Our first stop in Croatia was to Split, the second largest city after the capital of Zagreb. A balance of old and new, you can be on the Riva, or boardwalk, full of cafes and vendors, or head one street in and be at the steps of Diocleatian’s Palace.
While the city of Split is large, the historical portion is relatively small and easy to see in a day. From there, you really want to use Split as a spring board to all of the fun day trips you can take, whether it’s to one of the islands like Hvar or Brac, or to one of their national parks.
The weather wasn’t quite warm enough for a beach day for us and we only had one full day in the city so we decided to take the hour drive to Krka National Park, the second largest waterfall park in the country. The parking at the Lozovac entrance is free but you want to get there early before all of the tour buses.
You can do a long 3-4 hour walk, or the shorter 1 hour loop that takes you right to the base of the main falls. This is also the spot where you can jump in and swim! The most swimming happens around the end of May when the water has warmed up.
From Krka, on the way back to Split, we stopped at Fort Kliss, and abandoned fortress that was used for the filming of Mereen in Game of Thrones. It is rare that you can visit anything in Europe without a million tourists but we were some of the very few there which was nice. The price is still incredibly reasonable although there are no signs or audio guides to really explain what you are seeing (maybe some day soon).
There are tons of water activities that you can plan if you would like, we just were a little bit too early for the season but head here to see some of the options!
We spent part of two evenings walking along the historical streets and the waterfront of the city which is always bustling with cafes, tourists, and street vendors. When it isn’t packed with cruise-ship groups, it is a really peaceful place to be! I think that was enough to see the highlights here though.
Where We Stayed
Luxury Rooms Lucija and Luka
There aren’t many true hotels in the city so when we booked this room on booking.com we weren’t quite sure what we were getting. The service was incredible and the location could not have been better. The host met us at the parking garage with a card to get in then walked us to our room which had a view over one of the main squares. The room was ready with a complimentary bottle of wine, water, and snacks. Even though it was in a busy square, the sound-proof windows were up to the task and amazing. The bed was greats, shower was great, and they even provided a beach bag and towels for the day trips.
Where We Ate
MoNIKa’s Wine Bar
We stumbled across this wine bar because it was small, empty, and we weren’t quite ready for dinner yet. The owner wasn’t there so we couldn’t do a true tasting, which we were told can take over an hour, but instead we made friends with the waitress and enjoyed a couple glasses of wine and some snacks. All of the wine is local and some of them are made by the owner. We really loved the waitress and just the overall vibe. The wine has a serious discount if you buy it to go, so we obviously snagged some bottles.
Fetiva
Fetiva was recommended to us by our hotel hosts and the waitress at MoNIKa’s wine bar for the best local seafood around and they were right. My shrimp that I ordered literally tasted like lobster, they were definitely the best shrimp I have ever had. If you want to get a seat, make a reservation. Everything we read told us that too yet we still squeezed into the last table they had. We watched at least 10 people get turned away while we were eating dinner though!
Apetit
Apetit was a cute spot with nice ambiance and good food. The bruschetta here was the absolute best and my smoked seafood risotto was delicious even though I couldn’t finish it. It wasn’t a mind-blowing meal but we weren’t disappointed. It is just around the corner from where we stayed which was incredibly convenient.
If you’re a Game Of Thrones fan, don’t forget to check out my post on all the top spots in Split and Dubrovnik to stand where they filmed!
Happy Travels
Xx
Kali