[thats_my_poison]

Me and my friend are thinking of doing this tour:
http://www.statravel.co.uk/tours-and...ntry=HR&page=2

There's a 2-for-1 offer on the tour at the moment so it would only be £180.

Has anyone been on an STA tour before? Would you recommend it? We really want to island hop and this seems the easiest way to do it.

Do you think that accommodation is included? Or would you have to separately pay for that in each island?

[Origami Bullets]

First thing that stands out is that you have to pay extra for dinner each day. No doubt you will be pressured into paying for something overpriced, just because everyone else from the tour will be there, and you want to make friends don't you?

There's no mention of accommodation, so I strongly suspect that it's not included. Plus, it would appear that you will be entertaining yourself pretty much every day, which will cost.

Essentially, what you're paying for is just the transport between islands and some breakfasts and lunches.

[thats_my_poison]

so would you say it's better to do some research beforehand and just island hop ourselves? this article makes it seem v easy to travel between islands, i know absolutely nothing about croatia but the distances between the islands seems pretty short and the boat journeys are very cheap:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/200...g-europe-ferry

[Jeester]

I did one in Borneo. It was 11 days I thin k(off top of my head) and was one of the best times of my life. It was very well organised and a delight to go on. I would highly reccomend them to anyone.

(Even though they are a bit pricey and it would obviously be cheaper to do it yourself this was so much more satisfying and easy)

[Origami Bullets]

(Original post by thats_my_poison)
so would you say it's better to do some research beforehand and just island hop ourselves? this article makes it seem v easy to travel between islands, i know absolutely nothing about croatia but the distances between the islands seems pretty short and the boat journeys are very cheap:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/200...g-europe-ferry

To be honest, I think it's one of those things that could go either way. The STA tour will give you the advantage of a ready-made group of people to meet (which would, of course, be more important if you were travelling solo, but it may still be important to you). It looks like the STA tour will take the more scenic route and will stop off somewhere for you to swim from the boat. On the downside, it will very much tie you into a particular schedule, so if you find somewhere that you absolutely love and want to stay an extra day, you won't be able to.

Essentially, you're going to have to weight up the difference in cost between STA and the ferries, and decide if it's worth it to you on your budget. I've never been to Croatia, but I believe that English is fairly widely spoken in areas frequented by tourists (well, wikipedia tells me that 48% of Croats speak it as a second language), so there's no reason why you couldn't get through the language barrier by yourself. It's also pretty safe - let's face it, STA don't do the more adventurous backpacking such as, say, through northern Iraq, as a few people I know have done themselves.

[STA Travel]

Hey thats_my_poison, rest assured that accommodation is included on our sailing tours of Croatia - you'll sleep in a cabin on board the boat (amazing!).

As Jeester says, tours are a great way to take the hassle out of travelling - everything's sorted up front, plus you're guaranteed to meet a group of like-minded people.

Whatever you decide, Croatia is a beautiful country, and I'm sure you'll have a great time.

Cheers,
Emma