Plitvička Jezera, Croatia

With the frustration of numerous border crossing the day before behind us, we set off early to get on towards Plitvice Lakes in Croatia. The weather was looking decided stormy, but we were occasionally treated to bursts of sunshine.

We made good time and travelled through some lovely rolling hills occasionally coming across the odd small village and the occasional cyclist.

When we arrived, we found that it was bustling with tourists of all nationalities. There were coach parties, cars and even a special place to park motorhomes, which was great. We quickly found a spot and gathered some essential things together for a walk around the lakes and falls.

Once our tickets were bought we headed for one of the national park workers who told us that several areas were not accessible due to the heavy rains that they had been having over the past few days and weeks. However, they were prepared for that, so after heading down the hill towards the largest lake we found that we had to get an electric ferry to the next point on the walk due to the flooding. There are no combustion powered boats allowed on the lakes meaning that it was amazing quiet, apart from the loud chatter or a group of tourists behind us. Shame they couldn’t just enjoy their surroundings rather than talk about mundane things and taking numerous selfies.

One of the Plitvice Lakes, Plitvička Jezera, Croatia

We have seen more impressive waterfalls during our travels, but the colour of the water, the vast number of small falls all around the lake were gorgeous. Everywhere I looked there were more falls spewing water in to the lakes edges. Because of the rains, every falls was full.

As we exited the boat and started to walk around the pre-defined path around the lake complex, it quickly became obvious that there were so many people there… too many people there. We found that a particular group of tourists, that we seemed to be surrounded by, had no sense of courtesy or respect of personal space, it really tried to ruin the beauty, but nothing to could dull the falls… not even the rain as it started to pour down. Sadly, the timing was terrible. As the rain started to fall heavier and heavier, we arrived at the main falls in time to be swamped by more people all tripping up win each other trying to get the perfect selfie. I defiantly managed to get a couple of half decent shots despite but the mist, the people and the rain trying to stop me.