amount of time. A receipt is printed reflecting that time which you then must place on your dashboard. Since we only had paper money, my wife and I stayed by the car while the other two ventured into the city to find someone who would make change. They arrived back shortly with coins and we were on our way to Kava Tava for breakfast. The breakfast here ended up being excellent as well as the service.
We then spent the next 3-4 hours walking the city checking out some of the hot spots
Ban Jelacic Square
St. Mark's Church
Zagreb Cathedral
Zagreb 360 Degree Observation Deck
Later that afternoon, we began our drive to our next Airbnb tonight near Plitvice Lakes, and stopped through a scenic town we read about online called Slunj for dinner at Petro Rastoke. We spent a little time walking through the town and then had dinner. The food here was good but the service was not that great. Dinner took us much longer than we expected and caused us to get to our next Airbnb pretty late.
In conclusion, we really enjoyed our time in Zagreb. We had read online that we shouldn't spend much time here as it was less appealing than the rest of our stops. Now that we have been, we wish we would have allocated a little more time in this city, but we had alot to do in only 10 days.
This post was edited on 9/5/17 at 1:39 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:46 pm to Mark Makers
Day 3: Plitvice Lakes and Zadar
We had read a lot online about how crowded Plitvice Lakes can get during tourist season, so we decided to stay near the park the night before to help us get an early start. Here is the link to the Airbnb we stayed in.. Out of the 6 Airbnbs we had on this trip, this one was the worst…primarily due to it not having air conditioner at all. No fault of the owner’s though, it was something we overlooked on the Airbnb listing when we booked it. As a result, we had to sleep with the windows and balcony doors open for air flow. It actually was pretty comfortable with the doors open, but there was a dog at one of the nearby houses/apartments that literally barked all night long. I am a pretty hard sleeper so it didn’t bother me much, but it kept my wife up almost all night. It was nice being so close to the park though, we were able to leave our car parked at the Airbnb and just made a short hike down a trail to the main ticket counter.
The park opens at 7AM and I hoped to be there for 7, but we ended up getting there for around 8-830 and the crowds were already starting.
The two most popular trails are C and H, with trail H being the most popular. They are essentially the same exact trail, but one starts you off at Entrance 1 (Lower Lakes) and the other starts you off at Entrance 2 (Upper Lakes). Trail H, most popular, starts at the upper lakes, so your entire hike is gradually downhill, with the big finale waterfall “Vekliki Slap”.
We had read online that trail C was the best, because we would be starting away from the crowds and we would get to see the large waterfall first for pictures without the worry of people being in our pictures. The downfall of this trail is that you are walking uphill the whole time, but this means we would be walking towards all of the waterfalls instead of all of them being to our backs.
After purchasing our tickets, we noticed a large crowd of people were waiting for the shuttle over to Entrance 2 for trail H. We mentioned to the park worker that we had heard Trail C was the best, and she agreed pointing us in the direction of the shuttle to Entrance 1. There was no one there, so we ran over quickly and hopped on the shuttle. A couple more people hopped on before it left, but it was essentially empty.
We started down Trail C and quickly found the trail signs to be not marked very well, and the map that was given to us did not have the trails marked. As we were entering the lower lakes, we noticed a sign pointing towards a cave and opted to check that out.
When we came out the bottom of the cave, we saw another sign for trail C and continued on our way. After an hour or so of walking, I started questioning if we had gone the wrong way because we had not seen the large waterfall.
Sure enough, we eventually reached the end of the lower lakes and had completely bypassed the best waterfall in the park. So, we opted to backtrack all the way to the beginning. By this time, we had wasted hours and the park was starting to get busy.
We spent a little time checking out the tall waterfall, and headed back towards the dock for the boat that would take us to the upper lakes. By the time we reached the boat, we decided we had done enough walking and had seen enough blue water and waterfalls for the day. We chose to skip the upper lakes and just hopped on the boat back to where we had purchased tickets so we could begin our journey to our next stop in Zadar.
Not long after we left Plitvice Lakes, we decided to pull into a restaurant called Vila Velebita. It was a good stop, friendly staff and good food. This was one of the many places that I forgot to take food pictures.
It was around a 2 hour drive from Plitvice Lakes to Zadar. We found the drive to be very scenic however and that really made the time pass. At one point we even went through a tunnel that was 4000m long (almost 2.5 miles) which we found to be pretty impressive. Maybe that is common in other places but it was new to us. This drive was when we first started seeing a few areas that had been burned from the recent wildfire outbreak there as well.
When we arrived to Zadar, we quickly checked into our Airbnb so we could head towards the city and continue our day. A link to this Airbnb is here. While the apartment was nice, it seemed to still be under renovation and had numerous places with exposed wires that gave us a slight uneasy feeling for fire hazards. But, the place did have an air conditioning unit so that was a welcome site LOL. The downfall to this place was that we were about 20 minutes walking from the heart of the city so we had to drive and find pay parking when we went to the city.
We were able to knock out just about all of the Zadar’s highlights this afternoon.
The Sea Organ
The Greeting to the Sun
The Zadar Cathedral, where we saw a Croatian wedding taking place. And we climbed up to the top of the bell tower for a great view.
The Roman Forum.
For dinner, we had il Padrino which was right on the waterfront. The dishes were Prawns, Seafood Pasta, Seafood Risotto, and Lasagna.
The sunset views from this restaurant were incredible.
To end our night, we stumbled across the Zadar Craft Beer Festival…awesome!!!
We had read a lot online about how crowded Plitvice Lakes can get during tourist season, so we decided to stay near the park the night before to help us get an early start. Here is the link to the Airbnb we stayed in.. Out of the 6 Airbnbs we had on this trip, this one was the worst…primarily due to it not having air conditioner at all. No fault of the owner’s though, it was something we overlooked on the Airbnb listing when we booked it. As a result, we had to sleep with the windows and balcony doors open for air flow. It actually was pretty comfortable with the doors open, but there was a dog at one of the nearby houses/apartments that literally barked all night long. I am a pretty hard sleeper so it didn’t bother me much, but it kept my wife up almost all night. It was nice being so close to the park though, we were able to leave our car parked at the Airbnb and just made a short hike down a trail to the main ticket counter.
The park opens at 7AM and I hoped to be there for 7, but we ended up getting there for around 8-830 and the crowds were already starting.
The two most popular trails are C and H, with trail H being the most popular. They are essentially the same exact trail, but one starts you off at Entrance 1 (Lower Lakes) and the other starts you off at Entrance 2 (Upper Lakes). Trail H, most popular, starts at the upper lakes, so your entire hike is gradually downhill, with the big finale waterfall “Vekliki Slap”.
We had read online that trail C was the best, because we would be starting away from the crowds and we would get to see the large waterfall first for pictures without the worry of people being in our pictures. The downfall of this trail is that you are walking uphill the whole time, but this means we would be walking towards all of the waterfalls instead of all of them being to our backs.
After purchasing our tickets, we noticed a large crowd of people were waiting for the shuttle over to Entrance 2 for trail H. We mentioned to the park worker that we had heard Trail C was the best, and she agreed pointing us in the direction of the shuttle to Entrance 1. There was no one there, so we ran over quickly and hopped on the shuttle. A couple more people hopped on before it left, but it was essentially empty.
We started down Trail C and quickly found the trail signs to be not marked very well, and the map that was given to us did not have the trails marked. As we were entering the lower lakes, we noticed a sign pointing towards a cave and opted to check that out.
When we came out the bottom of the cave, we saw another sign for trail C and continued on our way. After an hour or so of walking, I started questioning if we had gone the wrong way because we had not seen the large waterfall.
Sure enough, we eventually reached the end of the lower lakes and had completely bypassed the best waterfall in the park. So, we opted to backtrack all the way to the beginning. By this time, we had wasted hours and the park was starting to get busy.
We spent a little time checking out the tall waterfall, and headed back towards the dock for the boat that would take us to the upper lakes. By the time we reached the boat, we decided we had done enough walking and had seen enough blue water and waterfalls for the day. We chose to skip the upper lakes and just hopped on the boat back to where we had purchased tickets so we could begin our journey to our next stop in Zadar.
Not long after we left Plitvice Lakes, we decided to pull into a restaurant called Vila Velebita. It was a good stop, friendly staff and good food. This was one of the many places that I forgot to take food pictures.
It was around a 2 hour drive from Plitvice Lakes to Zadar. We found the drive to be very scenic however and that really made the time pass. At one point we even went through a tunnel that was 4000m long (almost 2.5 miles) which we found to be pretty impressive. Maybe that is common in other places but it was new to us. This drive was when we first started seeing a few areas that had been burned from the recent wildfire outbreak there as well.
When we arrived to Zadar, we quickly checked into our Airbnb so we could head towards the city and continue our day. A link to this Airbnb is here. While the apartment was nice, it seemed to still be under renovation and had numerous places with exposed wires that gave us a slight uneasy feeling for fire hazards. But, the place did have an air conditioning unit so that was a welcome site LOL. The downfall to this place was that we were about 20 minutes walking from the heart of the city so we had to drive and find pay parking when we went to the city.
We were able to knock out just about all of the Zadar’s highlights this afternoon.
The Sea Organ
The Greeting to the Sun
The Zadar Cathedral, where we saw a Croatian wedding taking place. And we climbed up to the top of the bell tower for a great view.
The Roman Forum.
For dinner, we had il Padrino which was right on the waterfront. The dishes were Prawns, Seafood Pasta, Seafood Risotto, and Lasagna.
The sunset views from this restaurant were incredible.
To end our night, we stumbled across the Zadar Craft Beer Festival…awesome!!!
This post was edited on 9/15/17 at 1:20 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:46 pm to Mark Makers
Day 4: Nin and Pag Island
CLIFF NOTES: THIS TURNED OUT TO BE ONE OF MY FAVORITE DAYS FROM THIS TRIP.
Our intention was to spend 2 full days in Zadar, but we had knocked out most of the city highlights in Day 1. We did a little last minute research and decided we would try to find a nearby beach to spend the day. We came up with a few options and hit the road.
Our first stop was a town called Nin, which was only a short 25 minute drive from our Airbnb. We had read about a beach called the Ninska Laguna Beach, and supposedly it was one of the few sandy beaches in Croatia. We hung out here for about 3 hours enjoying the beach and the water. Though the water was murky near the beach due to the waves stirring up the sand, once we got out a good ways we couldn’t believe how clear the water was. They may be easily over looked in the picture but we were fascinated with the mountain scenery in the background as we enjoyed our swim. The beach has a couple of small patio restaurants nearby. I don’t have the names, but we ate at the one closest to the beach while our friends ate at the one further away from the beach and closer to the parking lot. They made the better choice as my wife and I were not too impressed with our food.
Although it was nearing 3:00 PM, we had read a lot about the beaches on Pag Island and really wanted to go check them out. We had nearly an hour drive to Pag and knew we wouldn’t have too much time once we got there. This scenery drive ended up being outstanding. We made a road side stop right before crossing the bridge onto Pag Island and I was blown away by the view. There was a small fast food joint here that I would have loved to sit on the patio and take in the views. But, we had already eaten and were limited on time so after 100 pictures we had to keep moving.
As we were crossing the bridge onto the island, we noticed an old fort to our left, and decided to make another stop and check it out. There wasn’t much to it other than more scenic views and photo ops.
Finally, we arrived to Pag Island. We had attempted to plug in the GPS an address to a beach we read about online. But as we continued following the GPS, it eventually brought us to nothing that looked like a beach. We continued driving on our own hoping we would stumble across it. On a whim, we decided to pull up next to a gentleman on the side of the road and ask him if he could point us to a beach. His response was, “Just park right here, there is one straight down.” We pulled off on the shoulder and got out to investigate. There we found a tiny concrete stairway down the side of the mountain to one of the most beautiful spots I had ever laid my eyes. It was a small, gravel beach nestled in the side of a mountain. The water was calm, crystal clear, and freezing cold. Although there was a couple people there when we arrived, they were picking up and leaving. We had the entire beach to ourselves for the rest of the evening until the sun went down. We were now much closer to the mountain views in the previous pictures from Nin. It was simply a slice of heaven that we had all to ourselves, and we all wished we had found this place earlier in the day or would have had more time to go back.
As the sun went down, I spent the few last minutes admiring where we were and climbed back up the stairs to the car.
Before driving off, I pinned the stairway on my GPS in hopes I could one day return. I’m not going to share this spot publicly, as I think it deserves to remain a “hidden gem”. If anyone happens to plan a trip to Croatia, let me know and I may be willing to share the location privately.
We made the hour-long drive back to Zadar, and went straight to the old city still in our bathing suits in search of a casual place to catch dinner. We ended up being lured into a place by a hostess called Bistro Pizzeria Donat. This was my favorite pizza of the trip, and I had quite a bit of pizza. It was just a simple tomato sauce, cheese, pepperoni, and bacon…but they put some kind of cream on top that really kicked it up a notch. The other 3 all ordered the same exact dish, fettuccini of some sort. I’ll try to figure out what it was and edit this later.
Then it was back to the apartment to pack and sleep as we had an early morning planned for tomorrow.
CLIFF NOTES: THIS TURNED OUT TO BE ONE OF MY FAVORITE DAYS FROM THIS TRIP.
Our intention was to spend 2 full days in Zadar, but we had knocked out most of the city highlights in Day 1. We did a little last minute research and decided we would try to find a nearby beach to spend the day. We came up with a few options and hit the road.
Our first stop was a town called Nin, which was only a short 25 minute drive from our Airbnb. We had read about a beach called the Ninska Laguna Beach, and supposedly it was one of the few sandy beaches in Croatia. We hung out here for about 3 hours enjoying the beach and the water. Though the water was murky near the beach due to the waves stirring up the sand, once we got out a good ways we couldn’t believe how clear the water was. They may be easily over looked in the picture but we were fascinated with the mountain scenery in the background as we enjoyed our swim. The beach has a couple of small patio restaurants nearby. I don’t have the names, but we ate at the one closest to the beach while our friends ate at the one further away from the beach and closer to the parking lot. They made the better choice as my wife and I were not too impressed with our food.
Although it was nearing 3:00 PM, we had read a lot about the beaches on Pag Island and really wanted to go check them out. We had nearly an hour drive to Pag and knew we wouldn’t have too much time once we got there. This scenery drive ended up being outstanding. We made a road side stop right before crossing the bridge onto Pag Island and I was blown away by the view. There was a small fast food joint here that I would have loved to sit on the patio and take in the views. But, we had already eaten and were limited on time so after 100 pictures we had to keep moving.
As we were crossing the bridge onto the island, we noticed an old fort to our left, and decided to make another stop and check it out. There wasn’t much to it other than more scenic views and photo ops.
Finally, we arrived to Pag Island. We had attempted to plug in the GPS an address to a beach we read about online. But as we continued following the GPS, it eventually brought us to nothing that looked like a beach. We continued driving on our own hoping we would stumble across it. On a whim, we decided to pull up next to a gentleman on the side of the road and ask him if he could point us to a beach. His response was, “Just park right here, there is one straight down.” We pulled off on the shoulder and got out to investigate. There we found a tiny concrete stairway down the side of the mountain to one of the most beautiful spots I had ever laid my eyes. It was a small, gravel beach nestled in the side of a mountain. The water was calm, crystal clear, and freezing cold. Although there was a couple people there when we arrived, they were picking up and leaving. We had the entire beach to ourselves for the rest of the evening until the sun went down. We were now much closer to the mountain views in the previous pictures from Nin. It was simply a slice of heaven that we had all to ourselves, and we all wished we had found this place earlier in the day or would have had more time to go back.
As the sun went down, I spent the few last minutes admiring where we were and climbed back up the stairs to the car.
Before driving off, I pinned the stairway on my GPS in hopes I could one day return. I’m not going to share this spot publicly, as I think it deserves to remain a “hidden gem”. If anyone happens to plan a trip to Croatia, let me know and I may be willing to share the location privately.
We made the hour-long drive back to Zadar, and went straight to the old city still in our bathing suits in search of a casual place to catch dinner. We ended up being lured into a place by a hostess called Bistro Pizzeria Donat. This was my favorite pizza of the trip, and I had quite a bit of pizza. It was just a simple tomato sauce, cheese, pepperoni, and bacon…but they put some kind of cream on top that really kicked it up a notch. The other 3 all ordered the same exact dish, fettuccini of some sort. I’ll try to figure out what it was and edit this later.
Then it was back to the apartment to pack and sleep as we had an early morning planned for tomorrow.
This post was edited on 9/13/17 at 5:54 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:47 pm to Mark Makers
Day 5: Krka National Park and Split
The next morning, we woke up and hit the road for Krka National Park for a 1 hour drive. This park is basically a smaller version of the Plitvice Lakes National Park we had already visited, with the main difference being that we would be allowed to swim near the waterfalls. Since we had already spent a lot of time hiking the lakes/waterfalls of Plitvice, we decided that our goal was to make this a quick stop. We would enter the park and head straight for the swimming hole for the sole purpose of swimming near the falls and getting a couple “selfies”. Walking through the park, we did end up making a few stops at some of the lookouts for some photo ops.
After walking for about 15-20 minutes, we made it to the swimming hole. Each couple took turns watching the bags/camera gear while we took a brief dip in the water and get the “selfies”
Once we had enough, we headed back for the parking lot to begin our journey to Split. Our goal was to see as much of Split as we could this afternoon. We were only staying here one night and wanted to catch an early ferry in the morning to head over to Hvar Island, so the more we time in Split this afternoon the better.
After another 1 hour drive, we arrived in Split. This Airbnb was located within the city walls which only allowed access by foot. We payed to park in a lot nearby and had to carry our luggage about 7-8 minute walk into the city to reach our Airbnb. We arrived and thanked the heavens for blessing us with another air conditioned home.
After getting settled in, we set out immediately over to the ferry landing to secure our ferry tickets to Hvar Island tomorrow, as well our ferry tickets off of the island in a couple days. Once we had our ferry tickets, we spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the city.
The Riva
The Cellars
Cathedral of Saint Domnius
Gregory of Nin Statue (Rub toe for good luck!)
Dinner at Adriatic Sushi & Oyster Bar
Split was a neat city and while easy to get turned around inside the walls, it did not take long to see everything. That night after dinner, the ladies decided to head in for bed and myself and my buddy were going to head out to the bars. We were pretty surprised to see that what was a bustling city a few hours earlier had turned into a ghost town. Apparently just about everywhere within the walls must shut down around 11PM. We found only one or two hole in the wall bars that were still open but were packed. After walking a few laps through the city and passing the same places numerous times, we decided to head back in as we couldn't find any hang out spots that interested us.
The next morning, we woke up and hit the road for Krka National Park for a 1 hour drive. This park is basically a smaller version of the Plitvice Lakes National Park we had already visited, with the main difference being that we would be allowed to swim near the waterfalls. Since we had already spent a lot of time hiking the lakes/waterfalls of Plitvice, we decided that our goal was to make this a quick stop. We would enter the park and head straight for the swimming hole for the sole purpose of swimming near the falls and getting a couple “selfies”. Walking through the park, we did end up making a few stops at some of the lookouts for some photo ops.
After walking for about 15-20 minutes, we made it to the swimming hole. Each couple took turns watching the bags/camera gear while we took a brief dip in the water and get the “selfies”
Once we had enough, we headed back for the parking lot to begin our journey to Split. Our goal was to see as much of Split as we could this afternoon. We were only staying here one night and wanted to catch an early ferry in the morning to head over to Hvar Island, so the more we time in Split this afternoon the better.
After another 1 hour drive, we arrived in Split. This Airbnb was located within the city walls which only allowed access by foot. We payed to park in a lot nearby and had to carry our luggage about 7-8 minute walk into the city to reach our Airbnb. We arrived and thanked the heavens for blessing us with another air conditioned home.
After getting settled in, we set out immediately over to the ferry landing to secure our ferry tickets to Hvar Island tomorrow, as well our ferry tickets off of the island in a couple days. Once we had our ferry tickets, we spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the city.
The Riva
The Cellars
Cathedral of Saint Domnius
Gregory of Nin Statue (Rub toe for good luck!)
Dinner at Adriatic Sushi & Oyster Bar
Split was a neat city and while easy to get turned around inside the walls, it did not take long to see everything. That night after dinner, the ladies decided to head in for bed and myself and my buddy were going to head out to the bars. We were pretty surprised to see that what was a bustling city a few hours earlier had turned into a ghost town. Apparently just about everywhere within the walls must shut down around 11PM. We found only one or two hole in the wall bars that were still open but were packed. After walking a few laps through the city and passing the same places numerous times, we decided to head back in as we couldn't find any hang out spots that interested us.
This post was edited on 9/15/17 at 1:18 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:47 pm to Mark Makers
Day 6-7: Hvar Island
We arrived in line for the ferry from Split to Stari Grad on Hvar Island fairly early. Our next Airbnb on the Island has a small private beach, and we had really been looking forward to some R&R after a busy first half of our trip. We arrived in line for the ferry an hour early as instructed and were close to the beginning of the line, so we had no issues getting our car on the ferry time that we had hoped. Once boarded, we had a 2 hour ferry ride over to Stari Grad. (I pulled this ferry picture off of the internet, for some reason I had not taken any pictures of it. It was the largest car ferry I had ever been on)
.jpg)
Once we arrived in Stari Grad, we had another 20 minute ride over to our Airbnb called Villa Hraste. A link to this Airbnb is here.
This place blew us away, and the pictures on the Airbnb website did not do it justice. We knew the views and the beach were going to be awesome, but the pictures of the inside of this place didn’t look the most appealing. It was much better seeing it in person.
As planned, we spent the afternoon at our beach drinking beers and relaxing. The beach was shared with a few neighboring homes/apartments, but wasn’t bad at all getting lounge chairs and enjoying the water. We had read online that Croatia had sea urchins, so we had all invested in good water shoes before this trip. I am sure glad we did, the sea urchins were EVERYWHERE in this cove. A lady from one of the villas next door ended up stepping on one, and it sounded painful from the cries.
As the sun went down, we got cleaned up and decided to go out into the city tonight for a nice dinner, as well as check out Croatia night life for the first time on the trip. We had read that Hvar was the party island.
We chose a place for dinner called San Marco, which was Italian cuisine (surprise surprise). This was one of our most expensive meals of the trip, but was a great choice and we had a great view of the harbor from the terrace where we ate.
I finally came across another IPA since the craft beer festival in Zadar, and gave it a try. This one is made over in England.
Lobster
T-Bone
Tuna & Asparagus
Calamari
After dinner, we went over to a bar called Carpe Diem which was also right on the Harbor. We hung out for drinks here waiting on the Pink Champagne night club to open at 2AM. Then we proceeded over to the night club for a couple hours before catching a taxi back to the villa. I wish I would have thought to take pictures at the bar/club, I may be able to pull some from the GoPro and add later.
We slept in pretty late the next morning after having a long night out, and decided to have the staff at our villa cook breakfast for us (as this was offered when we checked in). Again, slacked on taking pictures here. But they served us a ton of food including fresh bread, French toast, cheese, prosciutto, omelets, pancakes. The highlight of this meal was when my buddy ordered a bottle of water. Apparently, someone who worked there had filled a empty water bottle with vodka for some unknown reason. Our server happened to grab that bottle on accident not knowing. My buddy took a big ol swig of straight vodka on a morning after being out and drinking until 4AM, needless to say his stomach didn’t take it well and we got a great laugh out of it. Thankfully for their sake we are laid back and didn’t make a big deal of it, could have been a lot worse if it was served to a child LOL.
Once again, we spent our entire day hanging out at the house, relaxing at the beach, snorkeling, kayaking, etc.
After, we got cleaned up again and made a trip up to Fortica, a fortress on the mountain overlooking the city where we enjoyed another breathtaking sunset.
We then headed into town for a quick, casual dinner at Posteni…ANOTHER Italian restaurant. Thankfully I love Italian food and pizza, so it never got old.
Then it was back to the villa for sleep, as tomorrow will be our longest day of driving and we needed to catch an early ferry to fit everything in.
We arrived in line for the ferry from Split to Stari Grad on Hvar Island fairly early. Our next Airbnb on the Island has a small private beach, and we had really been looking forward to some R&R after a busy first half of our trip. We arrived in line for the ferry an hour early as instructed and were close to the beginning of the line, so we had no issues getting our car on the ferry time that we had hoped. Once boarded, we had a 2 hour ferry ride over to Stari Grad. (I pulled this ferry picture off of the internet, for some reason I had not taken any pictures of it. It was the largest car ferry I had ever been on)
Once we arrived in Stari Grad, we had another 20 minute ride over to our Airbnb called Villa Hraste. A link to this Airbnb is here.
This place blew us away, and the pictures on the Airbnb website did not do it justice. We knew the views and the beach were going to be awesome, but the pictures of the inside of this place didn’t look the most appealing. It was much better seeing it in person.
As planned, we spent the afternoon at our beach drinking beers and relaxing. The beach was shared with a few neighboring homes/apartments, but wasn’t bad at all getting lounge chairs and enjoying the water. We had read online that Croatia had sea urchins, so we had all invested in good water shoes before this trip. I am sure glad we did, the sea urchins were EVERYWHERE in this cove. A lady from one of the villas next door ended up stepping on one, and it sounded painful from the cries.
As the sun went down, we got cleaned up and decided to go out into the city tonight for a nice dinner, as well as check out Croatia night life for the first time on the trip. We had read that Hvar was the party island.
We chose a place for dinner called San Marco, which was Italian cuisine (surprise surprise). This was one of our most expensive meals of the trip, but was a great choice and we had a great view of the harbor from the terrace where we ate.
I finally came across another IPA since the craft beer festival in Zadar, and gave it a try. This one is made over in England.
Lobster
T-Bone
Tuna & Asparagus
Calamari
After dinner, we went over to a bar called Carpe Diem which was also right on the Harbor. We hung out for drinks here waiting on the Pink Champagne night club to open at 2AM. Then we proceeded over to the night club for a couple hours before catching a taxi back to the villa. I wish I would have thought to take pictures at the bar/club, I may be able to pull some from the GoPro and add later.
We slept in pretty late the next morning after having a long night out, and decided to have the staff at our villa cook breakfast for us (as this was offered when we checked in). Again, slacked on taking pictures here. But they served us a ton of food including fresh bread, French toast, cheese, prosciutto, omelets, pancakes. The highlight of this meal was when my buddy ordered a bottle of water. Apparently, someone who worked there had filled a empty water bottle with vodka for some unknown reason. Our server happened to grab that bottle on accident not knowing. My buddy took a big ol swig of straight vodka on a morning after being out and drinking until 4AM, needless to say his stomach didn’t take it well and we got a great laugh out of it. Thankfully for their sake we are laid back and didn’t make a big deal of it, could have been a lot worse if it was served to a child LOL.
Once again, we spent our entire day hanging out at the house, relaxing at the beach, snorkeling, kayaking, etc.
After, we got cleaned up again and made a trip up to Fortica, a fortress on the mountain overlooking the city where we enjoyed another breathtaking sunset.
We then headed into town for a quick, casual dinner at Posteni…ANOTHER Italian restaurant. Thankfully I love Italian food and pizza, so it never got old.
Then it was back to the villa for sleep, as tomorrow will be our longest day of driving and we needed to catch an early ferry to fit everything in.
This post was edited on 9/19/17 at 9:21 am
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:48 pm to Mark Makers
Day 8: Mostar & Dubrovnik
We got an early start again this morning as this day was going to consist of the most driving. We expected about 6 hours of driving along with a ferry ride and three border crossings.
We departed our place in Hvar, with an hour drive across the island of Hvar to the Sucuraj > Drvenik ferry. We severely under estimated how busy this ferry was going to be. When we pulled up, we were so far back in line that we couldn’t even see the boat. I had to get out and walk up to the front just to make sure we were in the right place. As I walked to the front of the line, I counted the number of vehicles in front of us. The next ferry was loaded, and we still weren’t even close. I counted the cars for a second time to see how many had made it on the ferry ahead of us. I wasn’t sure if we would even make it onto the next one, it was going to be close. After waiting for the next boat, it was time to load again, and we just BARELY made the cut. This ferry ride was much shorter than the last, it may have only taken 30 minutes to get across once we had loaded.
After departing the ferry, we had another 1 Hr 30 Min drive over to Mostar, Bosnia. We had heard rumors that the border crossing could be time consuming, but thankfully it was short and sweet. We finally arrived and began exploring.
My first instinct of this place was that it must be a poorer country. They had a few people begging for money in the main market area which we had not really seen in Croatia up to this point. There was a lady with two young daughters who even kissed our arms and then reached out for money. The prices seemed to be a good bit cheaper here than Croatia, which was surprising as I already considered Croatia to be lower priced. Lastly, there is a dominant Muslim presence in Bosnia which surprised me as Croatia was prominently Catholic and only a stone’s throw away.
First order of business was to get some lunch. We settled on a place called Sadrvan. I ended up with a mixed meet platter which included a native Balkan dish called Cevapi which was good, I really enjoyed my food at this place.
We continued to explore afterwards, first checking out the Stari Most bridge which is probably what the city is most well known for. It is common for people to jump from this bridge into the river below, and we had just missed someone jumping as we were walking up. We also visited the Bridge Museum.
We stumbled upon the Kriva Cuprija (Crooked Bridge) which was basically a smaller version of the Stari Most.
We then made our way over to the Koski Mehmed mosque. The girls paid for entrance into the lower Mosque only, while me and my buddy paid the additional fee to climb up to the top of the tower for some photo ops. By this time, we have climbed up numerous church towers with steep spiraling stairs throughout Croatia. But, this one was INTENSE. The staircase was literally only wide enough for one person surrounded by concrete walls. It was straight up to the top with no places to allow others to pass, anyone who is claustrophobic should definitely avoid this. If you met an oncoming person in the stairway, one of you was having to turn around and head back where you came from to allow the others to pass. It was just as tight of a balcony once you got to the top, but the views and pictures were worth the struggle.
After joining back up with the girls at the bottom, we spend the next few hours walking the city. It really didn’t take us long to see what we wanted to see.
On our walk back to the car, our Mostar trip was completed with getting to watch one of the locals dive from the bridge.
Then it was off to a 2 HR 50 Min drive to Dubrovnik. Our GPS ended up routing us a way that required us to cross the border multiple times between Mostar and Dubrovnik, but there may have been a better route. We were glad that we took the time to visit another country and experience a small piece of Bosnia, but we could not wait to get back into Croatia.
MOSTAR TIPS:
- The main tourist area of Mostar accepts Croatian Kuna currency. This was a welcome site as we did not have to worry about another currency just for one stop.
- Fuel is much cheaper in Bosnia than Croatia. Do yourself a favor and try to time your fuel stop in Bosnia and save some $$$.
We got an early start again this morning as this day was going to consist of the most driving. We expected about 6 hours of driving along with a ferry ride and three border crossings.
We departed our place in Hvar, with an hour drive across the island of Hvar to the Sucuraj > Drvenik ferry. We severely under estimated how busy this ferry was going to be. When we pulled up, we were so far back in line that we couldn’t even see the boat. I had to get out and walk up to the front just to make sure we were in the right place. As I walked to the front of the line, I counted the number of vehicles in front of us. The next ferry was loaded, and we still weren’t even close. I counted the cars for a second time to see how many had made it on the ferry ahead of us. I wasn’t sure if we would even make it onto the next one, it was going to be close. After waiting for the next boat, it was time to load again, and we just BARELY made the cut. This ferry ride was much shorter than the last, it may have only taken 30 minutes to get across once we had loaded.
After departing the ferry, we had another 1 Hr 30 Min drive over to Mostar, Bosnia. We had heard rumors that the border crossing could be time consuming, but thankfully it was short and sweet. We finally arrived and began exploring.
My first instinct of this place was that it must be a poorer country. They had a few people begging for money in the main market area which we had not really seen in Croatia up to this point. There was a lady with two young daughters who even kissed our arms and then reached out for money. The prices seemed to be a good bit cheaper here than Croatia, which was surprising as I already considered Croatia to be lower priced. Lastly, there is a dominant Muslim presence in Bosnia which surprised me as Croatia was prominently Catholic and only a stone’s throw away.
First order of business was to get some lunch. We settled on a place called Sadrvan. I ended up with a mixed meet platter which included a native Balkan dish called Cevapi which was good, I really enjoyed my food at this place.
We continued to explore afterwards, first checking out the Stari Most bridge which is probably what the city is most well known for. It is common for people to jump from this bridge into the river below, and we had just missed someone jumping as we were walking up. We also visited the Bridge Museum.
We stumbled upon the Kriva Cuprija (Crooked Bridge) which was basically a smaller version of the Stari Most.
We then made our way over to the Koski Mehmed mosque. The girls paid for entrance into the lower Mosque only, while me and my buddy paid the additional fee to climb up to the top of the tower for some photo ops. By this time, we have climbed up numerous church towers with steep spiraling stairs throughout Croatia. But, this one was INTENSE. The staircase was literally only wide enough for one person surrounded by concrete walls. It was straight up to the top with no places to allow others to pass, anyone who is claustrophobic should definitely avoid this. If you met an oncoming person in the stairway, one of you was having to turn around and head back where you came from to allow the others to pass. It was just as tight of a balcony once you got to the top, but the views and pictures were worth the struggle.
After joining back up with the girls at the bottom, we spend the next few hours walking the city. It really didn’t take us long to see what we wanted to see.
On our walk back to the car, our Mostar trip was completed with getting to watch one of the locals dive from the bridge.
Then it was off to a 2 HR 50 Min drive to Dubrovnik. Our GPS ended up routing us a way that required us to cross the border multiple times between Mostar and Dubrovnik, but there may have been a better route. We were glad that we took the time to visit another country and experience a small piece of Bosnia, but we could not wait to get back into Croatia.
MOSTAR TIPS:
- The main tourist area of Mostar accepts Croatian Kuna currency. This was a welcome site as we did not have to worry about another currency just for one stop.
- Fuel is much cheaper in Bosnia than Croatia. Do yourself a favor and try to time your fuel stop in Bosnia and save some $$$.
This post was edited on 10/10/17 at 5:19 pm
Posted on 9/4/17 at 6:50 pm to Mark Makers
(4 years later I am realizing I never finished sharing the last stop on our trip, so my memory of the details here won't be as thorough)
Day 9-10: Dubrovnik
Link to the AirBnb We Stayed In
View from the Airbnb:
Our first day in Dubrovnik was spent exploring the Old Town area.
Pile Gate:
Onofrio's Fountain:
Dubrovnik Cathedral:
Luza Square:
We visited Fort Lovrijenac, great views of Old Town from this fort some good photo ops here.
Lunch at Dubravka, there is no shortage of good pizza in this country:
Dubrovnik is where most of King's Landing was filmed for the Game of Thrones series, so we also had a Game of Thrones tour booked later that day. Lots of history of the city included on this tour as well, really enjoyed it.
Then back to the Airbnb for a beautiful sunset view:
Day 2 we got out of Old Town a bit and drove up Mount Srd. Amazing views of Old Town from up there!! Unfortunately it was pretty hazy/foggy the day we went, so made it tough to get good photos.
Then we visited Fort Imperial and the Homeland War Museum. This museum was great, documenting the Croatian War of Independence which was actually not so long ago, in the 1990's. We noticed many signs of leftover war damage still existed when driving through the country so it was a good stop to get more educated on this.
Overall, Dubrovnik is just one of those places that you have to go atleast once if you are visiting Croatia for the first time. However, it was probably one of my least favorite stops, primarily due to everything being so touristy. It was very crowded and much more expensive than the rest of the country. Old Town is pretty much loaded with souvenir shops. WHEN I go back and visit this amazing country again, I will not be putting Dubrovnik on the itinerary.
Day 9-10: Dubrovnik
Link to the AirBnb We Stayed In
View from the Airbnb:
Our first day in Dubrovnik was spent exploring the Old Town area.
Pile Gate:
Onofrio's Fountain:
Dubrovnik Cathedral:
Luza Square:
We visited Fort Lovrijenac, great views of Old Town from this fort some good photo ops here.
Lunch at Dubravka, there is no shortage of good pizza in this country:
Dubrovnik is where most of King's Landing was filmed for the Game of Thrones series, so we also had a Game of Thrones tour booked later that day. Lots of history of the city included on this tour as well, really enjoyed it.
Then back to the Airbnb for a beautiful sunset view:
Day 2 we got out of Old Town a bit and drove up Mount Srd. Amazing views of Old Town from up there!! Unfortunately it was pretty hazy/foggy the day we went, so made it tough to get good photos.
Then we visited Fort Imperial and the Homeland War Museum. This museum was great, documenting the Croatian War of Independence which was actually not so long ago, in the 1990's. We noticed many signs of leftover war damage still existed when driving through the country so it was a good stop to get more educated on this.
Overall, Dubrovnik is just one of those places that you have to go atleast once if you are visiting Croatia for the first time. However, it was probably one of my least favorite stops, primarily due to everything being so touristy. It was very crowded and much more expensive than the rest of the country. Old Town is pretty much loaded with souvenir shops. WHEN I go back and visit this amazing country again, I will not be putting Dubrovnik on the itinerary.
This post was edited on 6/24/21 at 8:50 am
Posted on 9/4/17 at 7:58 pm to Mark Makers
Glad to hear you also had a good experience with Condor. Looking forward to the rest of the trip! 
Posted on 9/5/17 at 9:33 am to Mark Makers
Posted on 9/5/17 at 9:49 am to Mark Makers
Very nice! Looking forward to the rest of this review.
Posted on 9/5/17 at 1:36 pm to Mark Makers
Updated with Day 1-2 Zagreb/Slunj. Hopefully this isn't too picture heavy, seems to be loading pretty slow. I may need to reduce the file sizes more. This is my first trip review on here so cut me some slack 
Posted on 9/5/17 at 2:14 pm to Mark Makers
Looking forward to seeing the rest. The wife and I are wanting to go at some point, but it will probably be a couple of years before we get a chance.
Posted on 9/7/17 at 9:38 pm to Bear-O-Dactyl
Updated with Day 3, Plitvice Lakes and Zadar.
So much I want to say but I keep reaching the character limit and have to delete half of what I typed
So much I want to say but I keep reaching the character limit and have to delete half of what I typed
Posted on 9/7/17 at 9:51 pm to Mark Makers
AWESOME review!!! That is probably the part of the world that I target for my next non beach trip, I will keep this bookmarked!
Posted on 9/7/17 at 10:14 pm to DoUrden
The good news is there is beaches, I just haven't gotten to that part yet on the review lol. It was a nice mixture of a mountains, scenery, beaches, cities, culture, history...just a little bit of everything there. I really fell in love with the place and have been having withdrawals ever since we got home
Posted on 9/13/17 at 5:55 pm to Mark Makers
Day 4 has been added.
Posted on 9/13/17 at 10:06 pm to Mark Makers
Look forward to your review of Bosnia. Enjoyed my time there more than Croatia. Both incredible places to visit but definitely different offerings.
Posted on 9/14/17 at 5:05 am to Tigerbait46
quote:
Look forward to your review of Bosnia. Enjoyed my time there more than Croatia. Both incredible places to visit but definitely different offerings.
I was surprised at how different the cultures were after crossing the border. Although we only visited Mostar for a small part of the day, all 4 of us enjoyed Croatia more than Bosnia. I'm still glad we made the visit though.
Page 1 of 2
Popular
Back to top
Follow TigerDroppings for LSU Football News