Croatia had been on my list of travel locations for a while, and I was determined to make it happen this trip! Our favorite travel companion, Sally, joined us for this part of the trip in August of Turns out, it was my favorite part of our Croatia itinerary, and by far the most dog-friendly! Pula is in Istria, which is the northwestern peninsula of Croatia. It is a popular vacation spot for Germans and Austrians though.
I had to reach way back to my German classes in high school to communicate with him! Overall, we had no issues communicating and most people did speak English I recognize being an English-speaker is a huge privilege when traveling. I did a lot of research on traveling within Croatia before booking this trip. I learned that the train system is not nearly as robust as in Western Europe. Buses are a more common method of transportation between cities, but whether dogs are allowed on a bus is up to the driver.
I was not going to risk relying on buses because of this! Istria is also a bit disconnected from the rest of the country when it comes to public transportation. So we decided to rent a car! If you are planning to visit multiple Croatian regions, I definitely recommend renting a car. The roads throughout Croatia are so nice, and driving was way quicker than public transportation would have been.
I thought it would be simple enough to get to Croatia by train from northern Italy⦠but I was mistaken. There is an option to take a train from Milan up to Austria and then down to Zagreb, but it takes about 19 hours. During a Google deep dive on how to get from Italy to Croatia, I discovered there are ferries that can take you across the Adriatic Sea!
We wanted to spend most of our time around Split, but the ferry between Ancona and Split is eleven hours overnight. Instead, we chose a much shorter option: the Venezia Lines ferry from Venice to Pula in under four hours.
