Croatia and Slovenia - come give me a hand planning please!

[FizzyLaser]

Are you an expert? This is the itinerary and we have to ( boring reasons to do with flights) add on an extra day

Where would you stay longer/go to etc

TIA

https://www.trailfinders.com/tours/europe/croatia/tour-highlights-of-northern-croatia-and-slovenia

Rovinj itself is gorgeous with lots of lovely restaurants (try Puntalina for dinner on the rocks - https://puntulina.eu/) - you will need to book before you get there.

We hired bikes and cycled round the nature park on the outskirts (close to where we were staying) and around Rovinj town, we took a ferry to nearby Katerina island and swam in the beautiful sea, we went on the inflatable aqua park by Lone beach, we went to Aquapark Istralandia which was absolutely fab and we took a ferry to the Brijuni islands which were beautiful and great fun (hire a golf buggy if you can). It was a great holiday - we loved it.

Thanks v much @Verite1

I love Rovinji. It’s a really cute town to explore. I would have to say that I was really disappointed in the food. We stayed in a 4 star hotel and did lots of research into where to eat and got recommendations from the hotel
too. We did not have one memorable meal and it’s really expensive. It’s the reason I would not return to Croatia as I am such a foodie.

Oh that’s interesting. We had a totally opposite experience. We thought food was better than in Italy!

Bookmarking!

These are all worth Googling:

Ljubljana
Lake Bled
Lake Bohinj
Piran
Rovinj
Pula
Zadar
Pag Island
Split
Brac island
Korcula
Dubrovnik
Ston

This is so helpful thank you! It really is an absolute mental block trying to find a country, a location, and a hotel, all the while knowing it has to be fairly economical yet relaxing as it’s a precious week of allocated holidays.
how, how! Do people have the mindset to do this?!

We've just come back from a fantastic holiday, staying 2n in Venice, 5n in Slovenia (Bled) and 7n in Croatia (Rovinj) before flying back from Venice (orig planned to fly to and from Ljubljana but direct flights from UK were cancelled). We absolutely loved the whole trip, especially the combination of city, lakes/mountains and beach. Our favourite place was Bled and could have stayed longer there, but we really enjoyed the variety we experienced throughout the trip.

We visited Ljubljana and thought it was lovely, but it was quite small and we were all really glad we had spent 2n in Venice instead. The drive up from Venice to Bled was fantastic too, with amazing scenery.

Rovinj is a lovely town and we had a great sunset boat trip which was a fantastic way to end the holiday. We had originally booked a hotel in Porec for our 2nd week, but when we got there it was v busy and full of kids, and Porec was crowded a bit tacky in the evening (although nice when we visited in the day time) so we left the hotel and rented a villa just outside Rovinj which was much better for us.

@Notname wpuld love Rovinj tips please! We plan on a sunset dolphin watching trip and some snorkelling, anything else we mustn’t miss? We have 5 days.

Sunset dolphin and snorkeling! Can you do this in October?in Rovinj?!cor!

We did a sunset boat trip which stopped off at a couple of places for swimming, dinner of sardines and bbq pork, dolphin spotting and return to shore after sunset. It was really good fun and not a bad price at c£40 with unlimited (bad!) wine and soft drinks as well as food. The guy running the trip was lovely and everyone sang songs while he played the accordion as we returned to shore 😊

Other than that, in Rovinj we wandered round the old town, went to the (rocky) beach and snorkelled (take water shoes as the rocks are sharp!) and we also went Istralandia water park which the kids enjoyed. Would have liked to visit Pula but we ran out of time.

@Moommoo - it can be nice, but October it is Late Autumn so Rovinj will be getting cold likely. Last October it was raining a lot, September was hot still.

We are off to the Postojna caves in Slovenia next week. They are drivable from Rovinj or are on route back to Ljubljana if flying from there

Thanks both! Sounds amazing.

Try flying to Venice. It’s only 3.5 hrs drive from Slovenia and we saved 000s on flights. Also we originally planned to do Croatia but there is so much amazing stuff to see in Slovenia we ran out of time. Agree with others Piran, Lubljiana, Vintager gorge, Lale Bohinj, Bled and the caves all incredible ! Fab waterparl in Lubljana too if kids just want a relaxing day.

Trieste also possible. It’s closer than Venice and Ryanair also flys there so cheap flights to be had.

I might start my own Slovenia thread as I’m really keen to go for a holiday in the next year or so. Flying to Venice and driving is an interesting idea. Do car hire companies allow you to take cars to other countries?

Yes that's what we did, although you have to check the terms of each as some may not allow it, or some may charge extra. The drive from Venice up through the Julien Alps to Bled was brilliant. Fantastic scenery and DH loved all the hairpin bends, it was one of the highlights of the holiday for him! The contrast between Venice and Bled was great too.