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Rail - Venice to Rijeka

We are trying to plan a trip seeing both Venice area and Croatia. (fly into venice, out of Split - or vice versa). The trip hinges on us getting from Venice to northern Croatia. I see that there seems to be a once-daily rail trip from Rijeka-Pivka-Trieste-Venice (and vice versa) that takes about 6-7 hours. But...when I check the trip planner for June, the trip stops showing up.

Does anyone know if a train option is reliable? I am using the Rail Planner app by Eurorail. Are there any other resources?

We will then pick up a car in Rijeka to sightsee/travel in Croatia. We are a bit of a novice in euro travel, so I don't want to get stranded and am not very daring or the fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants type.

Posted by
6773 posts

The timetable might not be out for June, which is why you wouldn't see the connection.
Either way, it's a long time on train - I see 7.5 hours with two connections.
It would be more fun to take the ferry from Venice to Rovinj or Pula, and rent a car in either city. Also, the area where these cities are located, Istria, is definitely worth spending a couple days.

Posted by
3776 posts

I agree with balso. Take the catamaran from Venice to either city then rent a car. The drive from there to Rijeka is about an hour. We go to Pula often from Rijeka for a day trip. The train is too long and boring.

Posted by
11 posts

Thank you for the responses. The ferry remains an option, but since it only runs 3 times per week, it’s not ideal.

I found that Enterprise’s website allowed a rental car pick up in Croatia with a return to Italy. But upon calling, that is actually not allowed.

Has anyone used a transfer service such as GoOpti? Rijeka to Trieste is what we would need.

Are there any other ideas on getting easily between northern Croatia and northern Italy?

Thank you all!

Posted by
6773 posts

There should be buses between Trieste and Rijeka, too, and it shouldn't take much more than 2 hours.

Posted by
26829 posts

GoOpti has been mentioned positively on this forum on a number of occasions. You can probably find some of the earlier posts via the Search function.