We all know Croatia for its beautiful coastline and charming resorts, the unique Plitvice Lakes National Park, or the filming locations of the Game of Thrones series.
Croatia is also home to some of the craziest and most interesting museums I have ever seen and today, I am here to share them all with you.
Best part? Most of them are located in Zagreb, so you don’t have to explore the country from one end to the other to see most of them (although it would be fun to do so!)
Museum of Illusions in Zagreb
If you want an hour of fun in the center of Zagreb, this is your choice! It’s perfect for the entire family, and we always have heaps of fun when we visit. Of course, our son is the one who enjoys it the most – but we do too, so adults are in for a treat as well.
Ticket prices range from 7 Euros for children to 9 Euro for Adults (discounts offered for families and groups). It’s well worth it, as this little museum will entertain you, will make you question your own eyes, and definitely will make you laugh.
It’s full of optical illusions, educational games, puzzles and children (as it is a fun educational museum for kids).
You can try a lot of free puzzle games at the entrance and even win some discounts if you manage to solve them- just don’t forget about the rest of the museum (as we did, because we looove brain teasers).
This museum will definitely put a smile on your face. Don’t forget to bring your camera and prepare to spend at least a coupe of hours here.
Traveling by bus is convenient and easy in Croatia’s capital, and I recommend checking out my guide to public transportation in Zagreb to learn how to get around.
Where to find the Museum of Illusions in Zagreb
Address: Ilica 72 – Zagreb (here on Google Maps)
Website: Museum of Illusions in Zagreb
Working hours: Daily from 9AM to 10PM
Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb
Loveable, cheesy, memorable, sad, heart-warming, funny, emotional, surprising – this is the Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb.
The museum is about failed relationships: people from all around the world sent a personal object that reminded them of their former relationships.
These objects are accompanied by a description, often very touching and sad, but you can find some pretty funny stories too (if you have the patience to read all the descriptions).
The museum is not just about love relationships – there are rooms dedicated to parental relationships and failed friendships also.
It has won Europe’s most innovative museum award in 2011 and there are still people coming from all over the world to visit it, as it gained a lot of international interest and went viral on social media.
If you’re in Zagreb and even if you don’t consider yourself a hopeless romantic this unusual museum in Croatia it’s a ‘must’. Not necessarily a great choice for younger children, though, as there’s a lot of reading involved in this museum.
The cost for a ticket is 7 Euros per adult, and there are no discounts I am aware of. Still – pretty cheap!
Where to find the Museum of Broken Relationships in Zagreb
Address: Ćirilometodska 2, 10000, Zagreb (here on Google Maps)
Website: Museum of Broken Relationships
Working hours: Daily from 9AM to 9PM (or until 10PM between June 1st – September 30th)
Peek&Poke Computer Museum in Rijeka
A museum that is often overlooked – for example, we missed it completely when we first visited Rijeka, simply because we didn’t know it existed. But now we do – and so do you, so make sure to visit!
It’s a great museum for your inner geek. Even if you think you don’t have one, trust me, after visiting this museum, you’ll become one!
The Peek&Poke Computer Museum in Rijeka is a collection of your childhood: hundreds of old computers (they are still working!), calculators, technical objects, the annoying sound of a 56K modem connecting, the old Windows startup song, and the awful music of video games (which will transform you into a child by the way).
You can discover lost, forgotten or rare computers and especially games you forgot about, and most of the objects are free to touch and work on. I have to admit, I loved this museum in Croatia.
And at the entrance, we got a free drink! No wonder it was fun to get lost in the museum. And despite its retro vibes, it is highly enjoyable by the entire family, including younger children. The ticket price is a flat 7 Euros per person.
It is very similar to another retro museum we visited, the Museum of Games we saw when we spent one month in Prague.
Where to find the Peek&Poke Museum in Rijeka
Address: Ul. Ivana Grohovca 2A, 51000, Rijeka, Croatia (here on Google Maps)
Website: Peek&Poke Museum in Rijeka
Working hours: Mon – Fri: 10AM – 6PM; Sat: 10AM – 6PM; Sun: Closed
Froggyland in Split
Picture this: you sitting near the fireplace and telling your grandchildren about a miniature circus made of stuffed frogs. The look on their faces: priceless.
To be fair, everyone’s look will be priceless after telling them about a museum of stuffed frogs in Split.
I know, I know, it sounds gross and cruel and bizarre – but let’s admit it, we love looking at these kinds of things, especially in an article titled “the most unusual museums in Croatia”.
And while you’re frowning upon the idea, I’ll tell you about it: it’s a collection of 507 stuffed frogs arranged in 21 cases by the Hungarian taxidermist Mére Ferenc. He completed the project in 1920, after 10 years of hard work.
I really believe it was hard work, as the cases appear in such detail, that you truly need passion and devotion to do this: there is classroom full of frogs, each frog sitting in a different position, or taking notes, frogs in the circus, frogs as blacksmiths, frogs having a picnic, frogs taking pictures with tiny cameras and so on.
It’s also a display of the early 20th century’s everyday life – but with frogs. Although it was forbidden to take pictures in the museum when we visited, you can check the frogs below at their website.
Also, if you enjoy visiting museums, I wrote about the best museums in Split here.
Where to find Froggyland in Split:
Address: Ul. kralja Tomislava 5, 21000, Split, Croatia (on Google Maps here)
Website: Froggyland in Split
Working Hours: 10AM – 10PM
Nikola Tesla Technical Museum
We’re rounding up the list with another great – and unusual – museum in Zagreb. This one is truly enjoyable if you visit it with your kids. OR with your boyfriend/husband who becomes a kid as soon he sees all the engines and technical stuff on display.
While we spent more than 2 hours in this museum and I had to listen to a presentation about how a steam engine locomotive works, I liked it in the end.
We even came back for a presentation about Nicola Tesla which included some really cool experiments: a rotating magnetic field, Tesla’s high-frequency transformers, the wireless transfer of electromagnetic oscillations, a remote-controlled ship, Tesla’s turbine (I had to Google these, to be honest). All are part of the Croatian inventions that have changed the world.
The presentation was in Croatian (although everybody in the room was an English speaker), but the experiments were enjoyable and unique. There is also a guided tour to a reconstructed coal mine underneath the museum to round up a perfect day.
And if you want to learn more about this amazing country, I recommend checking out my previous article sharing some amazing Fun Facts about Croatia.
Where to find the Technical Museum in Zagreb
Address: Savska cesta 18, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia (here on Google Maps)
Website: Technical Museum in Zagreb
Working Hours: 8:30 AM – 4:30 PM
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Do you know any other unusual museums in Croatia? Let me and the readers know by commenting below. Also, don’t hesitate to let us all know which of the museums above is your favorite.