Drive an hour south of Split and the coast changes scale: the Biokovo massif rises straight out of the sea like a grey curtain, and at its feet Makarska curls around a palm-lined harbour. This is the day trip for people who can’t choose between a swim and a summit — because here, you genuinely don’t have to. One warning up front: the mountain half needs a car and a cool head. Here’s the honest version.
Makarska town: the pretty base camp
Makarska itself is an easy pleasure: a broad riva under palms, an old town of pale stone lanes behind it, and the sheltered harbour framed by two green peninsulas. It’s more resort-flavoured than Split — this is the capital of a fifty-kilometre riviera of beaches — but the setting forgives everything. Coffee on the harbour with that wall of mountain overhead is worth the drive alone.
The beaches: the riviera’s whole point
The Makarska riviera is one long ribbon of pebble beaches backed by pine forest, and the water is some of the clearest on the mainland coast. The town beach is long and lively; walk the coastal path around the Sveti Petar peninsula for quieter coves. Connoisseurs drive ten minutes north to Brela, whose Punta Rata regularly makes lists of Europe’s best beaches — pines, white pebbles, impossibly blue water.
The Skywalk: 1,200 metres of air under glass
Above the town, inside Biokovo Nature Park, a horseshoe of glass juts out over the void at around 1,228 metres — the Skywalk. You look down past your shoes at the sea and the whole riviera, with Brač and Hvar floating beyond. The drive up is the adventure’s real test: a narrow mountain road with switchbacks and timed entry in season (there’s a park entrance fee, and summer slots fill — go early). Not a driver? Organised transfers run from Makarska. Haze builds by midday in summer, so mornings win.
Higher still: Sveti Jure
If the Skywalk whets your appetite, the park road continues to the summit of Sveti Jure at 1,762 metres — among the highest points in Croatia you can reach on asphalt. Up there the temperature drops sharply, the vegetation turns alpine, and the view swings from the islands to the mountains of Bosnia. Bring a layer even in August; the summit wind doesn’t care what month it is.
A realistic day plan
Early start from Split, mountain first: Biokovo entrance as it opens, Skywalk before the haze, Sveti Jure if the road and nerves allow. Down for a late, long lunch in Makarska’s old town, then the afternoon flat on a beach — town sand-and-pebble for convenience, Brela for the postcard. Ice cream on the riva, and home along the coast road as the light turns gold. If you’d rather trade the summit for a river canyon, Omiš sits exactly on the way.
Is it worth it from Split?
Yes — with the right expectations. As a beach day alone, Split’s own beaches are closer. What Makarska adds is the combination: the most dramatic sea-and-mountain landscape in Dalmatia, compressed into one day. It’s the trip that photographs least like the rest of your Split week — and our apartments in the old town put the coast road ten minutes from your morning coffee.