MissSwissBliss

Hello,

I've been researching a holiday to Croatia, Slovenia and perhaps Montenegro using this site as well as various travel books. I live in Switzerland and will be traveling with my husband and two children next month, and would like to get some feedback on some of our destinations. My kids are "well traveled," and based on experience, I know that they would prefer climbing on rocks over visiting museums, so this itinerary lacks the usual "cultural" spots. When I look at the map, I am impressed at how close all these places appear, but when I use ViaMichelin to plot out our route, I am deceived by the amount of time it takes to get from place to place. I realize that the roads are often twisty and slow, which I am accustomed to, but I would love to hear comments from people who have traveled this route via auto either with or without children. I am concerned that I have crammed too much into a short amount of time, but to eliminate Dubrovnik and Montenegro would be a shame.

Day 1
Drive from Zurich to Lake Bled via Austria
Approximate travel time:
7.5 hours

Day 2 :
1. Walk around lake 3.5 miles (1 1/2 hours)
2. Visit Island
• Possible rowboat to island
• Ring church bell 3x for good luck
3. Castle
4. Grand Hotel Toplice for special desserts

Day 3 :
1. Vintgar Gorge
2. Radovljica Bee Museum
3. Drive from Lake Bled to Karst Region
Approximate travel time:
1.5 hours

Day 4 :
1. Skocjan Caves (2 hours) or
2. Postojna Caves (easier)
3. Predjama Castle
4. Lipica Stud Farms www.lipica.org (maybe)
5. Drive from Predjama to Plitvice Lakes
Approximate travel time:
3.5 hour

Day 5 :
1. Plitvice Lakes
2. Drive from Plitvice Lakes to Trojir
Approximate travel time:
2.5 hours

Day 6 :
1. Drive from Trogir to Dubrovnik
2. Island of Lokrum (if time)
Approximate travel time:
3.75 hours

Day 7 :
1. Island of Lokrum
2. Old Town
3. Walk the Wall

Day 8 :
Travel to Montenegro from Dubrovnik
Bay of Kotor
Approximate travel time:
1.25 hours each way


Day 9 :
Drive from Dubrovnik to Opatija or Rijeka
Approximate travel time:
7 hours

Day 10:
1. Drive to Austria
2. Hochosterwitz Castle
Approximate travel time:
3.25 hours

Day 11 :
Drive to Zurich
Approximate travel time:
7.5 hours

SusanP

I can't say whether those driving times are accurate, but any way you look at it, that's an awful lot of driving! You only have two days in the entire time with no driving. A lot of driving for not much time anywhere.

Just an observation.

MissSwissBliss

I agree...a lot of driving and not enough time in any given place. I had originally wanted to visit Dubrovnik and Montenegro, but the airfare from Zurich was close to $500 per person (the Swiss Franc and USD are almost equal these days) and so I figured we would drive there instead. Have you been to Croatia and Slovenia? And if so, would you recommend adjusting the itinerary so that we spend the entire trip north of Split?

SusanP

I'm planning to go to Dubrovnik and Split in July, so I'm in the process of researching myself. I would have given that advice no matter what country you were talking about, just because it was so much driving and so little time in each place.

croatiantravelady

MissSwissBliss:
Your itinerary is so busy with driving from place to place and your holiday will be spent just driving. You need to understand that our weather is changing and you may not have clear, warm sunny days here. The rainy season has begun.
Please note you will not drive from Trogir to Dubrovnik under 4 hours. I strongly suggest you stay in the north and spend some time in each destination rather than in your car driving.
And please do spend more time at Plitvice, it is a spectacular place to visit and hike.
Dobrodosli
Carol
An American Living in Dubrovnik

JEFF_

I agree with others about trying to cover too much--and this is coming from someone who usually does do too much.

You might spend time in Istria. Check out Piran or Rovinj. They're not Dubrovnik, but you'd at least get the seaside experience. The amphitheater in Pula is worth seeing also.

I flew from Pula to Dubrovnik on the only non-stop of the week--and it was very reasonable. I think the flights within Croatia are generally inexpensive. Most flights to Dubrovnik are from Zagreb. Maybe a possibility for a day or two?

You don't really show any cities in your itinerary--maybe intentionally. But Ljubljana is an enjoyable place to spend a day or two. I liked it a lot.

I only did the Skocjan Caves. Truly amazing. I'm sure you'll enjoy your trip wherever you go. Here are some shots of Croatia and Slovenia that may help you decide. http://www.pbase.com/jeff_b/root

MissSwissBliss

Thank you to ALL for great advice... not sure what I was thinking when I pieced together THAT itinerary... yeah, and traveling all those distances in a car with children is NOT my idea of a vacation.

I've reconsidered, and will spend the first few days at Lake Bled, where we will visit the caves, bee museum, horse farm, and Vintgar Gorge. From there, we will travel to Lake Plitvice for two nights before heading down to Opatija or Rijeka, which will serve as a home base for day trips to Pula, Rab, and Rovinj. (Is that a good home base???)

En route back to Switzerland, we'll probably take the northern roads and stop at the Hochosterwitz Castle. Can anyone recommend a pension or hotel somewhere between Hochosterwitz and Zurich? Perhaps Innsbruck?

Jeff... I purposely avoided the cities... I love architecture and art museums but my kids would rather be in nature, and since they have indulged me in the past, I am happy to appease them this time.

Thanks for the help,
MissSwissBliss

LuvToRoam

Dear MissSissBliss, you have picked a wonderful destination for the things your family likes to do. We were in Slovenia last year, wonderful country. Your Day 3 sounds perfect; we spent a day like that. Day 4-we did the Skocjan Caves, the Predjamski grad and Lipica (although not all on the same day). Try to make the performance at Lipica, the family would enjoy that. We have just returned from Croatia (another wonderful country). Plitvice is a must and one day is enough to do a pretty aggressive walk/hike. We stayed at the Krizmanic Family accommodations, which we would highly recommend if you wanted to stay at the park. Trogir was also very nice but the traffic is crazy. The ride to Dubrovnik from Trogir isn't too bad. The wall is wonderful, as is the old town. Lokrum is wonderful also; hopefully the weather will be nice enough to swim (it was a little chilly towards the end of our stay last week). We did not go to Montenegro but friends of ours did and they noted the border was a pain. They felt they spent a lot of time in the car for that trip. I would say you have too much planned. I don't see down time, food time, relaxation time or "vacation" time in your schedule, but of course that is just me. If I were to eliminate anything it would be Montenegro. We did find the roads in both Slovenia and Croatia to be quite nice. The towns and cities however have very narrow streets. Have a great trip. I’m still compiling my notes, we just returned on Monday. Shirley. Have a wonderful trip! Shirley

huddoshols

We have just returned(yesterday) from 3 weeks travelling through Slovenia and Croatia. I too did alot of research about driving times before,but once you are there the routes can take longer. You only need a few trucks or motorhomes ahead of you and you cant overtake safely. There were many maniac drivers on the roads,especially to Dubrovnik. I would spend a greater time in a few places,than trying to see more. You will be exhausted from all the driving. We realy loved Slovenia and especially Lake Bled. The Istrian Peninsula was very scenic.Dont even think about staying in Rijeka,too big,but Opartija is lovely. We used Rovinj as a base,for 4 days,in Istria and still did not see everything.Go early in the morning(8) to start Plitvice Lakes walk as later in the day the bus loads arrive. But dont cut this area out,it is beautiful.For 11 days I would cut out Dubrovnik and Montenegro.They will be there for next time! All the cruise ship passengers that arrived in Dubrovnik each morning,spent half of the day eating lunch,then said they saw Dubrovnik! It is always nice to have the extra time to see things along the way that you hadnt planned to.

Lynda_bcn

I think this was a map of a large chunk of Europe you were looking at, for those places to seem close together! When would your kids get a chance to enjoy country pursuits with your original route? However well-travelled they are, sitting in a car day after day isn't much fun and those driving times seem optimistic to me, not allowing for a break even. Your reworked route, staying at a couple of places for several days and doing day-trips sounds a lot better idea for you all to enjoy it.
I would still suggest including Ljubljana, even though you aren't keen on doing cities. It's a charming Central-European capital with amazing art nouveau buildings and a relaxed feel. I first went in 1980 (when on a package tour based in Bled) and then on a family trip with our 12 year old in 2005.
That later trip covered part of Austria, staying on Wörthersee near near Klagenfurt (we saw Hochosterwitz from the road on one of our day-trips), then over Loibl Pass down to Bled and on to Radovljica. After a night in Ljubljana we headed to the coast at Piran which is a really pretty Venetian port; then back to Italy staying overnight in Trieste which is amzingly monumental in true Austro-Hungarian style. (Trieste fitted in because we are based in Barcelona and had opted to fly to Treviso to cut out the 1200km each way driving just to get us to the areas we wanted to visit).
I would have liked to go to Plitvice which I had seen on that first trip (our second week had been in Lovran near Opatija)as it was one of the real highlights of that trip (so don't rush it!). But we'd decided then to visit Croatia with more time another year.
That family trip had started off in Südtirol and Tirol in fact (also beautiful areas). For a hotel in the general area of Innsbruck I can recommend Romantik-Hotel Post in Imst which we've stayed at twice. Family-run, in a small castle; has indoor pool overlooking the garden; great food.Imst is between Innsbruck and Landeck so would be on your route home.
First time we stayed there was for just one night en route home (previous nights in Murnau then Füssen in Bavaria; following nights on Lake Como, in Brà and in Nice). It was that hotel marathon that made us book the flight the second time! Admittedly we'd stopped to sightsee on the way but it did seem a VERY LONG WAY HOME. So, yes to explore southern Croatia and Montenegro I would suggest looking out for a bargain flight to get you there painlessly!

CordeliaCH

MissSwiss, you mentioned staying in Opatija or Rijeka as a base for Istria. Between the two I'd pick Opatija but both are at least an hour from Rovinj (my favorite place in that area) and Pula, and are even farther from Porec. Obviously, if you want to spend time on Rab, Opatija would be the better base. But if you want to go to the Brijuni Islands (seems like something kids would enjoy) or the islands off of Rovinj, I recommend Rovinj as a central place to stay on the coast in Istria.

katie970105

Hi,
Just got back from the area. My comments:
Lake Bled: beautiful, but sleepy town. Stayed at Pension Mayer which also has an excellent restaurant--both hotel and food highly recommended. Vintgar gorge was WONDERFUL and i highly recommend this as well for an active family. Going to the island is entertaining but pricey. The lake is very walkable.
We stayed in Opatija, Croatia which was lovely as well. Only a 3 hour trip from Lake Bled. Roads between were dicey but paved.
Have fun!

apaulldp

Hey MissSwiss -
Just got back from my honeymoon in Croatia, so had a few notes. Your second itinerary seems much more manageable (we didn't get to Dubrovnic either, it was just too far down). As far as the Opatija/Rijeka question: Opatija was way... um, tackier than I thought. I can't see it being much fun for kids, as it's a bit Atlantic City-ish. We didn't spend a lot of time in Rijeka, but it's a GREAT base to take ferries. Rab Island was great, there's lots of bike trails and I'd definitely recommend that for you and your family. I think your kids would really love it.

Midnightsun

Miss Swiss: We got back from Slovenia this summer, so I can give you a few tips. If you stay at the Grand Hotel Toplice (200 euros per night for waterfront view, which is getting cheaper as the euro drops), you will get an hour of boat rental per day with your room. Stay there two days, and you can row to the island and back in the two hours you have a boat rental. The beekeeping museum in Radovljica looked like a fun idea to us as well. However, we arrived in town about 11:30 A.M., wandered around a bit, and then found that the beekeeping museum was closed from Noon to 2:00....so plan your visit accordingly. There's a fair bit of restoration going on in Radovljica, so there should be more to do in the old town each year.

Driving through the Julian Alps in a great circle from Lake Bled (or starting at Ljubljana...also worth a day or three) is a fun way to spend a day, although you could easily stretch it to two days. The mountains are lovely, and there are many places along the Soca River where you can picnic, kayak, or just dip your feet in the shallows. This is also an area with a great deal of history where there was much fighting in WWI, on the Italian Front that Hemingway describes in A Farewell To Arms. The WWI museum in Kobarid was voted Europe's best small museum some years ago, but we were running so late by the time we arrived that we missed it. As it turned out, we were so slow in driving through the mountains and admiring the scenery (even though we had a fairly early start) that we took the car train from Bohinjska Bistrica to Podbrdo, cutting off some of our travel through the mountains but enabling us to get back to Lake Bled at a reasonable hour.

Have a great trip!

MenloAve

We spent two weeks in Slovenia around this time of year last year. We had a wonderful time. We were also traveling with our 5 year old. One thing I can recommend is to always double the recommended amount of time to do anything when you have children with you. Yes, an adult can see/walk around the lake in an hour, but a child wants to walk, play, feed the ducks, look at the fish, play with sticks, etc.

I would recommend staying in a hill city Stanjel when you go to the Karst region. This is a great walled city that is an experience in and of itself. We stayed with Verna at the top of the city. [email protected] She has a few apartments at the top with great outdoor terraces for relaxing and taking in the scenery. We spent one day just exploring the city throughly with our son. Verna was completly prepared for kids with toys, high chair, etc. We also ate dinner one night at her restaurant. Very yummy. I would recommend.

We then spent a day going to the Skocjan Caves and the Predjama Castle.

I would also recommend Lake Bohinj in addition to Lake Bled. We stayed at an apartment right near Lake Bohinj and used that as our base to explore both the Lake Bohinj area and Lake Bled. We loved Lake Bohinj. We went horse back riding one afternoon, hiked up to a waterfall in the morning. Another day we took a boat to the cable car, rode that up, looked around (have the best picture of our three month trip from up here) and then walked back to our apartment. Just beautiful. There is a wonderful pizza place out in the direction of Stara Fuzina. They had a beautiful outside terrace with a view of the valley. Just a great place to hang out. Very close by is a restaurant that specializes in Slovenian food. It is good, but they also have a great kids play area that can be seen from the outside eating area. They have a wooden train, playhouse, etc.

In Bled, we went to the castle, played around the lake, rowed out to the Island, had a picnic lunch, and played with the ducks.

Another area we visited was Luce near Lorgaska Dolina. Beautiful. We stayed at Turistièna kmetija Stoglej
while there with the full board. (We didn't see any restaurants in the area so I would recommend full board - plus the food is awesome.) We spent a day hiking in the Lorgaska Dolina park up to the waterful. This was a relatively easy hike and the first for our five year old. He had a great time "marking" the trail making stone arrows on the way up. There are great drives in this area as well. Just beautiful countryside.