We will be renting a car 4/9 and will driving from Zagreb to Istria.
Should we drive from Zagreb to Pula or Rovinj. We are staying 2 nights in Rovinj. Are there any stops you recommend on our way?
We will leave Rovinj on 4/11 and will make our way to Plitvice Lakes where we will spend a night. Is there a route we should take and any stops on the way we should check out?
I would skip Pula with only 2 nights in Istria. There are several beautiful places to stop on the way to Rovinj. We enjoyed visiting Hum, Groznjan, and Bale. Many people like Motovun but we couldn't find a parking spot there. We didn't find much to do in Rovinj but were happy to spend a little time at the beach at Lone Bay. On the way to Plitvice, stop at Rastoke and walk along the river. It's a gorgeous area. We spent a night there and visited Plitvice early the next day.
If you are leaving Zagreb early in the day you could definitely stop in Pula. The main attraction is the Roman Colosseum. If you follow Rick’s parking in Pula advice in his guidebook, it is a short walk to the colosseum. You won’t need more than 1 hour to see it.
Then back on the road to Rovinj.
The hilltowns mentioned above are all very, very small and not worth the trouble to see with such a short period of time. We’ve been to them all, but we have an apartment in Rijeka and visit these places for a dinner outing. We usually stay for a month and have time to kill. We have never felt the need for a return trip to any.
As an aside, unlike most of Europe, the Croatians eat their main meal around 2-3:00.
We drove from Rovinj to Plitvice in October. It is a beautiful drive. On the way we stopped and walked around Svetvincenat which is very small but has a castle. We also stopped in Labin which is a walled hilltop town with a great atmosphere and lovely views. There is a fantastic pizza restaurant there, but unfortunately, I don’t remember the name of it.
You might want to stop in Opatija which is a ritzy city on the coast. We didn’t but it looked fun.
