Split, Croatia

Split is the second largest city in Croatia, and lies on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. It is a city of approximately 180,000 inhabitants, and is located in the Dalamatia area of Croatia. It seemed much bigger than this when we were looking at it! I was surprised that the population was so low when I looked it up.

The historic center of Split is right on the water, and has been a UNESCO world heritage site since 1979. This is also where you will find the harbour, the ferries to the islands, and the bus terminal.

When we left Trogir, we took a local bus. It cost 21 Kuna each (about $4 Canadian) and arrives about every 20 minutes. It is quite a long bus with a flexible bend in the middle, and packed with people. I don't recommend this bus unless you are going straight to the airport. If you want to go to Split from Trogir, take one of the coaches. If you ask in the inside of the bus station they can tell you when they are coming, but they seemed fairly often (anywhere from 30 - 45 minutes apart). You will pay when you get on the bus "around 20 Kuna". They say this because different coach companies do this trip and some charge 20 and some 21. The coach has better air conditioning, is faster because it makes WAY less stops, and lets you off right down at the harbour. When we took the city bus it let us off somewhere outside the old town and we just had to wander our way down towards the water to find it. I'm glad we took the coach when we had our big heavy backpacks.

Whoops, seems like I've gone off on a tangent there... but if you are ever visiting this is helpful information!

After finally making our way down to the old town we were quite impressed with how gorgeous it was. The Diocletian Palace forms about half of the old town of Split. It was originally built in the fourth century and was intended to house the Roman Emperor Diocletian in his retirement.

Before you enter the old town on the side it looks like this...

If you come in from the harbour side, you come into the old basement of the Diocletian Palace where they have shops set up to sell souvenir stuff.

When you exit out the other side you come into the town square. It looked like they were setting up for something to happen later in the day as people had cushions out on the steps to reserve their spots.

There was a cathedral, a bell tower and some crypts that you could have a look at for a small price, but we didn't go inside this time.

We enjoyed a walk through the beautiful streets in the old town. Mostly there were shops and restaurants... but the architecture of the buildings, towers and walls was what I enjoyed the most.

We decided to have dinner in Split before heading back to Trogir. There were quite a few restaurants right near the center so we used our usual method of picking... which restaurant has a lot of people in it? 😉 Our method worked again and we had a delicious dinner. We also had a very nice conversation with a couple of guys from Colombia who told us about their travels. After talking to them I've added Estonia and Poland on to the list!

After dinner we walked out by the harbour which is also beautiful (not the part by the ferries, but closer to the old town).

There is a long walkway along the water filled with (I bet you can guess!) more restaurants and shops.

We took the 8:00 coach home to Trogir which was much more lovely than our ride in on the regional bus.

We liked Split, but definitely like Trogir better as a base. Trogir is much quainter and more laid back (there were lots of young people drinking and cavorting in Split). I found Trogir to be much more beautiful, and quite a bit less expensive when I looked at hotels. However, if you are looking for a party and have money to blow go ahead and stay in Split 😀

Next we are off to the island of Brac for some beach time.