Hvar and Pakleni Islands half day private boat tour

This half-day private boat tour from Split gives you a short walk through Hvar Town and a long swim in the Pakleni islands — five hours in total, on a boat that belongs only to your group.

It is the quickest way to reach Hvar and still have a boat waiting when you want to leave — no ferry timetable, no queue for the catamaran.

Be clear about what it is, though: a swimming tour with a look at Hvar Town attached, not a day of sightseeing ashore.

Five hours door to door. Roughly two of them go on the crossings, an hour each way, leaving close to three to divide between the town and the islands.

Most groups spend an hour to ninety minutes ashore in Hvar and the rest at anchor. You can shift that balance on the day; you cannot stretch it. If the swimming is what you came for and Hvar is the backdrop, this is the better-value boat.

The tour lasts about 5 hours in total, as a morning departure (09:00 to 14:00) or an afternoon one (14:00 to 19:00). We do not publish a minute-by-minute schedule — on a private boat the time at each stop is yours to decide, and the sea decides the rest.

Departure from Split

Your skipper meets you at the agreed pick-up point for a short safety briefing, then it is south through Splitska vrata — the strait between Šolta and Brač — and across the Hvar channel. About an hour, sheltered by islands for most of it.

Hvar Town

You tie up in the harbour of Hvar, thirty seconds from the main square.

That distance is why a half day works here at all. Everything you can realistically see is inside a few hundred metres of the mooring, and most of it faces the same open space. What takes real time sits outside that circle: the fortress on the hill, the monastery further along the waterfront.

Sveti Klement, Pakleni islands

Five minutes out of the harbour the wooded islets begin.

Despite what the name suggests to English speakers, pakleni has nothing to do with hell. It comes from paklina — pine resin, collected here and used to seal wooden hulls. The group counts sixteen islands and islets, Sveti Klement the largest; the figure of nineteen that circulates online is wrong.

This is where the bulk of your five hours goes. The water between the islets is shallow and clear, the bottom pale, and the snorkelling along the rocks the best within an hour of Split. Our guide to things to see on the Pakleni islands has more.

Return to Split

An hour back across the two channels. On the afternoon departure you cross with a low sun behind Šolta — the best light of the day, and the reason many guests choose the afternoon.

You will not see everything. This is the walk that fits, starting at the harbour steps.

• St Stephen's Square — 4,500 m², the largest historic square in Dalmatia, and until it was filled in over the centuries this was seawater. The public well in the middle was cut in 1520.
• St Stephen's Cathedral — the eastern wall of the square, its Renaissance bell tower opening up as it climbs, each storey carrying wider openings than the one below.
• The Arsenal — built to service Venetian war galleys, on the south side of the same square. A theatre was added upstairs in 1612, one of the oldest municipal theatres in Europe.
• The lanes behind it — stone side streets and lavender shops that are not a tourist invention.

What does not fit: the Fortica fortress, the Franciscan monastery along the waterfront, and a sit-down lunch. All three belong to the full-day tour.

On a half day you realistically get one anchorage, sometimes two. Tell your skipper at the start which kind you want.

• Ždrilca and Mlini — narrow channels beside Marinkovac rather than open bays, so there is no swell and the water stays shallow. Where skippers take families.
• Palmižana, on Sveti Klement — an ACI marina, a botanical garden and restaurants above the beach. Pick it if you want a table and a bar, and expect company.
• A cove with no name — there are dozens, and the wind decides which are empty on a given day. This is usually the swim guests talk about afterwards.

If your group wants beach bars rather than bays, the Laganini and Hula Hula half-day tour does exactly that: Laganini above Palmižana, Hula Hula on the shore west of Hvar Town.

Both slots run five hours and cost the same, but they are not the same day.

The morning departure, 09:00 to 14:00. Flattest sea, bays close to empty, Hvar Town awake but not yet full. The right choice if you are prone to seasickness, travelling with small children, or want photographs without other boats in them. Back in Split for a late lunch.

The afternoon departure, 14:00 to 19:00. Warmer water and air, and the anchorages clearing after five as the day boats leave. The maestral, the north-westerly that builds through the morning, peaks around two in the afternoon and usually drops by five — so the outbound leg can be livelier and the run home calm.

We run the same two places as a full-day tour, and the difference is not only length.

This half day is a swim with a look at Hvar. An hour or so in the town — square, cathedral, Arsenal, coffee — and everything else at anchor in the Pakleni islands. One bay, no schedule, half your day still free at the end.

The full day buys the hours ashore. Eight hours instead of five makes room for the climb to the Fortica fortress, the Franciscan monastery, a proper lunch and usually a second swimming stop.

Rule of thumb: if you came to swim, take this one. If Hvar Town itself is the reason for the trip, pay for the extra three hours.

Hvar gets more than 2,700 hours of sunshine a year, so what changes month to month is the water and the crowd.

• May and early June – sea at 20–22 °C, cool enough that some guests swim once rather than three times. The anchorages are yours.
• July and August – water at its most comfortable, bays at their fullest. The morning slot gets out ahead of the crowd; the afternoon slot waits for it to leave.
• September – the sea holds its summer temperature and the day boats thin out. If you can pick your dates, pick these.
• October – workable on calm days, but restaurants on the islets start closing and cancellations become likelier.

The route never leaves the Split and Hvar channels, so it copes with wind better than our tours out to Vis and Biševo. A strong jugo still makes the crossing unpleasant; we move the date rather than run a bad day.

It is the wrong tour if you want to walk Hvar Town properly, eat a long lunch or reach the fortress; book the full day instead. Other short trips are on the half-day tours page.

Swimwear and a towel, sunscreen, a hat, sunglasses, something with sleeves for the crossings, and cash or card for drinks ashore. Leave the walking shoes — there is no fortress climb on this one. Water, snorkelling gear and safety equipment are already on board. Want to add a sea scooter and SUP to your day? These can be arranged as an extra. There is no toilet on the boat; use the ones in Hvar Town or at Palmižana.