Krka National Park: How to Ruin a Beautiful Place

1.  Make it overly accessible.
2.  Build large pavilions where restaurants serve overpriced food.
3.  Invite people to swim in the water.

These are the steps Krka National Park has taken to transform itself into a water park.  When I read about the park and its waterfalls and looked at the pictures, they sounded and looked pristine.  Yes, the descriptions stated that people swam at the bottom of the lowest waterfall, but I envisioned something similar to what we saw in Australia: a handful of people but by no means crowded.  Excited by the pictures, Marcia (on her birthday), Lee, Magge and I changed our plans to accommodate the hour and half trip north of Split.  When we arrived, we were very surprised at what we saw.  The park was beyond crowded, with the waterfalls and its surroundings packed with people doing their best to make Krka National Park look like the neighborhood pee-filled pool.  We had planned on taking a swim, but I don't know if we could have found any spare room in the water.  Besides, the bathrooms there charged five Croatian kuna (almost a dollar) entry fee, so the aforementioned pool is probably cleaner.