Dinaric Alps

Dinaric Alps is a mountain range of the Balkans named after Dinara mountain range. Most of the islands in Adriatics belong to this mountain system because the western parts of the range were partially submerged by the seawater in earlier geo history.

The Dinarics extend south from near the Italian-Slovenian border to northern Albania. Most of the montain system lies in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina; parts also in Italy, Slovenia, Montenegro, and northern Albania. The Dinaric Alps is one of the most rugged barriers in Europe, isolating the Adriatic coast from the interior.

Dinaric Alps make a united tectonic unit with the southernmost limestone Alps and Šara-Pindus mountain systems. In the science of geology this unit and all the ranges in it, developed during Tertiary thrusting, share the same scientific term, the Dinarides. The area refers to tectonic unit only, and this unit is in fact larger than the area known as Dinaric Alps.

Dinaric Alps are also a part of a huge and geologically young Mediterranean mountain chain that starts with the Pyrenees, continuing with the European Alps, over the Dinaric Alps continues to the Šara-Pindus system and over the Peloponnesus, Crete, Rhodes, and Eageanean islands reaches Taurus mountain range in Asia Minor, in Turkey.

The height of the majority of the mountains is between 1,000 and 2,000 meters, except the highest central core of Dinaric “triangle” where the most of the summits are between 1,900 and 2,600 meters high. But because of the other factors, even the “lower” areas of Dinaric Alps are mountainous in their character.

Check out our pick of classic and most popular adventure travel tours that you can do with us in area of Dinaric Alps.