Velebit - Hiking Premužićeva trail

Hiking the trail with friends in two days

The Premužićeva trail is a famous trail starting at Zavižan in the Northern Velebit and stretching for 57 km along the ridge of Northern and Central Velebit, passing close to several mountain peaks, but with little elevation gain. It is a masterpiece of design (by Ante Premužić) and construction, made in the early thirties of the 20th century, perfect fit of the drystone walling technique into the Velebit nature.

Early July 2021 three friends of mine, Larisa, Maja and Jelena, and I made quick arrangements to hike the famous Premužićeva trail in two days. The trail is usually hiked in three stages (days), but we were in good shape and had not too much time so the plan was to do it two days.

Without heavy backpacks, since we decided to stay at the same place for two nights. Our accommodation was at a cheese dairy in Krasno, a village below the Zavižan mountain, renting rooms and providing taxi services to the trail – for two nights. That was quite easy, we could hike equipped just with a day pack containing mainly water, some food and spare clothes.

Day 1 From Zavižan to Alan

We left Zavižan where our host drove us from Krasno after breakfast at the dairy, sometime around 10 in the morning. The morning was quite chilly, a bit cloudy but the weather forecast was promising.

The trail was beautiful, the weather just right, not too hot, we met just few hikers and made a couple of climbs to the mountains close to the trail.

Climbing one of the peaks (Gromovača 1676 m)

Enjoying the views over the strictly protected nature – the Rožanski and Hajdučki kukovi (stone ridges)

After the lunch from our backpacks at Rossi’s shelter we continued to hike and climb some of the peaks on our way. The scenery is mainly forest and rocks in this part of the trail.

Larisa climbing the Crikvena peak (1620 m)

And finally, at the final part of our first day hike we reached grassy trails and the mountain lodge Alan and shortly before that the Seravski vrh peak.

And the well deserved Velebitsko beer at the Alan lodge

The total stats of day 1: 17 km, 773 m elevation gain, elapsed (total) time incl. breaks a bit under 7 hours.

Day 2 From Alan to Baške Oštarije

We started our second day quite early, our host drove us from Krasno to Alan and off we went shortly after 8 a.m. The weather was again quite cloudy, just perfect. Since our distance for day 2 was longer that on day 1, we skipped the peaks on our way.

The trailhead was fabulous, with more grassy areas than the first part and views over the islands. The clouds disappeared later in the morning but it was luckily not too hot. We even saw wild horses down on the meadows, but quite far away.