Croatia has been on my bucket list ever since I first arrived in Germany. My first attempt to visit this beautiful country fell through and when I actually made the trip it was on short notice and a very short time frame. What was planned for a two-week adventure ended up being a four-day trip. I spent the first day driving through Austria and Slovenia leading down to the coast line of Croatia. It took a little bit longer than anticipated with a short stop at a National Park in Slovenia. The Coast line in Zadar was absolutely stunning! I ended up making an unexpected side trip onto a small island by mistake and it was so beautiful! If I would have had more time, more exploration would have occurred.
Once I made it over the mountains, I was troubled to run into road construction which blocked the way I knew to arrive at the park. I ended up almost running out of gas and finally managed to trudge into the Korana Campground before dark.
My first day in the Plitvice National Park was met with discouragement… the praised lower section of the park with the largest waterfall, the Veliki Slap, was flooded out and blocked to all public. However, I made it there by 0730 before all the other tourists and was able to get a head start exploring the rest of the park.
The park is made up of 16 different lakes. The main and largest lake in the park is Kozjak. When you pay for admission to the park, you are given a free boat trip across it. There is also a trail which circles around the lake connecting to the second sections of trails in the upper falls. There is also a bus system in place to allow passage through the park from the main gate across the… lake to the higher section of waterfalls.
The upper falls main attraction is a zig-zag of wooden planked trails leading you right in front of rainbow reflecting waterfalls. Throughout the 18km of footbridges, wooden benches and placed delightfully along the path which are perfect for gazing into the crystal clear water or even simply people watching.
A few longer trails weave around to go above the falls, offering spectacular views and scenery. When I made it to the upper section, I chose to take the long hiking trail that goes up and around most of the falls and the lakes instead of heading to the main waterfall attraction. I made the better choice. The views were absolutely amazing and worth the effort put into the hike. I just happened to be following this group of 8 people who just so happened to be at the same picture spot when I made it there. I lost count of how many group photos I took of them. Only one of them spoke a little broken English. They ended up offering to take a picture of me and kept giving me cookies along the way.! By the end of the day we would laugh and waved as we crossed paths and then of course the group picture.
I also happened to meet a professional bird photographer there. He was laughing when he saw me waiting for a picture with my tripod among the crowd. He is from California and is retired Army so, we had a lot to chat about. He made a trip to Idaho last summer but it didn’t work out due to the fires. He shared some tips about locations to take pictures in the park and shared his experience about going to Iceland as well. What a neat little moment with a perfect stranger!
My second day in the park started off early as well. I was there just before 0700 and made the first ferry across. I had the main waterfall trail almost completely to myself for over an hour! I was able to shoot pictures to my heart’s content, well almost. My tripod doesn’t like my telephoto lens because it weighs too much for the set up I was using. While this was frustrating, I made do with what I had and got some good pictures. I hiked a couple trails and was out of the park by noon. I spent the afternoon relaxing at the campsite. The next day I drove the 9 hours straight back to Germany. I made it almost the whole way without any hiccups….
Some important things to remember… vignette stickers, which are for tolls, are mandatory in Austria and Slovenia for all cars. If you get caught not purchasing the sticker/toll you can be fine over 120 euros on the spot by the local police. I know this first hand because I didn’t know a vignette was required in Slovenia and I was stopped crossing the border into Austria and fined 120 euro’s. It’s worth the few dollars to purchase the vignette even if it will be a short trip into the country! Overall it was a very short, but very rewarding trip! The exchange rate for Croatia is 9 Kuna to 1 euro so it was a cheap adventure, minus the fine… I wish it could have been longer and I could have seen more of the different countries but maybe I’ll be able to go back some day!!
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