Plitvice Lakes National Park and Croatian Coast

Before today, we thought Watkin's Glen (New York) was the most beautiful place in the world. We were wrong. The most beautiful place in the world is actually Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia.

From Plitvice

Plitvice is a series of 16 lakes connected by a series of travertine waterfalls. (See side topic on travertine.) The park was well done too, with boardwalks over the fragile travertine getting us right up close to the action with minimal environmental impact. It all felt very wild and was very clean. The water was crystal clear and full of fish. We were a little disappointed that swimming wasn't allowed, and I'm sure anyone with a love of fishing was disappointed that wasn't allowed either, but with over a million visitors per year, keeping everyone on the boardwalks is surely what we have to thank for such a beautiful park. The other thing we have to thank for the pristine condition of the park is the recent war, during which the park saw few visitors.

Additionally, unlike so many other places we've been, it really looked like we could see our entry fee at work: there was a boat ride connecting the upper and lower sections of trail in a nice big (though slow moving) electric boats, buses connecting many points throughout the park so you could easily hike one way, and park rangers conducting tests of the water. The boardwalks were beautiful and in excellent condition, plus the routes were well chosen such that you could almost never see any other stretch of boardwalk or the tourists walking upon it, making the park seem like it had a lot fewer people in it than it really did. I don't think we saw a single piece of litter. Kudos to whoever is running this place.

Anyway, in order to beat the rush we started our hike just after opening time, 8:00 or 8:30, I think. Our hike started at the bottom of the series of lakes with a steep down hill into the gorge. On the opposite side of the gorge from the path was a tall waterfall that is not actually part of the series of lakes.

From Plitvice

Among the first things we noticed were all the many fish swimming in the brilliant water. Does this look like a healthy river or what?

From Plitvice

A bit further along was a series of caverns up the face of the gorge. There was a path, but we didn't take it since it went away from the waterfalls and we were racing the package tourists.

From Plitvice

Just beyond we came to a row boat sunk in one of the lakes. We stopped for breakfast within sight of it and in a little bit some men came and dumped the water out and set it floating on the lake.

From Plitvice

These incredible lakes and waterfalls just went on and on.

From Plitvice

And there were great blue dragonflies.

From Plitvice

Some of the lakes were very still and provided amazing reflections.

From Plitvice

Although there were many other people on the trail, often we seemed to have this magical place all to ourselves.

From Plitvice

"How did you find out about this place?" Mom and Dad wanted to know. They brought the Rick Steves guidebook, but didn't notice Plitvice with its small black and white photo.

From Plitvice

"I watched a bunch of Rick Steves PBS travel programs off NetFlix before we left," I replied. "I thought the Balkans seemed like a nice place to visit, but a week after watching the only specific place I remembered that I wanted to go was here."

From Plitvice

Josh had fun playing with his big camera.

From Plitvice

After hiking the suggested route up the 16 lakes we took the bus part way back and then walked along part of the ridge trail which provided an entirely different set of views. From here you can actually see how the lakes flow into each other.

From Plitvice

We had breakfast right along there.

From Plitvice

Would you take a look at that crowd? Sure glad we arrived early!

From Plitvice

Back at the beginning again we have the tall side waterfall in the upper right and the lowest of the waterfalls between lakes in the lower left.

From Plitvice

And here are a couple very happy travelers.

From Plitvice

After Plitvice, we moved on to the Croatian Coast. It was very pretty, although we were along a section of coast that no one goes to. We stopped at a little town and did some swimming from a pebbly beach. We also admired the fish and other sea life from the dock. This looks like a nice area for snorkeling, but we had neither the gear nor the time.

From Croatian Coast

From Croatian Coast

From Croatian Coast

We arrived at our hostel in Ljubljana (back in Slovenia) around midnight, after wandering around the pedestrian zone looking for parking. The town was still hopping, but we checked into our hostel and went right to sleep.

Ptuj, Zagreb, Slunj

In the morning we walked through the Ptuj Castle, which had room after beautiful room still full of their great furniture, heaters, tapestries, and murals on the walls. The chandelier looks like it came from Venice!

From Ptuj

From Ptuj

Upstairs there were some interesting festival masks and unimpressive paintings.

From Ptuj

Downstairs there were a bunch of musical instruments and an armory. Also a not-so-impressive statue of St. George killing a pathetically tiny dragon.

From Ptuj

There were also nice views over the town of Ptuj from the castle grounds.

From Ptuj

Next we moved on to Zagreb, the Croatian capital, where we went to the City Museum to learn a bit about the country's history. After they booted us out because the museum was closing, we walked the Rick Steves walking circuit and admired the outsides of a variety of buildings. We were able to actually go into very few, as it was Sunday. We were surprised to find a bunch of tour buses outside of the cathedral (properly called, "The Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Saintly Kings Stephen and Ladislav"). It's not a particularly famous cathedral, nor is Zagreb much of a tourist destination. We think we found the answer when we went up behind the alter and found a body wearing a bishop's hat on display, being circled by praying people. This isn't mentioned in the guidebook, I think their bishop must have just died recently and the bus loads of people were coming to pay their respects.

From Zagreb

From Zagreb

From Zagreb

Pressing onward from Zagreb, we wound our way south toward Plitvice Lakes National Park. Along the way we passed, well, many things, but notably we stopped to photograph a storks nest atop a telephone pole. In some parts of the world, these are very common, but it's quite a thing to see for us Americans. So that's where babies come from!

From Ptuj

Our final photo stop was the little town of Slunj, which we saw out the window and had to turn around and explore! The town is perched incredibly, all but unbelievably, right on the cusp of a series of waterfalls. As one would expect, the main industry of the town was originally water power and you can still see some of the waterwheels. Also as one would expect, the main industry of the town is now tourism. So how is this possible? See the side topic on travertine.

From Spunj

From Spunj

From Spunj