Hiking the National Parks of Croatia 8 Days

Your guide meets you at the Zagreb or Rijeka Airport in the afternoon. (Details of arrival times and pick-up places will be arranged during the booking process. Pick-up at Pula or Zadar Airport available upon request.) After a short introduction, you will be transferred to our beautiful hotel in the Dobra River valley right across an old Croatian castle, where you can settle into your room, meet the other members of the group and discuss the plans for the week with your guide. Relax, enjoy your welcome dinner and go for a walk or a swim in the calm river.

The UNESCO World Heritage Site and most popular National Park of Croatia is waiting for you: Plitvice Lakes. The karst stone landscape has allowed this paradise of 16 lakes, uncountable waterfalls and little caves to be created. As we walk along wooden pathways, you will marvel at all those cascades around you. Your guide will choose a fitting route for your group, which may include some hiking up the mountain, as well as a boat tour across the biggest lake. A mixed day of walking, picture taking, lunch at a park restaurant, hiking and just tumbling around in amazement. Back at the hotel, relax and prepare for more.

After breakfast, we will head up into the „Gorski Kotar“ (Highlands) of Croatia. Rich forests and mountain meadows interspersed with white rocks make for great hiking. Around us in the wilderness are hiding all three European spices of mammal predators: the bear, the wolf and the lynx (who gives this National Park its name). After 2 to 3 hours of light to moderate incline we reach the peak of „Veliki Risnjak“ at 1528m, from where you can savour views all around Northern Croatia, down to the islands of the Kvarner Bay and up to the Alps in the North, providing a clear day. Enjoy your lunch package and a drink at the mountain hut before we head back into the still and mighty forest, possibly visiting another peak along the way. Now that you are used to the elevation, let‘s head for more peaks, and let‘s stay overnight in the mountains!

Northern Velebit National Park is everything you would expect to find in the Alps: mountain peak next to mountain peak, beautiful meadows above tree level, bizarre rock formations with large rock faces around every corner. The difference to the Alps is that from the Croatian Velebit mountain range you not only see mountains but also look down onto the Adriatic Sea and its countless islands! We will drive up to our trailhead and take everything we need for an overnight stay, as well as lunch packages. This day our objective is to hike the Goljak mountain ridge up to its 1605m peak, enjoying great views to either side, and then continue on to Alan Mountain Hut for afternoon relaxation, dinner and the overnight stay.

After breakfast at the mountain hut and packing up our belongings, we head up the ridge toward more mountain peaks: Alancic, Seravski vrh, possibly Veliki Kozjak (all above 1600m) and others offer wonderful views down to the Sea on the one hand and over to the hills and forests of the interior on the over. Meanwhile, most stunning are the endlessly different features of the karst formation landscape. Nearby, mountain caves open up ways into the dark, the deepest extending almost 1400m down! These wonders we leave to cave explorers. Stopping here or there for snacks, pictures or to fill up our bottles with fresh mountain water, we make our way back to the minivan in the afternoon. Now it‘s time for us to leave the interior and take up quarters in Northern Dalmatia right by the Adriatic Sea, where you can go for a swim in crystal-clear water or lay on the beach before and after tasting Dalmatian food and wine specialities for dinner.

On this day we will discover the magnificent waterfalls of the Krka River. First, we will take a walk around the famous Skradin waterfalls, where the first European hydroelectric power plant was built and used to electrically lighten up the streets of Sibenik as the first city in the world in 1895. Then, we will take a boat tour up the river, marvelling at its stunning beauty on all sides. After a stop on the island of Visovac and a short visit of the 14th century Franciscan monastery there, we arrive at yet another set of amazing cascades that culminate in the Roski slap. Here we are even allowed to go for a swim! Besides, we will enjoy lunch at a restaurant and walk around in amazement, before boarding our boat for the trip back to the park entrance. This is probably our most relaxing day, and by this time in the week, you have earned that!

Our last full day together leads us into a mountain canyon, where many scenes of the “Winnetou” movies were shot – the Velika Paklenica. After one hour of easy uphill hiking along the gorgeous river, we arrive at Manita Cave, where we will take in the beauties of underground formations and even fauna (52 different species of invertebrates have been identified here)! The cooler cave air is a welcome break from the Croatian summer. After this stop, we hike on, up a moderate climb to the mountain hut „Dom Paklenica“, our lunch spot. From there we can decide for the easy route back or a further climb up to one of the many mountain peaks in the park. Back at the hotel we will enjoy the last evening together, share pictures and impressions and remember the many exciting moments of the week.

Time to say ‚Goodbye‘! Depending on your further travel plans, after breakfast your guide will transfer you to the Zadar Airport or some other place in the area.