Split: the palace at your back, the islands ahead.
Which boat day actually reaches the Blue Cave. Whether Krka or Plitvice is the better use of a day from here. What the Cetina raft is like in August. Every tour out of Split, reviewed and ranked by the people who took it.
The Blue Cave and five islands, in one day out of Split.
Every Blue Cave tour →
Almost every visitor gives one day to the water, and the three shapes below are what that day can be. The cave is the fixed point: it is lit for a window in the middle of the day and closed outright when the sea is up.
Biševo, Stiniva, Hvar by evening
Out past Šolta at speed, the cave at its light window, the pebble slot at Stiniva, lunch on Vis and an hour in Hvar town before the run home.
Blue Lagoon, Šolta and the Trogir water
The lagoon off Drvenik sits shallow and still enough to read the bottom, twenty minutes out of Trogir. When the cave is shut this is the day that still runs.
Hvar town and the Pakleni channel
Skip the five-island dash: one crossing, a long afternoon anchored off the Pakleni islands, and a town that does not go to bed at ten.
The palace, the cave, the canyon: the Split shortlist.
Six days most trips here are built around. Each one is a full archive of reviews underneath, priced and ranked, so you can pick the version that fits your week rather than the first one you are sold.
More people take these Split days than anything else on this coast.
Every review →Ordered by how many travellers have actually been on them. The top of this list is where a first visit should start, and the reviews underneath say why.
1
Krka Waterfalls Trip with Boat Cruise and Swimming
Day trip from Split to Krka National Park for Skradinski Buk waterfalls, a scenic boat ride from Skradin, and swim time in Primošten.
From · $31
Read our review →
2
Krka Waterfalls, Food & Wine Tasting Tour
from $45
3
Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour
from $111
4
Blue Cave, Mamma Mia, Hvar and 5 Island Tour
from $109
5
Blue Lagoon & 3 Islands Cruise with Lunch from Split
from $78
6
Old Town and Diocletian Palace Walking Tour
from $17
7
Blue Lagoon Boat Party with DJs, Shots & After Party
from $47
8
Krka Waterfalls Tour, Boat Cruise & Swimming
from $32
Diocletian’s Palace is a Split neighbourhood, not a museum.
An emperor built himself a retirement compound here in the fourth century and the city never moved out of it. There are flats above the colonnades, bars in the substructures and a cathedral inside the mausoleum of the man who built it. Walking in is free; a guide is for the half of it you would walk straight past.
Krka is an hour from Split. Plitvice is not.
Krka’s falls are close enough to give you the afternoon back. Plitvice is roughly three hours each way, so most of that day is the coach — worth it once, and worth knowing before you book. Dubrovnik and Mostar are the same trade at a bigger scale.
What a Split day costs, from a palace walk to a boat of your own.
Every published review, bucketed by what it actually costs. The cheap end of this coast is not the weak end of it.
Palace walks, the Klis and Salona morning, tastings, museum entries and the tickets you would otherwise queue for.
The island boat days, Krka and Plitvice runs, rafting on the Cetina, quad and canyon afternoons inland.
Private boats, chartered speedboats, and the long cross-border days where a driver waits while you eat.
A cave, a canyon and a glass floor: only out of Split.
Old towns and boat trips run the length of this coast. Water that turns blue from underneath, a river cold enough to shock you in August, and a walkway bolted a kilometre above the beach belong to this corner of it.
The Blue Cave
Light comes into the Modra špilja through a second, submerged opening, bounces off a pale floor and fills the chamber with blue from below. It works for a window in the middle of the day and not at all when there is swell, which is why every operator sells the same early start and why boats sometimes turn back at the island. Entry is its own timed ticket and the last stretch is done a few at a time in a small tender.
- 1Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 7,150 reviews
- 2Blue Cave, Mamma Mia, Hvar and 5 Island Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 6,320 reviews
- 3Blue Cave & 6 Islands Speedboat Tour From Split or Podstrana★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 3,195 reviews
The Cetina Canyon
The Cetina cuts a limestone canyon behind Omiš and arrives in the sea in the middle of town. The rafting is gentle — a few chutes, one cliff jump you are welcome to walk around — and the water stays cold through August because it comes out of the karst rather than off a beach. Wetsuits are handed out in July and nobody argues.
- 1Cetina River: Rafting and Cliff Jumping Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 1,774 reviews
- 2Cetina River Rafting with Cliff Jump & Swimming★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,258 reviews
- 3Cetina River Rafting with Cliff Jumping Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 997 reviews
The Biokovo Skywalk
A glass horseshoe bolted to the Biokovo ridge, a vertical kilometre above the Makarska beach, reached by a single-track road that switchbacks up through bare karst. Vehicles enter the park road on a booked time slot, so this is one of the few things here you cannot decide on at breakfast. On a hazy day the cloud that hides the summit from town is usually below you.
- 1Skywalk Tour with a Tuk Tuk – Skip the line ticket★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 552 reviews
- 2Skywalk Tuk-Tuk Tour with Skip-the-Line Ticket★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 467 reviews
- 3Biokovo Skywalk Entry Ticket with Transfers★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 379 reviews
The bookings Split will not hold for you.
Most of this coast can be arranged over breakfast on the day. These cannot: they run on timed tickets, a border post, a booked slot on a mountain road, and a sea that gets its own vote.
- 01Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tourIts own timed entry ticket, a light window in the middle of the day, and a swell that closes it outright — put it early in the stay so there is a second chance.
- 02Skywalk Tour with a Tuk Tuk – Skip the line ticketVehicles enter the Biokovo park road on a booked time slot. A tour carries its own; driving up yourself means reserving the slot separately.
- 03Mostar and Herzegovina Tour with Kravica Waterfall from Split & TrogirA different country and a real border. Passports travel with you and the queue at the crossing is part of the day, not an add-on to it.
- 04Plitvice Lakes National Park Guided TourPlitvice sells timed entry tickets and caps how many people are inside at once in high season. A trip that carries your ticket is the difference between walking in and being turned away.
The bura blows and every boat in Split stays in. Then what?
Two winds matter here. The bura comes down off the mountains cold and hard and shuts the crossings; the jugo pushes up from the south with swell and rain. Either one cancels the cave and the five-island run, and neither one touches a single thing on this list.
Split by place — harbour, islands, hinterland
Trogir103 tours
Hvar138 tours
Brač & the Golden Horn49 tours
Vis20 tours- Pakleni Islands31 tours
Makarska Riviera48 tours
Klis & Salona12 tours- The full catalogue →
Split by day — what kind of day is it?
Split, Trogir, Brač, Hvar, Vis: the week that writes itself.
SplitThe newest reviews out of Split.
Everything, newest first →
Controversies behind Split and Croatia-Anthropologist guide
Read our review →
Small-Group Communist Tour of Split – Boutique group tour
Read our review →
Chill Private Walking Tour of Diocletian’s Palace
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Coffee, storytelling & walk – The best private tour of Split
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River Rafting from Split- Cliff Jumping- Cave Visit
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Private Blue Lagoon and Hidden Bays tour from Split & Brac for 12
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Full Day Boat Tour, Blue Lagoon and Šolta with lunch&drinks
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Private Full-Day 3 islands tour with snorkelling
Read our review →