Flew through Split on Saturday July 17, 2010. Airport is seemingly in the middle of a little village about 40 minutes outside of Split, accessed by small roads.

First appearances were fine - somewhat dated, but light and airy, befitting the area. Check-in was quick and efficient. Had a bite to eat in the sit down eatery upstairs, was ho hum.

Went through security - which was seemingly quite lax. Travel partner got through with two bags of liquids, without a question. Passports weren't stamped on the way through immigration.

The waiting area was severely overcrowded. The airport is clearly stretched to the max. Upon clearing immigration, we encountered people sitting waiting for their flights in and around the immigration desks, up and down the stairs, and even inside the duty free shop. There was not a seat to be had anywhere in the airport, and line-ups for the limited number of cafés and bars stretched throughout the terminal.

Adding to the chaos was the heat - A/C was on, but clearly not able to handle the temperatures outside (in the 30s) and the influx of people.

Our flight to Geneva ended up getting cancelled, and no one was able to tell us why or what our options were (easyJet doesn't employ staff on the ground here). We ended up going to easyJet's ticket agency "Aeroplan" (no relation to Air Canada's frequent flier program), and he somehow got us on another flight to London-Gatwick (we knew there'd be flights from London back to Geneva at some point).

When our flight was finally ready to board, we were ushered outside to board buses to our plane. First buses filled up, and we were left waiting while other jets powered up to leave for the runway. All of the ground personnel were wearing ear protection...except us. Was also a security risk - I could have easily ran up to one of the jets and thrown something in the engine (that's how close we were).

Our capatain on board explained that Croatian air traffic control is overburdened and crippling under summer travel levels. No kidding!

If you can avoid it (which is hard), don't fly through Split during the summer. Dubrovnik would be my choice.