I visited Croatia in 2019, and wasn't sure about the legalities of visiting Zeljava. So I located the local police station and emailed them to ask if I could get a permit or something to visit. They politely replied that no, it was off limits and dangerous, so I went anyway. Awesome place and I note they have cleared the vegetation away from the old DC3 to make it better for tourist photos! The base is awesome but do take the mines signs seriously and stay on the tarmac, and of course take care in the tunnels - they go for many hundreds of metres and if you get lost in there you're properly lost.

Elsewhere in the country get up into the Velebit mountains and try to avoid the tourist hot spots - beautiful towns but absolutely rammed with emmets. Split and Dubrovnik completely ruined. We liked Zadar and given a bit more time would have wanted to explore further inland. The beaches aren't generally great (think Skegness, 1965) but inland is more unspoiled, very friendly, and reasonably cheap.

Italy I'm afraid I wasn't too impressed with. Everyone drives either like a granny or like a total idiot, and they put speed cameras everywhere. I also met the world's rudest, most ignorant petrol pump attendant. I didn't really have an itinerary so should have done more research on places to go, but I accidentally found Orvieto which was gorgeous.

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In practice, the airbase has an active visible presence by both the Croatian police and their border guard... but they absolutely could not give less of a damn about tourists - they're only there because it's right on the BiH border and they're worried about illegal crossings into the Schengen area. The DC-3 is not just cleared of vegetation, but there's now a summer cafe set up next to it.


I respected the speed camera warnings, but once you start paying a bit of attention, you'll realize they put speed camera boxes everywhere. Almost all of them are empty and just have stickers to look like lenses!