Plitvice National Park

Park hours are stated as 07-1900 hours that time of year. Your hotel looks like a 6 minute walk to entrance 1.
All info about the park including length of walks and routes is listed. What is your walk pace and what do you want to see?
After seeing your email I looked up this stuff in less than 2 minutes.
I am going to Croatia in April. I need to know things to. So I looked them up. I will have to make decisions also on what would be best for my visit to the park.
Your itinerary should be to arrive and get into hotel. Get you walk shoes on, walk to the park and walk the paths as far as you can returning in time for the 1900 closing time. If you arrive at 3, get to the entrance by 4, you walk max 1.5 hours out and turn around and walk back.
Next day arrive park entrance at opening. Walk another trail using the same technique as the day before arriving to your hotel in time to catch whatever ride you are getting at 1pm.

As I recall, the walks are more or less loops. I chose the second-longest marked trail back in 2015 and finished it much faster than the guidelines indicated (at least an hour early). Now, I'm a good walker, but I was 63 years old at the time and no more than 5'3". The massive crowding in the park during my day trip really slowed me down. Of course, they may have recalibrated their walking times since 2015, but I don't think you're going to have a problem using the time estimates even if you want to take a lot of photos (something I didn't do).

I've only visited on one day so I don't have any hints regarding your schedule. I can say that we started at entrance 2, right when the park opened (our RS guide said this was best) and were quite glad that we did this. The upper paths were probably the most striking and interesting and we had very few others on the paths and boardwalks at the same time. When we came to the lake where you cross by boat, we started seeing the crowds of people that had started from entrance 1. From then on, it was so crowded you could hardly believe it. It took most of my attention to keep from being pushed off the boardwalk by the crowds . A kind member of my tour said, "come join us" and I fell in line behind him and his family as we used him as the "lead blocker" to make our way out of the park. Needless to say, I enjoyed the upper part much more than the lower part. Perhaps one strategy would be to do the lower section late in the afternoon one day and the upper part first thing the next morning.

Another hint for here is that if you use your phone as a camera, make sure you have some sort of strap or lanyard on it as it could easily get bumped or dropped off the boardwalks. I saw some people with these and was quite jealous! It was one of my first purchases when I got home.

Check with the hotel, they have packages that include tickets. Try going through this link to make your reservation to get a discount on the hotel. Click the word BOOK in the green banner at the top of the page.
https://np-plitvicka-jezera.hr/

Thank you for all your help, I appreciate it!
Happy Travels,
Louise

I just chose a place to stay the evening before going into the park. This was just sent to me for the place we are staying.Dear

Sir/Madam

Since every year there are more and more visitors comming to see beauty of our National Park it's getting harder to protect the nature. So in order to limit the number of people entering the Park per hour and entrance administration of Plitvice Lakes National Park has decided to introduce online ticket shop.
You can buy your ticket at:

https://ticketing.np-plitvicka-jezera.hr/Index.aspx?l=EN

In order to buy ticket you have to choose date, hour and entrance you want to start your tour from. After selecting all the steps on your e-mail address you will receive receipt and tickets.
The number of tickets per hour is limited so it's important for you to reserve your tickets on time.
Park will charge you immediately uopn purchase; any changes can be made upon to 2 days (48 hours) before the planned visit.
Tickets can only be purchased in advance, at least two days before the desired arrival date.

For example if you wish to visit Park on 5th of August I would recommend to buy tickets now to be sure you'll be able to enter the Park since tickets are limited to 650 per hour. If you buy tickets for 5th of August for 8AM you can the National Park between 8:00 and 9:00. You also need to choose Entrance 1 or Entrance 2.
We recommend Entrance 1 because it is a little closer to us than Entrance 2.

It's important to plan your visit in advance. If you choose not to buy tickets in advance there is possibility you will not be able to enter the Park.

Hope this is helpfull.
If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask.

Best regards,
Ana,
Plitvice Residence