Bled

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Bled - day 14-16 - September 5-7

We had the luxury of a private transfer (two cars) to take us to our final stop in Bled, Slovenia. It was a pleasant journey on good freeways. Our driver was a young guy who had a rafting and other adventure sport business, was a taxi/car-hire person, as well as being a policman. Very hard working! We had a long wait in a queue to cross the boarder into Slovenia and back into the Schengen zone.

You can see why the removal of border checks is a high priority as it must be costly as well as frustrating for those that need to move frequently between countries. Our driver said that we would be driving across almost the whole width of Slovenia from here - taking about an hour. Slovenia is not a very large country at all with a population around 2 Million.

We were dropped off in a lovely home for our stay in private rooms, about 20 minutes walk into the main area of town. Bled is situated on a lake, with the surrounding Julian Alps reflecting into it. So different from the warm coastline of Slovenia, for here we were in amountain environment with the temperature dropping significantly, I even had to pull out some stockings and a long sleeved top.

Bled is famous for being the home of the Bled cake, which is really like a vanilla slice pastry with light custard and cream but no icing. It was really delicious, and eating in the original café that made it, overlooking the lake it tasted even better I’m sure.

We took a gondola like boat out to the Island in the middle of the lake, which had a church on it. It is famous in Europe for weddings and we witnessed an Irish couple having their ceremony there. The water of the lake is fed by thermal springs and remains quite warm most of the time, around 23 degrees so the people we saw going swimming were not as mad as we first thought. I made sure not to sit at the end of the boat near the oarsman as it felt like he was going to hit me in the face with each stroke, a little distracting.

Another place where taking of many photos seemed appropriate. On one side of the lake was a castle on a hill rising steeply above the lake, and a white church on a nearby bank. Bled was lovely spot to sit and have a coffee overlooking the lake and surrounding mountains, or to walk around the lake which took about 1 hour an a half, or to walk up the hill to the castle. For the last two nights after the tour ended I stayed in a hotel with a great view from the balcony over the lake.

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