When we started our travel adventures in Europe almost four years ago, the 'must do list' contained the usual suspects - France, Spain, Italy, Germany; plus a sprinkling of historic capitals - Athens, Istanbul, Vienna. At that time our knowledge and awareness of ex-Communist Eastern Bloc members was limited and not part of our 'to do list' of Europe. However, when we started actively 'country ticking', these countries made their way into our travel plans. This post on Slovenia kicks off a series on countries that we feel should feature more often on the itineraries of anyone doing a European tour.
Before this trip, we took a quick peek at the Wikipedia entry for Slovenia and noted the rich history of this country that spans a timeline from being a Slavic settlement to the age of Empires - the Holy Roman Empire, the Austrian-Hungarian Empire and then the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. After World War II, a Socialist State was established that lasted until 1991 when independence was declared after a 10-day war. Slovenia is next door neighbours with Italy, Austria, Hungary and Croatia. It is often confused with the country of Slovakia - a point made by all the tour guides that we met on the trip.
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| Flag of Slovenia, Ljubljana City and the European Union - Slovenia, a member since 2004 |
Arrival in Ljubljana
The flight time from London to Ljubljana was just over 2 hours, catching a bus from the airport to the city centre. Our Friday arrival ensured that we could spend more time sightseeing the historic city and visit the famous tourist attractions of Lake Bled and Postojna Cave.
Ljubljana Tourist District
Our time in Ljubljana was spent in the Old Town - a cobblestone car-free district that encircles Castle Hill and contains many restaurants, bars and shops. One and a half days was sufficient to explore this pretty area - although allow more time to visit specific cultural attractions like the Castle or Market.
Best Western Premier Hotel Slon
Our hotel's name and emblem - the elephant, refers to the historic event of 1552 when Maximillian II, Archduke of Austria ascended the throne as Holy Roman Emperor and brought his elephant through the streets of Ljubljana, stopping at an Inn which is the site of the current hotel.
The Dragon - Emblem of Ljubljana
Ljubljana has its own emblem - the dragon. Depicted on the coat of arms and the famous Dragon Bridge (Zmajski Most), the association between the city and its dragon is believed to have originated from the legend of Jason and the Argonauts. According to Greek mythology, when Jason and his comrades stole the Golden Fleece near the Black Sea, they fled by rowing up the Danube River instead of heading back to Greece. They eventually headed over land in the Adriatic coast and found a large lake with a marsh (current day Ljubljana) where they killed a dragon.
Lunch - Food Market
A Friday lunchtime international food market was in action not far from our hotel and discovering this distracted us from starting any sightseeing activities. Our hungry stomachs led us around the food stalls offering dishes of various cuisines, until we settled on a chicken wrap from an Egyptian vendor. We sat with office workers on the steps of the Cathedral, eating our food and people watching.
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| The food market, next door to the Central Market |
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| Olie buying us lunch |
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| Hanging out with the Friday lunchtime crowd |
Preseren Square
The cultural meeting space of any city where citizens come to celebrate and protest is always known as the 'central square' - think Trafalgar in London, Grand Place in Brussels and Federation in Melbourne. In Ljubljana the equivalent is Preseren Square, named after a poet. For tourists, this is usually the spot where you meet up for the 'free walking tours' where a discretionary donation remunerates the local guide who spends 2-3 hours passionately sharing the hidden secrets of their city.
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| Preseren Square |
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| Statue of the poet, Preseren |
Ljubljana Free Tour
Information about walking tours can be found via Google, or the local tourist information center or recommendations from friends who have visited the city before. We did our research via TripAdvisor and so did many other travelers, as the Ljubljana Free Tour 'tour group' swelled to over 20 by the time it started. Our guide, Tina was a Sociology PhD student and did an excellent job leading us all around the city and explaining the history and significance of different sites and buildings.
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| Our guide in action |
The tour's meeting point was outside the pink Franciscan Church of the Annunciation - one of the city's most famous landmarks.
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| The pink church at Preseren Square |
Architecture in Ljubljana
Walking around Ljubljana, you will encounter structures from many different architectural periods - ancient Roman walls, medieval Castle and merchant houses along the river. However, according to our guide, the most famous architectural style is Art Nouveau - with Ljubljana being home to many of the finest examples of this style in Europe.
Triple Bridge
Our first stop was the Triple Bridge (Tromostovje), a set of three stone bridges across the Ljubljanica River. Originally there was only a single bridge, however in order to ease traffic crossing the bridge, Ljubljana's most famous architect - Joze Plecnik added two footbridges that taper in at an angle, creating the current design.
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| On the centre bridge, facing the Castle |
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| View of two stone bridges facing the pink Church |
Modern graffiti - the plague of padlocks
When we first visited Paris, we admired the Pont des Arts and the practice of 'love locks' that covered the bridge. However after seeing padlocks littering most bridges in Europe and the distressing news of the damage that they cause to the historic sites - we are now firmly against the practice. We hope that city officials take action to regularly cut locks and dissuade the trend from continuing.
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| A beautiful view ruined by padlocks |
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| Padlocks ruining the aesthetic qualities of sculptures on Butcher's Bridge |
Butcher's Bridge
The Butcher's Bridge connects the Ljubljana Central Market to the other side of the river. The bridge has modern glass walking strips where it is unwise to wear a dress as you may bare more than you intended to the people on the pier below. After the bridge opened in 2010, a design flaw was noticed in that the glass sections become extremely slippery during winter. Strips of plastic have since been laid on top to help people keep their balance.
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| Peering down the glass section of the Butcher's Bridge |
Ljubljana Central Market
Our guide Tina pointed out that the market on a Saturday morning was the 'place to be' for social catch-ups with friends and family in the city. As it was only Friday afternoon, the market was less than busy, with many shop keepers already packing up for the day.
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| Ljubljana Central Market |
Near the market we saw an unusual vending machine that supplied milk - either in a bottle hanging in the refrigerated section, or you could bring your own and simply top up.
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| The milk machine |
Ljubljana Cathedral (Stolnica Sv.Nikolaja)
Our next stop on the walking tour was Ljubljana Cathedral, built in the Baroque style with a large green dome and two towers.
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| View of Ljubljana Cathedral |
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| Inside Ljubljana Cathedral |
The current Cathedral door (known as the 'Slovene Door') is made of bronze and is decorated with scenes of Slovene history in commemoration of 1250th anniversary of Christianity in Slovenia. Overlooking the scenes, is a portrait of Pope John Paul II.
The remainder of the walking tour took us passed the Town Hall where we were introduced to the Mayor of Ljubljana who was greeting VIPs and stopped to chat to our tour guide and say hello to us.
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| Ljubljana Town Hall |
The University of Ljubljana has a very pretty main building and surrounds a large green space known as Congress Square (previously known as Revolution Square or Liberation Square). The balcony of the University building is symbolic as being the location of Josip Tito's speech when he first visited Slovenia after World War II.
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| Main building of the University of Ljubljana |
Krizanke
The Križanke Outdoor Theatre is used for summer festival events in a courtyard of the former Monastery of the Holy Cross - a residence for the Order of the Teutonic Knights when they were on route to the Crusades during the 13th century.
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| Statues in Ljubljana including two from Krizanke |
Our walking tour ended at this location,with Tina summing up the most recent events of Ljubjana's history - joining the European Union and adopting the Euro. She passed around examples of the Yugoslav dinara banknote in 1million denomination that was common during the early 1990's due to high inflation.
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| A very big banknote |
However Slovenia is a relatively inexpensive holiday destination - for example, we stopped off at a supermarket to buy 1.5L of water, a standard 330ml Coke and 0.5L of fruit juice - the bill coming to 1.53 euro, a bargain. You won't see those prices in Paris.
Valentin - Seafood restaurant
Whilst Slovenia is a land-locked country, it has access to seafood from the Adriatic Sea that can be trucked in from neighbouring Croatia. Valentin is a restaurant near the Central Market that has a seafood shop in the front section and a restaurant out the back. We stopped there for a small snack of grilled squid and fried whitebait, washed down with the local white wine that was a bargain 1.2 euro a glass.
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| Outside the restaurant Valentin |
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| Fried whitebait |
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| Grilled Squid |
Gostilna Sokol
After a short rest at the hotel, we headed back into the Old Town for traditional Slovene food at a pub-style restaurant - Gostilna Sokol. The dishes had generous servings - a stew, large dumplings and a cheese pancake side dish. The home brewed wheat beer was also quite refreshing.
Vigo Ice Cream
The influence of neighbouring Italy was evident in the large number of gelati shops in the Old Town. We chose to taste the range of ice-creams at Vigo and were not disappointed.
Slovenia Explorer
The next day we kicked off a full day tour with Slovenia Explorer - a day-trip specialist that we had researched from TripAdvisor. Our guide, Gregor was the boss of the company, experienced traveler in his own right; writer, photographer and has walked from Mexico to Canada - he even has his own Wikipedia entry (in Slovenian) that we had to copy into Google Translate to read.
We chose Slovenia Explorer as they offered small group tours (Slovenia in One Day) of the three main tourist sites in Slovenia: Lake Bled, Postojna Cave and Predjama Castle. Overall the tour was very well organised and we made friends with the other members of the group with the exception of two ladies that epitomized the worst traits of group touring.
Inconsiderate Travelers - Guaranteed to meet at least one on your travels
They were late in joining the tour, keeping the entire group waiting whilst they finished their breakfast. They then delayed the bus at every stop as they wanted more time to go shopping and eating and complained that the tour was 'rushed'. Lastly, when the tour guide was explaining the amazing views of Lake Bled from the Castle, they refused to climb up the stairs to join the group and insisted on spending the entire time in the cafe drinking lemonade. Have to wonder what possesses travelers with this kind of mindset to even want to leave their homes.
Lake Bled (Blejsko Jezero)
Our first stop was Lake Bled, located in the Julian Alps and a popular country resort for hikers and rowers. Our bus parked at Vila Bled - a hotel that was the former residence of President Tito and sits on the shores of the lake.
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| Views of Vila Bled |
Rowing to Bled Island
Bled Island sits in the middle of the lake and the traditional method of getting there is to hire a ride on the Pletna boat - a type of gondola that holds up to 20 passengers. The boats are operated by oarsman who inherit the right to perform this profession through the generations.
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| Pletna Boats |
Church of the Assumption
On Bled Island, the Church of the Assumption is a Baroque church dating back to 1698. The 99 steps leading up to the main building is traditionally a task for grooms to carry their newly married brides up - a practice that is supposed to ensure a happy marriage.
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| View of the church |
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| View of the 99 steps |
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| Taking in the view of the Lake |
Potica
After the climb up the stairs, it was time for morning tea. We ordered 'potica' - a typical Slovenian festive cake that was filled with walnuts.
Bled Castle (Blejski Grad)
After a quick drive around the lake, we headed to Bled Castle - built in the Romanesque style with parapets, ramparts and towers to reflect its 17th century origins. Walking along the castle walls provided an amazing view of the surrounding area. |
| Bled Castle |
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| View of the mountains |
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| View of Bled Island |
The castle had a small museum on the top level, a cafe, chapel and some shops selling wax stamps and metal work.
There was a ceremony taking place on the day that we visited the castle - the mayor of Ljubljana was there and a bottle of champagne ready to be distributed over two dozen glasses.
Lunch was a stop-over at Restaurant Proteus in the town center near the Postojna Caves. The three course menu included wine for 15 euro - a bargain price.
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| The restaurant |
Prejama Castle
The castle was built in the 13th century in the mouth of a cave for protection. The most famous resident - Erazem Lueger was in conflict with the Hapsburg Empire and was later besieged by them for a year and a day - secretly getting supplies via a tunnel that led to a village on the other side of the cave. He was eventually betrayed by a servant and was shot by a cannon ball when he went to use the outhouse.
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| Walking to Prejama Castle |
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| Prejama Castle |
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| Flowers on the castle balcony |
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| View from the castle |
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| Cannon balls outside the outhouse where Erazem was defeated |
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| The tunnel were Erazem restocked supplies |
Postojna Cave
The last stop on our tour was to visit the Postojna Cave - Slovenia's number one tourist attraction. The cave system stretches for over 20,000m and has a train system that ferries visitors into the most scenic sights. A large stretch of the cave was badly damaged during World War II when the German occupying forces stored aircraft fuel in the cave and this was sabotaged by Slovene Resistance fighters.
On arrival, visitors are split up into groups based on language and directed to the train station for a short 5km ride into the cave system.
The cave system was lit up with a stunning range of artificial lighting that made the tour interesting, although it was difficult to capture it all on camera.The tour guide explained the difference between stalactites (drip from the ceiling) and stalagmites (grow from the ground), and the different minerals that cause the range of colours in the limestone.
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| End of the railway line |
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| A range of photographs from inside the cave |
Spaiza - Dinner restaurant
After the tour we were dropped off outside the restaurant Spaiza for our dinner reservation. Selected based on positive reviews on TripAdvisor - we were not disappointed. We selected the fish degustation menu with matching wines. A complementary dish of smoked horse cheek was served as an appetizer - we were not clued in that it was horse meat until we heard the waiter mention it to another table. But despite the negative attention horse meat has had in the UK, it tasted identical to corned beef.
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| Horse cheek |
Ljubljana by night
To work off all the good food that we had eaten, we took a walk along the riverbank where we saw the many bridges lit up, couples enjoying romantic dinners at cafes and hundreds of spiders making use of the artificial light and warm weather to catch their dinners - tip: never lean against the side of a bridge in Europe at night during summer unless you want to be greeted by an angry orb-weaving spider or two.
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| One of the bridges at night |
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| Hello spiders |
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| Laneways full of cafes |
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| A lightbox sculpture arrangement |
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| Tripe Bridge at night |
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| View towards the Triple Bridge |
Ljubljana Castle
On our final day in Ljubljana we decided to climb the small hill to the castle to admire the stunning views from the top.
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| View from the top |
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| The forest surrounding the castle |
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| A band playing in the distance |
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| Thick castle walls made of stone |
Hisa Sporta
The exercise walking up and down the hill was enough for the day, so we headed back to the Old Town where a Sunday antiques market was in action. Stopping for a beer at the Hisa Sporta pub, we people-watched and enjoyed buskers entertaining the crowds - a relaxing end to our short trip to Slovenia.
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| The busy Sunday market |
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| Entertaining buskers |
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| Beer to complete the morning's activities |
Drama getting back to the airport
The night before we had confirmed a booking with the hotel's reception for a shuttle service to the airport. From the list, we saw that at least another hotel guest had done the same thing. However as we waited for the minivan to pick us up, we noticed about a half dozen other people waiting for a ride to the airport. It appeared that our hotel was a very 'well known' departure point for the airport shuttle and the driver was also quite relaxed in allowing anyone to get into the minivan if they could pay. It soon became apparent that there wasn't enough seats and the driver started to panic and called his boss. A number of the last minute guests were booted out in place of people who had made proper reservations. But this still left a short-fall of three seats.
Olie and another hotel guest went inside the lobby to the hotel's reception to complain, asking the staff to intervene and prove that we had made a prior reservation. The driver soon followed and it didn't look good as people worried about whether they would be able to reach the airport in time to catch their flights. However, after some heated conversations where the driver's boss had a conversation with the hotel's general manager (apparently asking him for a favour) - all was well and the hotel used their own car (a flashy BMW) and bellboy to take us and the other guest to the airport free of charge.
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