Who would have guessed it, a quiet, slow start to our day, well maybe not that slow. We were picked up at about 9am and headed out to Plitvice Lakes, and our commune with nature.
From our understanding the Plitvice Lakes system contains many, many waterfalls and but we have been cautioned not to draw comparisons with Niagara Falls and Iguazu Falls.
Left at 9am with our driver Borna in a Mercedes E200. He said it would take between 2:30 & 2:45 to get there. The ride was very comfortable. The highway speed “limit” is 130kph, but our drivers from Split have done around 20kph over this, one said it was common for police to allow up to 20 or 30kph over limit on freeways.
A lot of our trip seemed to be on the plateaus of the mountains. There are many lakes and rivers and deep ravines, but not a lot of agriculture. We saw some sheep farming, shearing shed and all, just after we turned off the highway towards Plitvice.
On the highways and country roads I have seen animal warning signs for pigs, cows, wolves, deer, and I think bears (may have been fat dogs/wolves)! During the drive we saw some hay bails in fields, may have been grain crops, some military vehicles on the road and a military base. There were lots of country roadside stalls selling cheese and honey. The further we went the more sheep, wide plains and high mountains we saw. There were lots of touring type motorcycles on the road.
This area of Croatia is near the border with Slovenia, Hungary and Bosnia Herzegovina.
We got to our hotel about 11:45am and as we were checking in our room became ready. We dropped our things in our room and went to a restaurant next door to have a quick bite before being picked up at 1pm. We ordered a pizza at about 12:10pm, it hadn’t come by 12:55pm so we cancelled and just paid for our drinks.
Our driver was waiting for us, in an amg version of the same car that got us here, very nice, but overkill for our ride time.
We arrived at Gate 1 of Plitvice Lakes Park about 5 mins later, converted our voucher to tickets and we were in the park by 1:15pm. Our first stop was the highest and biggest waterfall in the park, Veliki Slap. 
We had a good time walking along the edges of the lower lakes. All the boardwalks here, and that is a lot because almost everything you walk on near the falls or the lakes is a wooden boardwalk, appear to be made from local timber, they look great. 
There are so many waterfalls. The lakes are at the bottom of a deep valley, and the terrain steps down as it descends into the valley. New lakes are formed at each step and the waterfalls form between the steps as the water drops from one lake to the next. The bigger the drop between the lakes the more spectacular the waterfalls. Most of the waterfalls traverse the full width of the valley, maybe 100 to 150m wide. The biggest waterfall is at the lower end of the Lower Lakes, Veliki Slap (Slap is Waterfall in Croatian), it is a 78m drop. This waterfall, unlike the others in the system, is formed when a stream, the Potok Plitvice, cascades down from the top of the cliffs, not from the lakes upstream from it. The drop occurs in two stages. It’s impressive and be prepared to get wet if you want to view it from up close at the bottom. After there we made our way up the valley on boardwalks. The waterfalls in order as we saw them were; Veliki Slap, Sastavci, Novakovica Brod – a cascade about 12m high down a series of steps between lakes, Kaluderovac, Gavanovac – a cascade down about 6m high, at the top where the water leaves the lake it is like the edge of an infinity pool, spectacular to watch, Milanovacki Slap – a beautiful set of falls bursting out from a tree lined edge, and Stapovi Mike Trnine – a dramatic surge of water from a large lake, the falls aren’t as steep as others and reminded me of a mean set of rapids. ( This is the best I can do in identifying each waterfall, signage is almost non-existent here and Google isn’t much help either – so please excuse any errors).
From just above the Stapovi Mike Trnine we got a small transfer ferry to the top extreme of the lower lakes. It was a very gentle and serene 15-20mins.
At the end we got off and transferred to a small ferry type boat to cross the river and finish our Lower Lakes experience. From there we walked up the hill and caught a “Bus-train” back down stream close to where we entered the park at Gate 1. There was a 10 minute walk to the Gate 1 area. Along the way we got overhead glimpses of the waterfalls we had seen down in the valley.
Differences abound here, another example we saw while in the National Park. People had their dogs with them, all breeds and sizes. 
At home that is strictly not on. And the dogs were also allowed on public transport and in restaurants!
On reflection, while these falls don’t really rate in the same category as Iguazu or Niagara, they are amazing in their own right.
We got a bus from there back to our hotel. A very enjoyable day, particularly since we missed the rain that started a little after 6pm.
