If you have not been to any of the national parks in Croatia, you are missing out. Holy fairytale land! We thought Island Hvar was beautiful, and it was, but the two parks we visited, Krka National Park and Plitvice National Park are so lovely in a totally different way.
In this first post I am going to share our experience at Krka National Park.
Scroll down for info on planning your own trip to Krka National Park in Croatia and the video!
Henry and I had seen photos of the famous Krka waterfalls on Instagram and knew we had to see them before leaving Croatia. We cut our month on Hvar short by a week to road trip to Zagreb, stopping along the way to get a dose of Vitamin N.
Since we visited Krka in December, there was practically no one else there. I’ve seen photos of the boardwalks so full of people that you can’t pass – not my favorite way of seeing a place. It looks beautiful in warm, sunny weather, but we thought the mist added a little mystique. We were smitten.
Visiting Krka National Park
We spent most of one day in the park, but didn’t get to see everything. We took our time wandering over the boardwalks in the Skradinski buk (Lozovac entrance) section of the park. This is where you see the waterfalls and walkways that populate Instagram and give Krka its reputation for being a waterfall park.
A visit to the waterfall parks of Croatia could be squeezed into a longer Croatia road trip, although we just visited these two parks, Zadar, and Zagreb.
We then went around the south end of the park, stopping in Skradin for food supplies, and north to Roški slap. There we walked up river to some cascades and down river to the waterfall.
Sidenote: “Slap” is Croatian for “waterfall” and every time someone said it, Henry made a slapping sound. He’d even try to trick us into saying it more often so he could make the sound. We have taken two words from Croatia; waterfalls will always be called slaps, and peanuts are forever known as kiki riki.
The Krka River flows through a karst topography, a landscape formed from the dissolution of soluble limestone. It’s a region with sinkholes, underground streams, and caverns. The water dissolves the limestone and deposits some of that material into travertine ledges and other formations. Algae and moss also help encrust the crystals of calcium carbonate and play and important role in building travertine.
The travertine ledges form the seven waterfalls in Krka: Bilušića buk, Brljan, Manojlovac slap, Rošnjak, Miljacka slap, Roški slap and Skradinski buk.
There are also 20 archaeological sites in the park, but we were focused on the natural wonders. Anders and I did hike up over 500 steps to Oziđana pećina cave above Roški slap only to find out it was closed.
Stay Near Krka National Park
There are plenty of hotels, apartments, rooms, and other accommodations near Krka National Park. We stayed just outside Krka Park in Lozovac. We used Airbnb to make our reservations, but Booking.com has a lot of rentals, too.
Our favorite site for vacation rentals is VRBO and there are a bunch in Croatia.
First-time Airbnb users can get $35 off with this link.
Getting To Krka National Park
We rented a car, but you could easily do a trip to either park on the bus. Once you are there, there are frequent busses and boats to move you around the park. Bus and boat rides are included in your park admission and many places you can’t access via a car anyway.
Caveat: In winter there are no boat rides in Krka, but the busses were still running and you can drive directly to more areas.
We drove and made Krka part of a bigger road trip around Croatia, I’m already dreaming of other must-see places in Croatia.
Entrance Fees for 2017
Note: Prices are in kuna, use a currency converter to figure out what this means to you.
Resources
Lonely Planet: Croatia Travel Guide
A Guide to the River Krka and Krka National Park
Read About Our Time in Croatia
- Ten Things to Do in Hvar, Croatia
- Krka National Park
- Plitvice Lakes National Park
- Zagreb Christmas Market
- From Montenegro to Austria via Serbia and Croatia
- Five Favorite Hikes in Europe
- Books Set in Croatia
- Traditional Croatian Foods to Try During Travels
I loved your article, it gave an enticing picture of a most beautiful place. Melynda I really do hope to visit it someday, I am always so impressed by the interesting and amazing place on our blue dot.
I hope you get to visit, too!
What a great capture of an amazing place! I like Anders’ comment after taking about dinosaurs trying to eat them – “but we still got an eye on the landscape” – love it!
Thanks for sharing your year away with us!
Yes, that sums him up pretty well. He knows what I want, he knows what he wants, and he assures me that he can make both happen 🙂
Stunning. I love how the whole place is maintained as a forest with minimal external things as possible without looking like its manually landscaped! The wooden plank walkway is perfection!
Aren’t national parks great?
Beautiful waterfalls and trees! Good to know about the Slap, I would be making that joke constantly, too. Such a lovely park to explore with family.
My husband still makes the joke from time to time…
I love love love this place and I visited here two years ago for my birthday. Your pictures and post took me right back there. Great pictures and some good information, wish this was out before I went because I would have definitely noted it.
So fun to remember past trips, isn’t it? I already love reminiscing about out time in Krka 😉
Great post and really helpful, thorough info. I went to Croatia last summer and was even in Split but didn’t make it here 🙁 I can’t believe you spent most of a day there and still didn’t see everything… That’s exactly why we couldn’t find the time to go. It looks amazing though, I’ll have to visit next time! Croatia is such an amazing place.
There are so many places to see in Croatia, that it’s hard to do them all. It’s such a tiny, but rich, country.
It looks so beautiful at this park. I only visited Plitvice when I was in Croatia. I would love to go back and visit this one too as it looks stunning 🙂
We went to Plitvice after this trip to Krka. Plitvice is bigger, with more waterfalls, but Krka was such a nice spot to start our explorations.
The Krka National Park looks really ethereal. A great place to be one with nature. The waterfalls look really magical. I am sure it was a wonderful experience walking through the Park.Your pictures have captured the sublime beauty of the place very vividly.
Thanks, it was a magical place.
I LOVE waterfalls so this is totally my type of place! It seems that the pathway to the waterfalls is mostly flat and easily accessible. That makes it a great spot for family adventure!
It is very easy walking, and pretty short, so it is accessible for just about anyone.
Ahh, such stunning photos. So lovely that you did this as a family and get to share these memories with each other. I plan on visiting Croatia in September and I cannot wait, it looks like a stunning country with so much natural beauty. Thanks for all these great tips, I will be sure to bookmark this post!
You are going to love it! Make sure to visit Plitvice, too.
Those photos are gorgeous! Krka national park looks amazing, and I’d love to go there when visiting Croatia in the future (the country is on my bucketlist). The waterfalls are incredible!!
It was one of our favorite places in Croatia. We were so glad we made the effort to get there.