vienna - slovenia-croatia-mostar

Hi Elna, Four countries and 10 days isn't very long. To help us with advice, can you give an idea of which towns within Slovenia and Croatia you had on your wish list to visit?

10 days is pretty tight. I did do something somewhat similar in 2009 and here is what my trip looked like. Vienna - 3 nights with a day trip to the Wachau Valley * long train ride to Bled Bled, Slovenia - 3 nights with day trip to Julian Alps
* rented car and left early and drove to Plitvice Parks, toured during the day and then Split, Croatia - 2 nights Dubrovnik, Croatia - 3 nights So you can see that is 11 nights. We did not make it to Mostar. Croatia is a long country and it takes quite a bit of time to get from top to bottom - so do research that. There is no train system to get you down to the southern tip so you really have to rely on either a rental car, busses or ferry's.

Agree with others - the distances you are considering are great to cover in 10 days. I would take the train from Vienna into Slovenia - if you get routing through Ljubljana, it is worth a stop for a day or two - nice city with great architecture. To avoid pricey drop-off fees for a rental car, I suggest taking the train to Rijeka, Croatia and pick-up a car there to travel down the Croatian coast. You would need to check if driving it into Mostar would be allowed. We used Sixt and they said it was OK (also OK to take it into Slovenia) but when we were checking for rentals found some companies said you could only drive the car in Croatia. For drop-off avoidance, we picked up our car in Split (took the bus from Dubrovnik to Split which was good as there is not much to stop and see along that stretch of Croatia) and dropped it off in Opatija - small town close to Rijeka which the train to Ljubljana stops at. We were traveling south to north.
Need accommodation recommendation for Dubrovnik, let me know. And what time of year are you planning this vacation?

Thank you very much - we are planning a trip end June, beginning July. Will be nice if you can tell us about accommodation.

For Dubrovnik, check with Butterfly Services at http://www.butterflyservices.hr/en/holiday_rentals/rentals.
We stayed in Divine 1 - right in midst of Old Town in the area of the town that is flat - so few stairs to carry luggage, etc. Viktor & Isabelle were great - they manage a number of apts in the area. Some apts within the Old Town have 100 ++ stairs to get to them. We also stayed in other towns in Croatia, Slovenia & Vienna so if you want further info let me know which towns/cities you are visiting. If you send a private message, I will be notified about it - in case I don't check back on your original post.

I did this trip with trains and ferry and had a great time. Using public transportation we made friends along the way and didn't have the responsibility of a car. We took the train from Vienna to Ljubljana, which covered some beautiful terrain. After a couple days in Ljubljana we took the train to Rjieka, Croatia and boarded the overnight Jadrolinija ferry to Dubrovnik. This was a lot of fun cruising the Dalmatian Coast and islands with people from all over the world. We then based in Dubrovnik and took some excellent day tours to Montenegro, Mostar, and Medjugorje. Personally, if I can do my trip without long drives I find it much more liberating and also easier to connect with others. After driving thousands of miles in Europe I have learned my lesson.