About this journey

Rijeka station, whose neoclassical arcaded façade stretches 150 m along the platform edge, opened on 25 June 1873 when routes from Budapest via Zagreb and from Vienna via Ljubljana and Pivka were completed. The building itself followed in 1889–1891, designed by Budapest architect Ferenc Pfaff. From Rijeka the line climbs inland through the karst terrain of the Croatian littoral toward the continental interior.

The destination, Ogulin, sits at 323 m above sea level in a karst valley formed by the rivers Dobra and Zagorska Mrežnica. The Dobra disappears underground at the town centre, and the western side of the valley is defined by the mountain massif of Velika Kapela, dominated by Klek at 1 181 m. Ogulin is also the point where electrification ends: the track from Zagreb runs electric as far as here, and trains continuing south toward Dalmatia change to diesel traction, because the onward Lika railway — the only rail link between continental Croatia and Dalmatia — is a 220 km single-track, un-electrified line. That line, construction of which began in spring 1913, was completed in stages and finally finished on 25 July 1925. The journey from Rijeka to Ogulin therefore traces the coastal approach to one of Croatia's most significant railway junctions.