Croatia - Croatia Tours

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ramble

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Anyone gone to croatia with Croatia Tours or Concorde Travel ? Can you recommend them? I usually DIY holiday and haven't used tour operator before. Looking at Cavtat or Hvar. Any views on resorts also very welcome, never been to croatia before.
 
If you search for Croatia you will get plenty of discussion.

We used Croatia Tours-no complaints.

Cavtat is nice-if a little too tourist driven (advantages and disadvantages)

Ask ClubMan about Concorde, or search.
 
Cavtat is nice, but directly under flight path, gets annoying, especially peak season.

If you have a choice, I'd choose Hvar, you can see Cavtat on the way to(or way back) from the Airport.
A 2 centre holiday would be ideal...Cavtat/Dubrovnik area and Hvar/Korcula/Brac Islands as well.

Croatia Tours are good.


If you are interested in Self Catering accommodation, PM me for recommendations.
 
Before you book anything check Aer Lingus flights. They fly direct to Dubrovnik and accommodation there is cheap - if you're willing to rent out a room in a house. You'll get lots of people offering rooms for however many nights you want and it's handy if you want to move around. A ferry leaves from Dubrovnik and goes to all the islands so you can hop on/off wherever you want. Haven't been to Hvar but Split is beautiful.
Word of warning though, the locals everywhere seem to resent tourists, despite relying on them for income. A waiter blatantly tried to rip us off and he only backed down and gave us our money back when I went mental.
 
aaa1 said:
Word of warning though, the locals everywhere seem to resent tourists
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Certainly not our experience in Dubrovnik and Korcula a couple of years ago.
 
aaa1 said:
Word of warning though, the locals everywhere seem to resent tourists, despite relying on them for income. A waiter blatantly tried to rip us off and he only backed down and gave us our money back when I went mental.
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Absolute tosh.
 
Avoid Cavtat!!!! was just there recently, place is a building site! and not much in it and its an hour in horrible bus journey to Dubrovnik... would strongly advise you look at Lapad, next town from Dubrovnik...short bus ride to Dubrovnik, runs every ten mins till 1am...and we used it so it's reliable!

Lapad has lovely walks, a nice strip of pubs, restaurants and is very relaxing. And you'll easily get to Dubrovnik from there. We walked it a couple of times, about 40 - 45 mins in the heat. Went with Aer Lingus, bang on!
 
Ridiculous generalisation!,in my experience,I found the Croatians extremely friendly,decent people.
AS for Concorde,I flew with them last month & has no problems(but Croatia tours definitely seem to have a better reputation.
If it's your first time in Croatia,I'd recommend seeing a few places & a great way to travel is by the state owned ferry service up & down the dalmatian coast.You have to see Dubrovnik & I'd also recommend Brac for it's beach,though Hvar has better restaurants & is probably a nicer island.Istria in the north is intersting as well & I'd recommend Rovinj.I stayed in Makarska for a week in June,not as picturesque as other parts,but very nice place.
 
JohnnyBoy said:
AS for Concorde,I flew with them last month & has no problems
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Obviously my experiece was less positive. As was that of at least one other AAM contributor, another couple who over there the same time as us and several others who I spoke to in the process of dealing with our complaints. All sufficient for me to consider that they should be avoided. From what I've heard Croatia Tours might well be a better bet.
 
Yes I echo all that -ridiculous statement-happened to us once in Barcelona
lets face it can happen anywhere-I occasionally raed about bad tourist experiences in Ireland-surely not!
 
Culchie, you're virtually a local, put back on your tourist glasses and you'll admit that the locals are not exactly reliable when it comes to service and decency, you've found your niche and so it's easy.

Concorde I'd avoid, Cavtat is okay for a day trip (overnight), Dubrovnik is a great day out, but c'est la! One tip would be to fly seat only into Split or Dubrovnik and travel. Split is closer to more outlets and has more to do, plus accomodation that's a lot more reasoable, plus you can get an early bus to Dubrovnik and spend the day there before escaping before the goons come out!

Try not package it, though Cro Tours I would recommend for decency and support! Do go off the beaten track and back behind the coast, there's more to see (well, there's more land there )
 

Yeh, Croatia is a country for 'getting out there', it's not a 'packaged 2 week stay' in the same location kinda of place.
Sure that suits the package holiday companies, but you miss out on so much if you stay in the same place.
 
Was over there in June and had a great time (apart from the flights!).
Culchie's a great man for the advice.

The plan was to fly into Dubrovnik and out again in ten days, travelling around some of the islands. We (2 of us) flew with Aer Lingus. As we were about to land in Dubrovnik, we we're just about to hit the ground, the plane pulled up. Later we were told this was due to turbulance and no other planes were landing so we would be diverted to Split.

Aside: when we landed in Spit, we noticed that no other planes had landed after us!

Rather than a four hour bus journey at 9PM, we decided to stay in Split. An inspired idea!

The trip went as follows -
Split - 2nights : A beautiful place, really liked it. Got accomodation when we got off the bus. Cost €40 per night for the two of us.

Hvar - 3nights : This was the best place of the lot, can't stress that enough! Again, got accomodation as we got off the ferry. Cost €30 for the two of us

Korcula - 1 night : Seemed like a really nice place also but we had to leave the next day due to ferry times. The lady in Hvar organised accomodation for us. It was in a great location. €30 all together.

Lapad / Dubrovnik - 3 nights : Again accomodation was organised for us, same price. Lapad is really close to Dubrovnik, the bus ride was maybe 5 mins, would probably be the distance of Heuston Station to O'Connell St.

We only spent 1 day walking around Dubrovnik, was a bit too touristy compared to the other places in that we had people trying to get us into shops/restaraunts etc.

This was probably the best holiday I've had in a while and I'd advise winging it. If you're doing this, it's a good idea to get a map of the town you're staying in and get the location of the apartment/ room.

Hope that helps!
 
ixus said:
Lapad / Dubrovnik - 3 nights : Again accomodation was organised for us, same price. Lapad is really close to Dubrovnik, the bus ride was maybe 5 mins, would probably be the distance of Heuston Station to O'Connell St.
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Ah - it's a bit longer than that surely! More 10-15 minutes I'd say - at least from the Lapad terminus near the Hotels Neptune/President.
We only spent 1 day walking around Dubrovnik, was a bit too touristy compared to the other places in that we had people trying to get us into shops/restaraunts etc.
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Funny - we never experienced the touts or hard sell when we were there. It was around September/October so maybe they were taking it easy at the end of the season.
 

Up in the terraces of the Old Town the owners would be 'encouraging' you to sit down all right, as all the restaurant seating meets each other.

I wouldn't classify it as 'Hard Sell' though.
 
Two weeks in the same place also suits families culchie. When we were 2 we toured, now we are 5 its not so easy. We usually alternate day trips with quiet days on holiday, croatia looks good for this because it is reasonably compact and has more to it than tourist resorts. We have decided to give it a miss this year as it looks like somewhere requiring a bit of planning. So we're off down the country with our tent to get some water sports and horse riding with a bit of comfort in a good hotel for the last few days. Thanks for everyone's input, Croatia's definately on my list for next year.
 
ramble - don't be put off by the anti-package snobs especially if you have kids. Packages can be a good deal and a useful base for a bit of exploring of the wider area in which you are staying.
 
Close encounters of the croatian kind


I know people who were waiting to go home in Dubrovnik airport and saw this! They had to wait until the next morning to get the flight.

You were lucky you didn't decide to go the previous week - it pissed rain.
 
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