The old town takes an afternoon. The water takes the rest.
Which Blue Cave boat leaves early enough to get inside. What the Elaphiti lunch cruise really includes. Whether Krka or Plitvice is the better single day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Croatia.
Dubrovnik’s walls, an island lunch, and the two lake days.
The four bookings a first Croatian trip is built around. What each one costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The first afternoonEpic Game of Thrones Tour + Lokrum & Saver OptionDubrovnik from the ramparts and the filming lanes below them. Go late, when the cruise ships have cast off and the stone has cooled.
02The island dayFull-Day Dubrovnik Elaphite Islands Cruise with Lunch and DrinksA wooden boat out to the Elaphiti islands with lunch aboard. Three car-free islands, and the swim stops are the point.
03The waterfall dayKrka Waterfalls Trip with Boat Cruise and SwimmingKrka from Split, with the park boat and a swim in the Adriatic on the way back. The busiest single booking in the country.
04The lakes dayPlitvice Lakes Guided Day Tour with TicketsPlitvice out of Zadar, tickets already in hand. The timed entry is the whole reason to book this one ahead.
Blue Cave, island lunch, or a speedboat that hits five islands.
Almost every Croatian holiday turns on one question: which boat. Three kinds of day out of Split and Dubrovnik, what it costs to get aboard each one, and who each suits.
Six bases, and the best day out from each one.
A walled city at the bottom of the map, a Roman palace people still live inside, a Venetian peninsula in the north, an amphitheatre with nothing built over it, and the lavender island everyone leaves last. Pick the base, then pick the boat.
The days out more travellers book than anything else in Croatia.
The whole Croatian catalogue →Eight bookings carry more travellers than the rest of the country combined, and seven of them touch water.
1
Krka Waterfalls Trip with Boat Cruise and Swimming
Spend nine hours exploring Krka National Park and Primošten from Split. Ride by air-conditioned bus, cruise from Skradin to Skradinski Buk, follow a guided park walk, then choose between swimming, lunch, wine tasting, or cobbled lanes. Guides such as Ante, Gianna, Leo, and Leon are known for clear timing, local tips, and good humor.
From · $31
Read our review →
2
Blue Cave Small-Group Boat Tour from Dubrovnik
from $84
3
Krka Waterfalls, Food & Wine Tasting Tour
from $45
4
Full-Day Dubrovnik Elaphite Islands Cruise with Lunch and Drinks
from $78
5
Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour
from $111
6
Split/Trogir: Blue Cave, Mamma Mia, Hvar and 5 Island Tour
from $109
7
Epic Game of Thrones Tour + Lokrum & Saver Option
from $25
8
Elaphiti Islands Full-Day Cruise with Lunch
from $78
Dubrovnik and Split are walked, not driven.
Every guided walk on this coast →
Both old towns are closed to cars and small enough to cross in twenty minutes, which is why a guide is worth more here than the map is. These three carry more walkers than anything else on the coast.
- 1Old Town Walking Tourfrom $23
- 2Dubrovnik Discovery Old Town Walking Tourfrom $24
- 3Walking Tour of Split and Diocletian’s Palacefrom $48
The walls, early or late
The full circuit is two kilometres of steps with no shade on it. The morning opening and the last hour before closing are the only two times it is bearable in July.
King’s Landing, street by street
The Jesuit Stairs, the Pile harbour and the Lokrum throne room, with the scenes lined up against the stone. Most of it is free to walk; the guide is what turns it into a story.
Arenas and palaces still in use
Pula’s amphitheatre still has its outer wall standing, and Diocletian’s palace in Split has shops and flats built into the colonnades. Neither is a ruin behind a rope.
Plitvice and Krka are two very different days.
Plitvice is sixteen lakes stacked down a limestone valley, walked on boardwalks, three hours from anywhere on the coast. Krka is nearer, smaller and ends at a waterfall you can still stand in front of. If you only have one spare day, distance decides it.
Croatian days out, sorted by what they cost.
Every tour on the site, grouped by price. A good number of the best Croatian days come in under the cost of a Hvar dinner.
Old-town walks, arena and palace tickets, the short harbour cruises and the panoramic boat hops.
The full-day standards: Blue Cave runs, Elaphiti lunch cruises, Krka and Plitvice with entry included.
Private skippers, chartered island days and the Mostar runs that cross a border and come back.
Three days out that only happen in Croatia.
Limestone coasts and boat trips exist all round the Mediterranean. A cave that turns silver at eleven, a walled city that doubled for a fictional capital, and a waterfall you can swim under in another country do not.
The Blue Cave
Sunlight enters the cave at Biševo through a second opening below the waterline, bounces off the white floor and turns the whole chamber silver-blue. It works for roughly two hours either side of eleven, entry is capped and timed, and a metre of swell closes it outright. Boats leave from Split, Trogir and Hvar, and the early ones are early for a reason.
- 1Blue Cave Small-Group Boat Tour from Dubrovnik★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 9,360 reviews
- 2Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 7,150 reviews
- 3Split/Trogir: Blue Cave, Mamma Mia, Hvar and 5 Island Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 6,320 reviews
King’s Landing
The Jesuit Stairs, the Pile Gate harbour, the Lovrijenac fort and the gardens on Lokrum did eight seasons of work as somebody else’s capital city. The lanes are still lanes and people still live in them, so the tours run early or late and stay off the laundry lines. Lokrum needs its own ferry and half a morning.
- 1Epic Game of Thrones Tour + Lokrum & Saver Option★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 5,995 reviews
- 2The Original Game of Thrones Tour & Lokrum Option★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 5,064 reviews
- 3Dubrovnik Game of Thrones Tour & Optional Lokrum Island Visit★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 4,702 reviews
Mostar and Kravice
Two hours inland from Dubrovnik the coast stops and Bosnia begins: an Ottoman bridge rebuilt stone by stone after 1993, a bazaar of coppersmiths, and a curtain of waterfalls at Kravice you can swim under in summer. Bring a passport, expect two border queues, and take the semi-private run if the coach timings look tight.
- 1Mostar and Kravice Waterfalls Tour from Dubrovnik (Semi-Private)★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 3,125 reviews
- 2Kravice Waterfalls, Mostar and Pocitelj Day Tour from Dubrovnik★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,244 reviews
- 3Mostar and Herzegovina Tour with Kravica Waterfall from Split & Trogir★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,217 reviews
Four Croatian bookings that will not wait.
Most of this coast can be sorted over breakfast the day before. These four run on entry caps, cave light and river levels, none of which care what time your flight lands.
- 01Plitvice Lakes Guided Day Tour with TicketsEntry is capped and sold by time slot through the summer. The morning slots go first, and a coach without tickets is a coach that waits.
- 02Blue Cave Small-Group Boat Tour from DubrovnikThe cave is entered in small boats under a timed permit, and the light only works around midday. Swell closes it with no notice.
- 03City Walls Early Morning or Sunset Walking TourThe rampart circuit shuts before dark and the ticket desk queues the moment a cruise ship berths. Early or late, and never in the middle.
- 04Cetina River: Rafting and Cliff Jumping TourRafting on the Cetina runs to the river level, roughly April to October. Outside that window the trip simply does not go.
The day the boats stay tied up, and what to do instead.
The bura drops off the mountains without much warning and cancels sailings out of Split, Zadar and Hvar at a few hours’ notice. Inland is the answer. The lakes and the river canyons are at their best in flat grey light, the Istrian woods do not care about wind at all, and a cellar is a cellar in any weather.
Truffle woods, island cellars, and lunch cooked under a bell.
Croatian cooking splits at the mountains. Istria hunts truffles and presses olive oil; the islands grow Plavac Mali on terraces nobody could farm today. Both end at the same long table.
By kind of day — boat, stone, water or table
Dubrovnik, Hvar, Split, Krka, Zadar, Plitvice: the run most first trips end up doing.
The reviews that landed most recently.
The rest of the new ones →
Discover The Old Town Split 1.5h walking Small group tour
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Private Wine Tour from Zagreb: Two Local Wineries & Samobor
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Painting party at Art Bottega – Paint & Wine Studio in Zagreb
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Zrmanja River Kayaking, with optional transfer from Zadar
Read our review →
Zadar Walking Tour sponsored by Gligora Cheese and deli.
Read our review →
Istrian tapestry – gourmet tour combining wine, truffles and olive oil
Read our review →
Truffle and wine / Taste of Istria from POREC, ROVINJ, PULA
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