Interrailling - Croatia, Zagreb / Split to Athens

dioltas

Hi, just wondering if anyone has advice on this trip.

Doesn't seem to be any train routes from Split down South towards Greece.

I think you can get a bus through Bosnia / Montenegro / Albania, but I don't know if this is going to be covered by ticket and it seems like an awful trek on a bus.

May be able to get a ferry to Bari in Italy and then a ferry south from there. I think the Ferry to Bari, if we definitely can get on isn't covered, but the Ferry from Bari is at least partially covered. Looks like it could be easily be over 42 hours.

Other option is train back up to Zagreb (this is the direction we will have come from anyway), or skip Split / Dubrovnik and go to Beograd in Serbia from there.
Looks like we can get trains all the way down from there, although I wasn't able to find any train times!

Hoping to go around the islands and then fly home from Athens. Flights are already booked back from Athens so can't really change this!

So if anyone has made the journey before, some advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

stephenmario

I've done this route, what I did was get a ferry from Split to Hvar, Hvar to Dubrovnik. and then bus to Belgrade and you can get the train all the way down from there. Can't remember the prices as money wasn't an issue for the group at the time.

el oh el

I did Belgrade - Zagreb via Bar, Budva, Dubrovnik and Split last week, Bus from split to Dubrovnik was around 120 Kuna which is around 17€ and from dubrovnik to bar it'll be around 18-19€ (I payed 17,5€ from Budva to DU and 1,5€ from Bar to Budva). If you take a train from Bar to Belgrade in the Summer months DO RESERVE SEATS (it's only about 3€). We didn't reserve and ended up having to stand at the bar in the train for 12 hours, with no free space in the corridors to either sit or stand! From Belgrade there are trains south or you could take a bus down the coast through Albania from Bar.
I wouldn't skip Split/DU (Dubrovnik is very touristy though but Split is grand!)

dioltas

Thanks for the advice.

I think we will either end up doing the bus from Bar/Dubrovnik and then straight down, or a ferry from Dubrovnik to Bari, and then a ferry to Patras.

The ferry to Bari is about 8 hours and €50, which isn't covered by the interrailling ticket. The ferry from Bari to Patras is covered and is about 16 hours.
So it's 24 hours on a ferry in total.

Can you remember roughly the trip from Dubrovnik / Bar to Belgrade took in total? Looking at our route I'm thinking we might be packing too much in and aiming to cover too much distance.

dioltas

Thanks for the advice.

I think we will either end up doing the bus from Bar/Dubrovnik and then straight down, or a ferry from Dubrovnik to Bari, and then a ferry to Patras.

The ferry to Bari is about 8 hours and €50, which isn't covered by the interrailling ticket. The ferry from Bari to Patras is covered and is about 16 hours.
So it's 24 hours on a ferry in total.

Can you remember roughly the trip from Dubrovnik / Bar to Belgrade took in total? Looking at our route I'm thinking we might be packing too much in and aiming to cover too much distance.

el oh el

Dubrovnik to Bar was about 3.5-4 hours and the train ride from Bar to Belgrade was supposed to last 9.5 hours but we had a delay, so it took about 12 hours. We didn't have any seats, not even on the floor, for those 12 hours though

You should plan in around 2-3 nights for each place you go to. We made the mistake of trying to visit too many places (8) in just 15 days of which we spent 5 at one beach, so don't plan in too much!