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Croatian mini trip report in 800 word or less
Where? Croatia? Just where is that again? That was the response we would get when talking about our planned trip to Croatia in fall of 2008. Most don’t know much about the war that ensued in the early 90's, a war of independence from the old Yugoslavia. The war is long over, the country is rebuilding, tourism is back, and Croatia is a safe place to visit. Being monolingual we were pleased to discover English is freely spoken everywhere in Croatia. We were also happy to discover how welcomed Americans were in Croatia
The big draw to Croatia is the coastal towns and islands. The capitol is inland and considered a bit off the beaten path. It does offer a wonderful old town though and that is where we decided to make our first stop. We are very happy we decided to visit Zagreb. It has a wonderful old town, interesting markets, good public transportation, is friendly, safe and quite affordable. Lodging in the downtown area would be the exception to affordability. For that reason we chose to stay in the outskirts. This did prove to be ideal for day-trips out of town, while convenient to old town via public transportation. There we had a parking space we didn’t need to worry about. We would recommend Madi, a wonderful place at the end of the bus line, owner occupied; modern, clean, and complete with a terrace, kitchen access and reasonable pricing. For a good time head to Upper Town and seek out the Ro-Do Bar (near St. Catherine Church) and hash over politics with owner Dominic. Maybe he’ll even offer you some Medovca! Tip: If driving in Zagreb a GPS is quite useful. We found the Zagreb streets to be poorly marked, if marked at all. Our GPS guided us to our accommodation without a hitch, a true stress reducer on your trip into town. After 4 days in the big city we were ready for a bit of tranquility, so on to Plitvice. You may as well leave your camera in the case when you visit Plitvice National Park as pictures cannot adequately capture its natural beauty. We did take a ton of pictures but none really show how crystal clear the emerald-green lakes are or how tranquil the waterfalls that connect them are. Hum, can something be both crystal clear and emerald-green? You get the idea. The trails are well groomed and offer a variety of walking lengths. There is an electric boat that traverses the largest lake as well as buses that go from various points. We enjoyed our two-day stay with the Krizmanic family located only a five-minute walk to the main Plitvice Park entrance. The Krizmanic guesthouse provided clean, nice rooms with friendly service. And now…On to the coast! We chose to stay in Trogir versus Split and in the end felt this decision was right for us. We did a day trip to Split and although it is larger and a major departure point for island excursions, we just prefer the smaller and more compact towns. Trogir was clean, fun, and had its fair share of nice attractions. One of our outings was a day trip to Omis where we did a raft trip down the Cetina River with guys from www.raft.hr. This was a blast and highly recommended for any age and skill level. We stayed at Apartments KASALO while in Trogir. The apartment was wonderful, and offered a stunning view of the harbor from the walkout terrace. This is another owner-occupied accommodation we were well pleased with and recommend. Since our Croatian adventure was quite varied, it is hard to rate one place better than another, but we absolutely loved Dubrovnik! We did all the tourist things; walked the wall, visited the Buza Bar, attended a concert, went to a folk dance and did some island excursions. We spent many hours contemplating life while sipping wine and enjoying views overlooking the city and coastline on our terrace. We stayed at Simply Angelic Apartments (another GPS direct hit). Immaculately clean and with all the conveniences, including a terrace (did I mention we are terrace/balcony people), we definitely recommend it. Beware that you need legs for this place, many steps down and many steps back up. This trip offered something for everyone. See our detailed trip report on Fodor’s http://www.fodors.com/forums/threadselect.jsp?fid=2 Feel free to email us with any questions that you may have. We highly recommend Croatia and all of the places that we stayed at. |
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Thanks Jed, obviously we are url-challenged....
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lovely to read your report
we never did find the buza bar but we did like trogir and it was thanks to this forum that we chose to stay there instead of split lots of people are anti- split but we were glad to see it- one of those last minute decisions because we were sailing and couldve spent the last night elsewhere- im a good armtwister! we like plitvice lakes - a good place to visit but i dont know that id spend more than a day there you can see a lot in half a day dont know about zagreb glad we didnt spend a night there - its very hometown- quite an unsophisticated capital in our opinion but we had a pleasant enough time there between flights- had about five hours |
A great summary. I've been following your detailed trip report closely and still get goosebumps thinking about Croatia! :)
When we tell people we bought a house there most ask, "Why Croatia?" Of course they have never been there otherwise they would buying there, too! :)) |
travel2live2-still jealous....
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