Croatia
Plitvice Lakes
Sixteen lakes spilling into one another down a forested limestone valley, crossed on boardwalks laid just above the water, with the barriers between them still growing.
Plitvice Lakes is sixteen terraced lakes in a forested limestone valley in Lika, each one spilling into the next over barriers of travertine that the water is still building. Boardwalks run just above the surface, so you walk through the cascades rather than looking at them from a distance, and the water shifts between turquoise, green and grey as the light changes. Veliki Slap, the tallest waterfall in Croatia, drops into the canyon at the lower end. It was Croatia's first national park, it is on the UNESCO list, and it is compact enough to see properly in one long day.
Suggested stay
1–2 days
Language
Croatian
Currency
EUR
Timezone
UTC+2
Why you'll love Plitvice Lakes
The water filtered through limestone, it runs clear enough to count trout over the drowned trunks, and turns from turquoise to green to grey with the light.
The boardwalks plank walkways cross the lakes and thread past the falls at water level, often without a rail, so the cascades are running at your feet.
Veliki Slap the tallest waterfall in Croatia drops into the canyon at the bottom of the system, and the path takes you right to the foot of it.
Still growing the barriers are living travertine, laid down around moss and algae, so the lakes rearrange themselves on a timescale of decades rather than aeons.
Best time to visit
Apr, Jun-Aug
14-29° days
44.852° N, 15.590° E
UTC+2 · Europe/Zagreb
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Weather & when to go to Plitvice Lakes
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Apr, Jun-Aug
Cards tinted by calculated verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Plitvice Lakes
July and August are hot and the boardwalks move at a shuffle from mid-morning, with timed-entry tickets for those months going early. December and January are cold, the boats and shuttle trains stop and much of the trail network closes, though frozen falls are exactly why a few people come. In April the water runs hardest and low boardwalks can shut in high flow.
Top things to do in Plitvice Lakes
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Veliki Slap - the tallest waterfall in Croatia
scenic nature wildlife 👍 PopularThe Plitvica stream arrives from a side valley and drops the better part of eighty metres into the canyon at the bottom of the system, which makes it the one waterfall here that is not fed by the lakes at all. The path runs to the foot of it across wet rock, and the spray reaches the boardwalk.
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The Lower Lakes canyon - Milanovac to Sastavci
scenic hiking ⭐ Highly recommendedBelow Kozjak the valley narrows into a limestone canyon and the boardwalks tighten with it, crossing Gavanovac and Kaluđerovac between walls of rock and tufa. At the end the last lake pours over Sastavci and the Korana river begins. The most dramatic hour in the park, and best walked early before the tour groups come down.
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The Upper Lakes - Galovac and the terraces
scenic hiking ⭐ Highly recommendedAbove Kozjak the valley opens into beech and fir forest and the lakes spread out in wide terraces, with the heaviest concentration of cascades in the park around Galovac. Longer, greener and quieter than the lower section, and the boardwalks here cross open water for hundreds of metres at a time.
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Lake Kozjak - cross the middle by electric boat
scenic 👍 PopularThe largest and deepest lake splits the system in two, and silent electric ferries link the landing stages at either end. It is the one stretch of the visit that is not on foot, it is included with park entry, and the crossing is the only place you get a long open view down the water.
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Šupljara cave and the Vidikovac viewpoints
scenic history 👍 PopularA hole in the cliff above Kaluđerovac lets you climb up off the lower boardwalk and come out on the path along the canyon rim, where the viewpoints give the postcard shot of the lakes stacked below. The cave appeared in the Winnetou films, which is why older German visitors know it by name.
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Prošćansko jezero - the lake at the top
nature wildlife off beaten pathThe uppermost and second largest lake, ringed by forest at the head of the valley, with a quiet path along its shore. Almost everyone turns back before it, so it is the easiest place in the park to be alone with the water.
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Čorkova Uvala - the old-growth forest
nature wildlife off beaten pathA reserve of primeval beech and fir in the north of the park, never logged, with fallen giants left where they land. Access is restricted and it is walked with a park guide rather than wandered into, which is also what keeps it worth seeing.
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Bears, wolves and lynx in the park forests
nature wildlifeThe beech forest around the lakes holds brown bear, wolf and lynx, along with deer and around a hundred and fifty bird species. You will almost certainly see none of them from a boardwalk, but the park runs interpretation on the large carnivores and the tracks are real.
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The frozen lakes in deep winter
scenicIn a hard winter the falls freeze into columns and the shallow lakes ice over, which is a genuinely different park and the reason photographers come in the coldest months. It is cold, the days are short, the boats and shuttle trains do not run and only a limited route stays open, so check what is walkable before travelling.
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Walk the long loop instead of the short one
hiking scenicThe lettered routes from each entrance range from a two-hour lower-lakes circuit to a full traverse of all sixteen lakes on foot. Taking the longest option, and walking the leg most people ride, is how you get stretches of boardwalk to yourself in the middle of a busy day.
Best areas to stay in Plitvice Lakes
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Rastovača and Plitvica Selo
First-time visitors $$Guesthouse hamlets beside Entrance 1
Explore hotels in Rastovača and Plitvica Selo →
Velika Poljana
Early starters $$$In-park hotel clearing above Kozjak
Explore hotels in Velika Poljana →
Mukinje and Jezerce
Apartment stays $Quiet residential villages near Entrance 2
Explore hotels in Mukinje and Jezerce →
Grabovac and Rakovica
Drivers and campers $Roadside villages north of the park
Explore hotels in Grabovac and Rakovica →
Korenica
Town amenities $Small Lika town with real services
Explore hotels in Korenica →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Plitvice Lakes
Getting to & around Plitvice Lakes
Getting there
Nearly everyone arrives on the D1, the old road between Zagreb and the coast, which runs past both park entrances. Intercity coaches stop on the roadside at Entrance 1 and Entrance 2, and there is no railway anywhere near the lakes.
Flight
Franjo Tuđman Airport Zagreb (ZAG)
Zagreb's airport is roughly two hours north of the park by road, mostly on the motorway before the D1 turn near Karlovac. No bus runs from the terminal itself, so it means a hire car, a booked transfer, or a coach out of Zagreb bus station.
Coach
Roadside stops at Entrance 1 and Entrance 2
Zagreb to Zadar and Split coaches pass the lakes through the day and set down on the verge at both entrances. Book ahead in summer, because a full bus can drive straight past a roadside stop.
Drive
Car parks opposite both entrances
About two hours from Zagreb, a similar run up from Zadar and around three and a half hours from Split. The car parks fill by mid-morning in summer and the two entrances are a couple of kilometres apart on the D1.
Flight
Zadar or Split airports, for the coastal approach
Coming from Dalmatia rather than the capital, Zadar is roughly two hours away and Split about three and a half, both by hire car or coach. Many people take the lakes as a stop between Zagreb and the coast rather than a destination in itself.
Getting around
Walking
The whole visit is on foot. Lettered routes from each entrance link the boat and shuttle stops, from about two hours to most of a day.
Free
Electric boat
Silent ferries cross and run the length of Kozjak between the lower and upper lakes. Included with park entry; the queue, not the crossing, is the slow part.
TBC
Panoramic shuttle train
Road trains run along the ridge above the Upper Lakes between three stops, included with entry, and save a long walk back to an entrance.
TBC
Car
Useful only for the entrances, your guesthouse and anything outside the park. Nothing inside is drivable, and the two entrances sit a couple of kilometres apart.
TBC
Guesthouse transfer
Most guesthouses in the surrounding villages will drop guests at an entrance in the morning and collect them later. There is no taxi rank at the lakes.
TBC
Day trips from Plitvice Lakes
Rastoke, Slunj
Half dayWatermill village
The Slunjčica meets the Korana over the same kind of travertine steps as the park, except here wooden mill houses are built directly on top of them and the water runs under the floors. A small, strange, still-lived-in version of Plitvice geology.
Getting there
car | bus
30 min by car or coach north on the D1
Barać Caves
Half dayShow caves
Lit limestone chambers walked on a guided circuit, with the usual columns and curtains plus cave-bear bones and evidence of prehistoric use. Cool and dry, which makes it the obvious wet-weather alternative to a day on open boardwalks.
Getting there
car
20 min by car north near Rakovica
Zadar
Full dayCoastal old town
A Roman forum, a circular ninth-century church built out of its stones, and a waterfront where the Sea Organ plays the swell through pipes under the steps. Time it for sunset, which Hitchcock rated and which the town has been dining out on ever since.
Getting there
car | bus
About 2 hr by car or coach to the coast
Zagreb
Full dayCapital city
The Upper Town of tiled roofs and gas lamps, the Dolac market above the main square, and a run of small museums that punch above the city's size. Easy to fold into the drive back if you are flying out of Zagreb anyway.
Getting there
car | bus
About 2 hr by car or coach north
Una National Park and Bihać
Full dayRiver gorge over the border
The Una runs green over wide travertine steps on the Bosnian side of the border, with Štrbački Buk the big drop and rafting the usual way to see it. A very different country an hour from the lakes, and far fewer people.
Getting there
car
About 1 hr by car east, passport needed
A little history of Plitvice Lakes
The lakes are a piece of live geology. Water running off the Lika karst arrives loaded with dissolved limestone, and where moss, algae and bacteria grow in it the mineral comes back out of solution and cements around them. What that builds is travertine, and the barriers keep rising, ponding the water behind them into sixteen lakes that step down more than a hundred metres from Prošćansko at the top to the canyon where the Korana river begins. Barriers breach, new ones form, and the shape of the system is not fixed.
People long treated the valley as somewhere to get past rather than to visit. It lay on the Ottoman military frontier for two centuries, dangerous enough to be nicknamed the Devil's Garden, and only in the late nineteenth century did a local society begin protecting the lakes and laying the first paths. The park was declared in 1949, the boardwalks and boats followed, and the Winnetou westerns filmed here in the 1960s made the place famous across German-speaking Europe. In 1991 the lakes were the site of the first fatal clash of the Croatian war, and the park spent four years under rebel control and on the World Heritage danger list before it was demined and reopened.
Ottoman forces take Lika; the lakes sit on a contested frontier long known as the Devil's Garden.
A society for the protection and improvement of the lakes is founded, the first organised conservation here.
Plitvice Lakes is declared a national park, the first in Croatia.
The West German Winnetou films are shot at the lakes, bringing the first wave of mass tourism.
Inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list for its travertine lake system.
The Plitvice Lakes incident in March brings the first fatality of the Croatian War of Independence; the park falls under rebel Serb control.
Added to the List of World Heritage in Danger as the war continues around the park.
The park returns to Croatian control in August and reopens to visitors.
Removed from the danger list after demining and repair of the boardwalks and paths.
Know before you go
Payment
Cards & cash mixed
English
Widely spoken
Wifi
Workable
Power
Type C / F
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+385
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
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FAQs about Plitvice Lakes
▸ When is the best time to visit Plitvice Lakes?
April and June to August are the reliable months. April has the heaviest water, straight off the snowmelt, and October brings beech colour with a fraction of the crowds. Midsummer is warm and by far the busiest. Winter is cold with much of the trail network closed, though frozen falls draw photographers who plan around it.
▸ How long do you need at Plitvice Lakes?
One full day covers both the Lower and Upper Lakes at a decent pace. Staying a night nearby is the real upgrade, because it puts you at an entrance when it opens, hours before the day coaches from Zagreb and the coast arrive, and leaves room for Rastoke or the caves.
▸ Do you need to book tickets in advance?
Yes, in season. Entry is timed and the number of people admitted per slot is capped, so summer slots sell out days ahead and turning up on spec can mean waiting or being turned away. You enter within your slot; once inside you can stay as long as you like.
▸ Entrance 1 or Entrance 2, which is better?
Entrance 1 sits at the bottom, by the Lower Lakes canyon and Veliki Slap, so you start with the drama and walk uphill. Entrance 2 is at the top near the hotels and puts you into the Upper Lakes first, walking down. Either works; whichever is closer to your bed is the practical answer.
▸ Can you swim in the lakes?
No. Swimming is banned throughout the park and enforced. The travertine barriers are fragile living rock and the whole system depends on them, so you stay on the boardwalks. If you want to swim, the Korana river downstream and the Una over the border are where locals go.
▸ Is it manageable with small children?
Mostly, but plan for it. The boardwalks are flat, yet there are plenty of steps, uneven planks and long stretches with no handrail beside deep water. Prams are close to useless; a carrier is better. The boat and shuttle train let you cut a long route in half if legs give out.
▸ Are there bears in the park?
Yes, brown bears live in the forests here, along with wolves and lynx. Sightings from the boardwalks are very rare, and the trails you will be on are busy enough that wildlife keeps its distance. The park treats the large carnivores as one of the reasons the forest is protected.
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