Slovenia

Friday 26th October

We had arrived into Ljubljana late last night after flying with Wizz Air from London Luton Airport and caught a €9 (£8/$15 nzd)van to our Airbnb in the center of town. It was this super cute place in what used to be the tobacco dock so it had a beautiful oval roof and could even sleep 6 people! We really were there for just a few hours before we left at 9am to walk 20 minutes to the train station to leave our bag whilst we explored Slovenias capital city. Now the name is definitely something iv been struggling with since its not normal to have those syllables in that order in english but the name is said lub-lee-yana. Slovenia is a small country of 2 million that is bordered by Croatia, Hungary, Austria and Italy. It has a very small coastline along the Adriatic sea so its not entirely landlocked and there is a small town called Piran which is on the seaside. Everyone has told me it is the New Zealand of Europe and even after one day here I can see why as it also has the seaside, alpine peaks, rolling hills, rivers and lakes. So far we have discovered that the Slovenes as they are known as are incredibly friendly people and have impeccable english. As we walked from our Airbnb we admired the beautiful coloured buildings and the red/orange/yellow autumn leaves falling off the trees in Tivoli park. After visiting Croatia we knew that Slovenia was also another country that was part of Yugoslavia along with Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina. They gained independence in 1991 and became their own country and all this was just a bit of casual history talk as we walked but we were missing the walking encyclopedia - Mr Paul Commons. The train station was pretty easy once we got some cash and we were able to rent a small locker for the day for €3 (£2.70/$5 nzd). This was also where we would come and pick up our car at SIXT so it made sense that we left the bag here. Next stop was definitely a nice cafe for breakfast and a blog I had been reading earlier mentioned a place called Le petit Cafe which had excellent reviews on google. This was another 20 minutes walk away but we ended up down town admiring Prešeren Square which is the main town square where the famous Triple Bridge (Tromostovje) is located. This connects the old town with the new town and was built in 1932 after the original bridges built in the 13th century were no longer sufficient. It was pretty quiet in town at this stage and the morning air was crisp and clean as we walked along the river side looking at the glistening water below and the colourful buildings on the other side with the Ljubljana Castle looming over top of the entire town. We came across the small cafe which had a French feel about it and there was no doubt we would be getting something tasty for breakfast. We found a cute table by the window where we could watch the passersby as unfortunately in Europe we often find it hard to sit outside and eat as you often feel as though you have inhaled an entire cigarette yourself with everyone smoking around you so if you are just as against smoking as we are I would highly recommend saving yourself the unpleasantness and sit inside! It was also a bit cold to be out there! Funny enough we both ordered the English breakfast which was super cheap price of €6 (£5.40/$10 nzd) each and Lew added a hot chocolate on the side whilst I got the chia seed and beetroot smoothie. We kinda should have planned what we would do today but we ended up catching up with emails and “life admin” as iv been told its called. Breakfast was wonderful and thankfully didn’t include any black pudding like a traditional full english breakfast would back in the UK. Having brushed my teeth in the bathroom and paid we left and made our way back through town to where the funicular goes up the hill to the castle. We got a little side tracked along the way as there were SO many cute nordic design shops I was eager to look into. The funicular cost €4.40 (£4/$7.50 nzd) for us both for a one way ticket up to the castle. The castle was built in the middle of the 15th century by the Habsburg monarchy who demolished the fortress already standing on the hilltop that belonged to the former rulers the Sponheim family. It was of course intended to defend the city against the many Ottoman invasions (Turkish empire) and was originally made of wood before being reinforced with stone like it is today. During its time the castle was a military hospital, a state prison, quarantine station for prisoner of war (WW1) and was occupied by the Nazis during WWII. It was renovated in the 70’s and became the popular tourist destination it is today. There are many exhibitions inside such as the puppet museum, museum of Slovene history and many art displays which you can pay extra for but it is free to walk around the grounds. Once we had looked around and got a pretty view of the red roofed city below us we begun our descent down Gornji trg which is what the blog I had read recommended as a scenic way off the mountain. Sure enough it was a lovely cobblestoned street with residential houses lining the way and popped out the bottom of the street where I had wanted to do some shopping anyways. There were a few gorgeous shops such as ‘Gud One’ and an amazing store where I bought a gorgeous pillow case for our bed called Formadoma Design Shop. There was this delicious looking but very simple bakery called Pekarna Osem that had been recommended and walking in the heavenly smell of fresh bread hit us. We could help but buy a big warm fresh loaf for dinner and a focaccia to share now with olives and dried tomatoes. As we wandered up the street eating our focaccia we came across the triple bridges again and then the Open Kitchen which is pretty much exactly what the name suggests and it is a collection of food stalls. There were all sorts of food from things that looked far to close to a tagine (we need to give them a wide berth for at least a year after our recent trip to Morocco!), Asian, Zimbabwean and a lot of traditional food that strangely involved a lot of horse meat to our disgust. We weren’t quite ready for lunch at this point but we had a place to come back to when we were so we continued to walk up the river where we came across the central market. This was where all the locals were gathering their fresh produce for the week and they even had vending machines that sold locally produced milk, cheese and yoghurt! We purchased some mandarins and admired the lovely bright orange pumpkins on display for halloween next week. A few streets over the river and found another cool design shop called Flat that had a wacky bike outside where they had altered it to have a tiny wheel on the front. I can’t imagine it would be the most stable thing to ride! We spoke a lot about how winters back home in NZ everyone just sort of buttons down the hatches and gets through winter but here in Europe they really enjoy the season. Many bars out on the riverfront had heaters under the tables to keep your legs warm and sheep skins on the seats. At this time of year they also begin selling mulled wine and spiced apple cider and everyone is encouraged to get outside despite the miserable weather. It makes us excited thinking about the upcoming ski season and we are struggling to plan where to go as there are SO many options. We sat on a bench by the river enjoying what little sunlight was poking through the clouds and watched as local school children rowed dragon boats up and down it shouting and giggling. Dragons are actually a reoccurring theme around the city as they are the Ljubljana city symbol as they represent power, courage and greatness. You can see them on the dragon bridge and also in the castles coat of arms. Once we had built up an appetite we went back to the Open Kitchen to get some lunch around 2pm. Lew decided to try a pita bread with horse meat and I went for the Zimbabwean chicken curry. Lew told me he thought it looked like a tagine and I was instantly nauseated, so I begun neighing at him…a great combination. Post lunch we walked to an area called the Metelkova Art Center which used to be the former site of the military headquarters for the Austro-Hungarian Empire and then the Slovenia headquarters of the Yugoslav National Army. The 7 military barracks were used by squatters since 1993 but is now used as a hipster area for bars and live music with its graffiti covered walls and abstract mosaic decorations. We only needed to walk through here briefly as there wasn’t anything going on with it being a Friday afternoon but the train station was close by where we were getting the car so it made sense to visit. We were due to pick the car up at 4pm but headed there early to pick up our bag and deal with the reservation with Sixt. Everything was all prepaid for and we had got extra insurance so the excess was less but still they encourage you to spend more money to include tyres and windscreen coverage. They basically scaremonger you into it and declining it we left feeling a little apprehensive despite being good drivers. We had the same small car as in Greece - the Opal Corsa in black so it was pretty easy for us to get in and drive away. Lew always switches back into driving on the right with such ease and I was back on navigation. It took us an hour to get up north on the motorway through beautiful valleys of trees changing colours and small townships which the motorway flew over. Lake Bled is the tourist hotspot in Slovenia at all times of the year which is why we decided not to base ourselves here. There is a small town around the sister lake of Bled called Bohinj which is a lot quieter and only 20 minutes drive away which is where we will be. We passed through Lake Bled just as the sun was at photographers golden hour and we absolutely had to pull over to take a couple of shots of the castle perched precariously up on the hill and the church on the island in the middle of the lake. There were still people out kayaking and we vowed we would have to come back to properly admire it all. We continued onwards and the further we went into the mountains the more relaxed we became. How can we even live in a city such as London when we love the mountains so much? We pulled into our Airbnb which was above the tourist office and out host met us there and showed us up to the apartment on the third floor. It was a very well designed Scandinavian styled apartment with all wood and nice Ikea stuff. It was cosy and had a full kitchen. We were very pleased we decided to stay here for the rest of our nights! We quickly unpacked and walked down to the supermarket 5 minutes away to grab something for dinner. The fresh mountain air was cold but pleasant and reminded us of our time in the Dolomites in Italy which are ever so close here. Wandering around foreign supermarkets have become one of our favourite pastime and we loaded up ingredients for nachos for dinner. We purchased €43 (£38.70/$73 nzd) worth of breakfast and dinner ingredients as well as some snacks for our adventures. We walked back to the apartment realised we forgot an avocado - a staple of nachos and Lew had to run back. We relaxed in the apartment for an hour or so before Lew begun cooking dinner. He said the meat smelt a little like his lunch and he thought it may be horse. Reluctantly I translated the label on the front of the packet but it was pretty vague as to what type of meat it was…thankfully. Whilst we ate nachos we caught up with my parents and then planned what we would do for the next few days whilst we were in this beautiful country.

The smell was heavenly of all that fresh bread!

Triple Bridge and Franciscan Church of the Annunciation

The mountains makes this guy grin from ear to ear

Saturday 27th October

We were woken up to heavy rain and wind as forecasted but it was much more miserable out there than we expected. We enjoyed a quiet start watching the rain being blown sideways through the valley and the autumn leaves being pulled off the trees. We knew the entire time we were here was expected to be exactly the same weather but despite our Airbnb being nice and cosy we needed to get out and see some of this country! We planned to do a bit of driving today and head from Bohinj where we were staying up into the Soca valley to the town of Bovec. This is the area where a lot of rafting and kayaking on the rivers happens but I doubt we will be interested in that today! Along the way up we also bookmarked some walks if the weather clears up as there are many waterfalls within the mountains. Packing up some snacks we headed out popping into the tourist shop below us to pay our €1,27 (£1.14/$2 nzd) tourist tax per person for each night we were there which is something we believe NZ should introduce. As we left Bohinj the rain was just bucketing down as we begun to wind our way into the mountains with the road scattered with pretty coloured leaves. The first stop of the day was 1.5 hours away which was the Tolmin Gorge. The roads were stunning as we approached the Triglav National Park where the gorge is situated. It was still very wet and we certainly didn’t bring the appropriate clothing for this kinda weather as Lew was in jeans and me in my running shoes. Both of us had very half arsed rain jackets that are instantly wet and we vowed to invest in proper ones once we returned to London. The park is the only one in this area where you have to pay an entrance fee of €5 (£4.45/$8.70 nzd) for an adult and €4 (£3.56/$6.98) for a student and the older women in the isolated ticket booth exclaimed how much she loved NZ when she asked where we were from. Sadly she hadn’t managed to get there but she said she had been there through google maps! There were pretty minimal amounts of people out on the track as expected and the rain wouldn’t give us a break. The easy circular trail would take us about an hour as we climbed up and down stone steps, walked across swing bridges and entered into different caves along the way. It was very well sign posted and some of the popular views are the Devils Bridge which is a 60m high bridge in the valley over the Tolminka River, there is the wedged rock called Bear’s Head, Zadlaška Jama (Dante’s cave) and the thermal springs in the caves under Devil’s Bridge. It really was a stunning area and we enjoyed getting some fresh air as we gazed up at the rocks and looked down on the clearwater river below us. The rain did ease up enough at one point for us to put down the umbrella as we walked back to the car and we hoped that as we drove further north the weather would continue to get better. Alas we were very wrong indeed and it actually got worse rather than better with our windscreen wipers on as fast as they could go to see anything. We tried to go into a couple of waterfalls as we drove north called Slap Kozjak and Slap Boka but it really was too miserable now to get out of the car. We passed through many small villages where there seemed to be no signs of life and we thought that in just a few weeks time this would likely be covered in snow. With it being 4pm and we had only just eaten snacks in the car we thought since we were so close to the Italian border we could find some good pizza in the area. Pulling into a carpark in Bovec we ran from the car to Gostilna in Pizerija Letni vrt to get ourselves a small snack before we had to drive 2 hours back home. There was barely anyone here but the ended up having a good menu and they did a mushroom risotto for me and a salami pizza for Lew. He wasn’t overly pleased about it and then he remembered that the pizza in Italy got worse and worse and we drove up the country! We ran back to the car and plotted our way back home avoiding going through Italy and Austria which were options and would most definitely be an issue as we didn’t have a vignette for Austria which is needed to drive on the motorways! There was a section on the map where there seemed like there was a million switch backs just outside of Trenta where we had to drive through the Vršič Pass. This is the highest pass in Slovenia and the upper roads are impassable by heavy snowfall much of the winter which was quite obvious with the super high snow marker poles on either side of the road. The road played an important part of WWI and was improved in 1915 in order to supply the Isonzo front with supplies and this lead to the roads nickname of Russian road since approximately 10 thousand Russian Prisoner of war were used as labourers. The rain was just constant through here which also made it very impressive with waterfalls cascading down every few meters. We had to stop a couple of times to admire a few that seemed to have a copious amounts of water. On the way down into the Kranjska Gora region on the border of Italy and Hungary the corners of the road had been made with cobblestones to aid in friction for the cars. These had been in place since 1915 when those prisoners of war had laid them individually by hand. The road signs even had a countdown of the number of hairpin bends left on the pass and Lew swore the sign begun at about 70! It was pitch black by now as we made our way back into the main highway to continue the further hours drive home. We snuggled in for the night with the rain hammering on the windows outside and didn’t even need dinner after the late lunch we had!

Watching the sideways rain in the mountains

Avoiding the puddles in his inappropriate walking shoes!

Local restaurant Gostilna in Pizzerija Letni vrt

Sunday 27th October

Another miserable day with heavy liquid sunshine ie rain. Daylight savings has ended as of today which meant that we had an extra hour sleep in although I still woke at the usual time. We hung around the house which was warm and quiet despite the rain banging on the windows before making a plan for the day. We would head into a couple of areas recommended by the tourist office below when we were there yesterday. The rain was so hard we were soaked just getting to the car but we begun the drive into Stara Fužina where we were told there were some walks up the valley. This was the first time we had seen Lake Bohinj and we were impressed by how clear it was and surrounded by autumn trees. Clearly this was a bit of a hot spot during summer as there were numerous picnic spots and places to hire kayaks all around the waterfront. We found a place where you could walk but the rain was absolutely bucketing down so we continued onwards. We wound around the river through darkened road due to the forest and bright orange and yellow leaves framing the road. The rivers feeding the lake had oodles of water flowing down them after the intense 28 hours of rain we had had so far. Driving right around we came across the cable car that takes you up to Mt Vogel but there wasn’t much point in doing that with all this weather. There was a sign pointing to a waterfall called Savica which we hadn’t heard of but decided to check out. Turns out it’s the third most visited attraction in Slovenia and today it would be even better with all this rain! We parked up and walked up where we were greeted by a wood cabin where you had to buy your ticket. We ended up having to go back to the car to get some money because we weren’t expecting to pay. We were a little frustrated because yet again NZ is free to anyone to go into some pretty impressive walks such as the glaciers in the west coast and Cathedral Cove on the Coromandel Peninsula. Overall it cost us €5.50 (£4.90/$9.60 nzd) for an adult and a student but we paid (cash only by the way) and begin the walk up in the pouring rain. We were pretty soaked by the time we had walked 20 minutes up some stairs to where the waterfall was coming down the valley. We could hear the river roaring below us and we knew this would be impressive once we reached the top. The Savica is very unique among the worlds waterfalls as it’s water direction is divided into two parts in the hidden underground. It is in an A shape and appears at 836m and is 78m high. We knew we had reached the top as we could see the mist coming off the falls flying through the valley. There was a small wooden hut as a shelter that gave you a view but certainly didn’t shelter you from the wind, rain and spray coming off it. Normally the pools at the bottom of the falls which are basically a trickle are open but today they were quite clearly shut off. The falls are fed from the valley of the Triglav Lakes and Pršivec that flows to it through a horizontal cave tunnel. We were able to get some good shots but were certainly soaked once we had finished admiring it all. Lew was once again in his jeans which were his only pair of long pants and he was drenched. We got back to the car and and removed as much wet stuff as possible having to sit on a couple of plastic bags so we didn’t wet the seats. There was no point in going home to change as neither of us really had anything to change into and we would just get soaked instantly anyway when we went back outside. We decided to make our way to the famous Lake Bled instead. Unfortunately the weather was just not giving us a break at all and there wasn’t much we could do to not get soaked. The Bled Castle was a potential option and we drove up through the town to that. We weren’t exactly keen in paying €3/hr (£2.67/$5.20) in parking so we came back down to try and find something free down at the bottom. After reading some TripAdvisor reviews and being unable to find a free carpark we realised everyone goes to the castle for the view over the lake which wouldn’t be so good in this weather anyway. Giving up on the idea I had been recommended a walk called Mala Osojnica which gives you a good view back over the lake, church and castle. It didn’t seem very well sign posted from the road and there literally no parking on the side of the road that’s free, your always forced into a car park. The closest one we could find was €5 (£4.50/$8.50 nzd) and only took cash which we didn’t have so we were very frustrated. We had read that you get fined if you don’t park in these designated areas so we decided to flag the walk especially since the rain was still very hard. We ended up in a small town just on the outskirts of Bled and we found a free area to ditch the car and walk towards Iglica Falls. Everyone seems to be inside whilst we were wandering around soaking but thats what you do when your a tourist and only here for the weekend! The waterfall wasn’t much excitement but there were these incredibly steel metal stairs heading up to goodness knows where. We decide to climb them and see where they took us. We ended up on top of the rock looking out over the small city and paddocks below is. We found a road back down and around to where the car was parked and we both felt a bit better with the fresh air despite our shoes squelching from all the water in them. I think we are getting a bit of cabin fever not being able to do what we want hiking wise. We called it a day making our way back to our cosy Airbnb and I made some butternut squash soup for dinner and we chatted to Pat & Joe in Colorado.

Capturing the shot whilst getting soaked!

Monday 29th October

For once it wasn’t raining and Lew desperately wanted to go for a run this morning before we had to check out at 10am. Of course by the time he got himself up and ready the rain had set in again but a promise was a promise and we layered up ready to go. He didn’t plan a run so instead we just found ourselves on some logging trails up the back of the city which had multiple large streams of water we had to jump across and eventually wade through since we were already so wet. It was only about a 3km run and soaked our shoes in not only rain but mud for the rest of the day. We showered, had breakfast and did some computer work waiting for 10am to come around. It was such a shame we hadn’t been able to fully enjoy the beautiful mountain area with all its hikes and water sports but autumn weather is so unpredictable. Our plan for the day was to drive 1.5 hours south to the famous Postojna Cave Park and also visit Predjama Castle before coming back into Ljubljana for dinner and then to the airport to drop the rental car back off. The rain eased a little as we got to Lake Bled 20 minutes away and we stopped in a driveway for a cheeky snap before carrying on. Slovenia does a very very good job of not having anywhere you can pull off the road for a quick photo opportunity which is incredibly frustrating. Driving down the main highway the roads were flooded and the rivers swollen and it didn’t look like the country could take much more water despite the fact it’s supposed to continue to rain all week. It was difficult driving for Lew as the car got pulled in all directions when we hit giant puddles of water. We arrived at Postojna caves just before lunchtime and went into the parking lot where we ran inside to find some tickets. What we didn’t realise was that you are on a tour for starters and then because we are out of peak season there was a break for two hours over lunch time before the next one begun. Luckily we had 45 minutes of free parking apparently so we were able to get out and come back without having to pay the €5 (£4.45/$8.70 nzd) twice. We booked ourselves on the 2pm tour which cost us €25.80 (£22.95 /$45 nzd) for an adult for Lew and €20.60 (£18.33/$35.94 nzd) for me as a ‘student’ (note that these are low season prices) and then went back to the car to drive to Predjama Castle 9km away. The castle itself is very impressive tucked away in the cave mouth like nothing iv ever seen before. The castle was first mentioned in documents in 1274 and was owned by a knight called Erazem Lueger. After a war the castle was destroyed and rebuilt in 1511 only to be destroyed by an earthquake and the current castle we saw today was actually built in 1570 on top of the original medieval fortifications. We decided not to pay to enter the castle and just wandered around the outside of it thankful for the break in the rain so we could take some photos. It really was quite impressive the way it nestled into the rock and clearly the rock below it had been hollowed out and used for storage. The river ran down underneath it and it was certainly well worth the visit. With 45 minutes to go we drove back to the cave ready to begin the tour at 2pm. It certainly wasn’t what we expected after the last cave we did in France called Gouffre de Padirac where we were rowed into the cave system by a small boat. This time however we were loaded into a small electric train and whizzed through the 2km of cave system like a theme park ride on what is said to be the only double tracked cave railway in the world. It was a chilly 10 degrees in the cave but it was dramatically lit up so we could see the impressive interior and mass of stalactites and stalagmites. They were different colours and the train came so close to the rock you could have had a limb taken off in the process if it was sticking out! It was such fun but very difficult to take photos at the speed we were going and we were pleased when the train finally pulled up at a platform where we would begin the 1km walking part of the tour. We had an english guide and our group was rather large as she explained to us that the cave system is 24km total but we only get to see 3km of it all. We walked up a very well paved concrete track with hand rails and everything to the top of The Great Mountain which is 40m high and still 60m below ground. Our guide told us that the cave system was discovered in 1818 by a local man and a year later it was opened for tourism. The visit during the first opening period lasted 6 hours as they had to trek their way into the cave with candles and torches. In 1872 the first railway was introduced and the guides were made to push a cart carrying four people along! It was still torch lit even then as the first lights were added into the cave in 1884. Our guide told us that the cave is about 3 million years old and developed due to the river running underneath it. This process also created three levels however the upper levels no longer exist as they collapsed half a million years ago. The cave is safe as it hasn’t change over 20 thousand years and the Boca River still flows along the lower levels of the cave. The stalagmite and stalactites are created by the rain water seeping through the rock and collecting limestone as it goes redepositing in the cave ceiling and the floor as it drip. Something I had never seen before in caves like this was when the cave is on an angle the stalagmites drip on an angle as well and create a curtain effect. We were urged not to touch them as they only grow 1cm per 100 years! We were shown all sorts of coloured rooms where there is entire white room made up of pure limestone stalagmite and stalactites, then there was a red hall where the limestone is mixed with calcium oxide giving it the beautiful red colour. We saw other coloured versions as well with grey being manganese oxide, green…well thats just algae and then yellow from iron oxide. They even had a bridge that we needed to cross over that once again was made using Russian prisoners of war. The deepest part of the cave is at 140m because it is formed under a slight hill and they have only ever found fossils at the entrance of the cave but nothing deeper inside. They do have over 100 species of insects and animals that live down here though which are mostly beetles but the largest animal is 30cm. That is the cave Salamanca which is has 5 different names and is also nicknamed the baby dragon. They are amphibious but prefers to live in the water in the lower levels of the cave. They are endemic to this area and live up to 100 years! But still they would only see their surrounding grow by 1cm during their lifespan which shows how insignificant that time really is for the world. These animals can live up to 10 years without food due to their painfully slow metabolism and they also have no pigmentation in their skin to protect themselves from light. There were a few in a small tank we could look at but it stated it was against the law to photograph these animals. We finished up in the large concert hall before we went back on the train to continue back to the main entrance. We managed to get right on the front which was exciting and definitely felt faster! It was a nice feeling finally emerging from the cave system and thankfully it still wasn’t raining and now felt rather warm! We didn’t have a huge amount of time at this point and had to Google our way back into Ljubljana where we would pick up some dinner before heading to the airport. Finding a car park was a little difficult with all the one way streets and we had to travel around a few blocks to get there! We had a short walk back along the riverfront to this well recommended restaurant called Julija which served traditional Slovenian food. Lew was stressing that we didn’t have time to sit down in this fancy restaurant but it was basically empty since it was only about 5pm at night! The food was off the charts good with Lew getting the steak and I had the beef stew with polenta! We scoffed it down, flagged the waitress down for the bill and fast walked it back to the car and headed onto the motorway to the airport. It was simple dropping the car back and we crossed our fingers that they wouldn’t find any tiny scratches we would have to pay for. All was well and we were actually asked to put my carry on suitcase under the plane which meant I was able to get rid of all my liquids and take my backpack on instead of my tiny handbag! We arrived into London Gatwick at roughly 10pm and then had to get ourselves home on the underground. Well Slovenia you certainly didn’t woo us with your weather but I can 100% recommend visiting as it was an absolutely stunning place for a long weekend and truely reminded is of home! xx

Curtains formed by the cave being on an angle

LewisOctober 26, 2018