We are doing a seven day swim vacation on the coast of Croatia. Afterwards we would like to spend time using train travel to make our way to either Paris or Frankfurt. From one of those cities we would have a nonstop flight back to Seattle. The time frame would be about a week. Any ideas on stops along the way to either destination?
Thank you! Liz
Posted by
Sioux Falls, SD, USA
3046 posts
Split is a hard destination to train out of. It takes a long time to get to Zagreb, and the trains are not reliable - we did the sleeper one time, and got delayed 6 hours. Once in Zagreb, you can go Ljubljana-Munich-Frankfurt-Paris. I'll see what others say, but I would take the bus (Flixbus) from Split to Zagreb, or Split to Ljubljana. The rest will go well.
Posted by
Munich
187 posts
Just to make sure, it's a long way and if you don't want to sit on the train for more than 3 hours a day, you'll need the whole week and spend every night in a different place.
- Zagreb – Ljubljana – Villach – Salzburg – Munich – Frankfurt or Munich – Stuttgart – Strasbourg – Paris would be the main route with a lot of possible stops.
- Going through central eastern Alps you could change it to Villach – Zell am See – Kitzbuehl – Innsbruck – Zuerich – Paris/Frankfurt or seeing Dolomites via Villach – Lienz – San Candido/Innichen – Fortezza/Franzensfeste – Innsbruck - Zuerich.
- Finaly you could find your way via bus (and ferry) to Venice or Trieste and take the train from there via Milan and Switzerland to Paris.
My recommendation would be to concentrate your second week on a smaller region of your taste and complement the travel either by flight or night train. For example:
- Ljubljana, Bad Gastein, Salzburg. Form Salzburg by nightjet to Paris
- Euronight from Zagreb or Ljubljana to Stuttgart. From there via Alsace Region to Paris or via Rhein and Mosel valley to Frankfurt.
- Travel via Slovenia and/or Istria to Venice. Fly out from there.