Italy/Austria/Slovenia/Croatia Road Trip: Critique My Itinerary

From my perspective you have way too many 1- and 2-night stops. I'd drop Villach and head straight from the Dolomites to Slovenia. If Austria is a must, I'd drop the Dolomites.

The Dolomites are lovely; I'd want to spend more than two nights in that area. Since you're an active family, I think you might prefer staying up in the mountains in a town like Ortisei. Bolzano has a very pretty historic area, and you'll want to see the Iceman, but it can be really hot down in that valley. At the very least, be sure your lodgings are air conditioned; not all are.

As of 2015 there was a zip line in Pazin, the administrative capital of Istria. However, I usually suggest at least 4 nights if people are going to Istria. It's a very interesting area, not just a place to go to get into the water. There's a border crossing when you drive from Slovenia to Croatia. If you just want to be sure you have a bit of beach time, I wonder whether the area around Piran wouldn't work as well, and you wouldn't have the international border to deal with twice. There can sometimes be traffic back-ups; I assume they are worse around weekends and holidays. I have no interest in beaches, so Piran is just a thought.

I think your children would be interested in one of the Slovenian cave complexes. Skocjan is more natural (no colored lights); Postojna is more developed. Postojna has a little train that runs underground. Note that there seem to be a lot of "Skocjan" places in Slovenia. If you choose to go to the Skocjan Caves, be sure you head toward the right place.

There have been quite a few earlier threads about things to see in Slovenia aside from Ljubljana and Lake Bled. Be sure you check those out. Lake Bled is very pretty, but it's quite small, and it's probably no more than a 1-hour drive from Ljubljana. I suspect there might be a better way to distribute your 6 nights in that part of Slovenia, but I haven't had a car on my trips to that country, so my experience has been somewhat limited.

Thanks! This is just the kind of feedback I'm looking for.

PS - I just noticed I posted this in "Beyond Europe" but meant to put in "General Europe". Oops!

I'm sure you'll have additional input (including, I hope, some from folks who've had the opportunity to drive in the areas you plan to visit), but it would be a good idea to re-post in the correct forum. Not everyone looks at the "All Topics" list as I do.

I agree (as usual) with a acraven. Look at it this way: you have nothing but 1- or 2-night stands, the only exception is (strangely) Ljubljana (4 nights there). Odd that you would dedicate your longest stretch to a city when you say you want outdoors time. Ljubljana is a nice, small-ish capital, but on a trip as short as yours IMHO you don’t have time to burn there (and your trip seems very short to me, given the long list of places you’re trying to cover). I’d actually cut a couple of places, and at least reduce Ljubljana, maybe even eliminate it. All your 1- and 2- night stands are gonna wear you down.

Add a night in Venice at the beginning of the trip to give yourself time to settle a little, and see an incredible city unlike any other. Your kids will probably love riding the vaporettos (mine did, and they were 12 and 15).

Four nights in Ljubljana with a day trip to Bled is plenty. Bled is less than 45 minutes away, very small town. We did Bled (including rowing out to the island) and Vintgar Gorge in one day. I would bother relocating to stay there. You could do one of the caves as another day trip. We spent 4 nights there in June 2018, and even with a day of rain we felt that was enough time.

There are a ton of water parks near Innsbruck. I think I remember signs for mountain coasters (sommerrodelbahn). They are fun - we rode one near Hallein Austria. You might look at going from the Dolomites to Mittenwald, Germany. The mountains are spectacular!

The Soca Valley in Slovenia is stunning also.

Personally, I really, really liked Ljubljana. It's a manageable size with picturesque architecture and a narrow river running through the center. Totally charming, though also totally discovered at this point. I would certainly not eliminate it. But the 6 nights in Ljubljana/Bled could be trimmed. Ljubljana, for one thing, isn't blessed with a the number of large, important, time-consuming museums you'll find in most other European capitals. (I guess those ended up in Zagreb and Beograd.)

Thanks again for all the feedback. Based on it, I'm going to try and consolidate my itinerary a bit to avoid so many 1-2 night stays. So for instance I'll pick a single base in Slovenia rather than do Bled and Ljubljana separately. I'll also have to decide whether to beef up the Istria portion of the trip (to 3-4 nights) or drop it entirely so that I can beef up the other parts of the trip.

As I spend more time researching, I'm finding several interesting outdoor activities in the Carinthia region of Austria (for instance the Nassfeld Adventure park with a mountain coaster, and the Pyramidenkogel observation tower (100m tall tower that you can slide the whole way down) that seem like my kids would love. I haven't found similar stuff in the Dolomites so far but have lots more research to do. I'll be looking for similar stuff in Slovenia (cave complexes? Ljubljana castle?) and Istria (???) but again am very early in my research. All your help is appreciated!

Hi, Tom! Welcome to the forum! I spent nearly a month in Slovenia last fall. It's a beautiful place with friendly people.

I'm working on a trip to Austria this fall. I, too, have been intrigued by the Carinthia region of Austria. Klagenfurt looks pretty interesting to me...

• Minimundus, a park with 1:25 scale buildings/structures from around the world
• The dragon fountain
• Europapark on Wörthersee with its playground
• Near the Pyramidenkogel observation tower you mentioned.

Thanks Dave. Great suggestions. We're looking for a home base in Carinthia, do you think Klagenfurt is the best choice?

Since you have a sense for the type of stuff that interests us, would you recommend any activities / locations in Slovenia we should try for that portion of the trip?

I use Google Flights every year to research my transatlantic-flight options. It does not sell tickets. It will route you to the website of the appropriate airline if you make a selection.

Hey, Tom. My response is slow... sorry!

Keep in mind that I write as someone who has researched the area but not been there. I'm hoping maybe someone else who has been in the area will pop and give some thoughts.

Lienz, technically not in Carinthia but just north of it, is about half-way between the Dolomites and Ljubljana. It's a little over a 2-hour drive for both legs (taking the main roads). Klagenfurt is a little off a straight line between the Dolomites and Ljubljana. It's 3 hrs 40 min on the 1st leg per Google Maps and then about 80 minutes for the second leg. Villach is on the straight line. Lienz has what looks like a decent Sommerrodelbahn (alpine coaster). The one near Klagenfurt looks pretty lame. I guess what base works best depends on what you want to see/do.

My trip to Slovenia was a solo one. I was looking for hiking -- not necessarily looking for kid-friendly activities. If you google "kid activities" or "family activities" + location, you will get many sites to look at (including random blogs of families who have gone to the location and who catalog what they did). Sites to start with for Slovenia...

50 Places to Visit with Kids in Slovenia

The "Family Fun" section of Slovenia's national tourism website (which is a very good site for Slovenia in general)

Currently living in Carinthia so a little bit biased but I would definitely recommend it as a place to visit! It's a lot less touristy with non-German speakers, but a popular place for Austrians ro visit in the summer. From Klagenfurt you'd be able to get to the Wörthersee easily, and I believe in the summer there's lots of water activities on the lake. It's also near the Pyramidenkogel. Of course there are plenty of hotels and apartments all around the lake so you could consider staying there for easier access to these things. From Klagenfurt, Nassfeld (which has a Rodelbahn) is about an hour - if you were to stay along the lake you'd be slightly closer. But please do consider keeping Austria in your itinerary, it's absolutely beautiful down here!