Lovely Ljubljana and Bled

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Lovely Ljubljana and Bled

Overall we really enjoyed Slovenia. It is a really striking country, small, incredibly green, and in the north Mountainous. Ljubljana the capital is about half the size of Edinburgh. It has a great feel to it, full of cafes and cheap restaurants, a castle, interesting architecture - much of it seemingly designed by one man - Joe Plečnik, he has a hand in many buildings and bridges in the city. Ljubljana is a perfect place for a long weekend. What is most appealing about the place is again, how laid back it is. Its trendy but understated. For me it was a place we visited and I thought - yeah I could easily live here. We spent much of our time wondering around the older sections of town. They have a real market in the centre of town most days - its quite large full of fruit, clothing, flowers, cheap household stuff, it is nice to see something like this, it was well patronised by the locals, and not something put on for the tourists, and not a Tesco in sight….

Ljubljana and Slovenia as with a lot of central and eastern Europe has seen its share of rulers in the past, they are now 100% behind the EU, the flag is proudly on display around much of the country. They seem to have a strong national identity, along with Joe Plečnik there are a number of other local heros in the statues and paintings across the city. The most common image though is the villain - the dragon that was slain by Jason trying to get away with his golden fleece. The dragon dominates the city coat of arms, bridges, etc.

We moved on to spend 2 nights in Bled, and take a full day looking around the area, in hindsight we probably should have stayed another night in Ljubljana. Bled is pretty picture perfect, but it has been overrun by tourists, and doesn’t have the homely feel of the capital. I think I lot of people actually seem to base there holiday in Bled and do a day trip to Ljubijana - don’t! The lake is impressive, and rowing the boat out to the Church on the island is a really nice thing to do but we were more impressed by Vintgar Gorge - about 4 km from Bled. The gorge has some similarities to Plitvice with the rocks and the water clarity, well worth the walk on the way to the waterfall. One negative for us was that someone stole one of the main pannier bolts off the bike whilst we we in the park, I think one of a couple of motorcyclists parked nearby must of pilfered it… a pretty low act. Without this bolt we wouldn’t be able to carry one of the panniers, luckily one of the few spare bolts I took with me fit, and it caused us no delays.

The trip out of Slovenia through Italy to the northwest was stunning. This is the start of the Dolomites, it really is incredible scenery. It was one of those days were every view you saw was fantastic, but there was too little time to stop, just a wee espresso here and there, we were heading for the Swiz boarder, crossing the Stilvio Pass.

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Photos

Ljubljana
Building at the town square

Ljubljana
Inside the city hall

Ljubljana
Famous marble fontain

Ljubljana
Ljubljana Castle

Ljubljana
View from the tower

Ljubljana
The stair to the top of the tower, Ljubljana Castle

Ljubljana
The river

Ljubljana
Market

Ljubljana
Wooden storry boards on sale in Ljubljana.

Ljubljana
Flower stands on one side, and Pumpkin stands on the other

Ljubljana
The famous dragon bridge.

Ljubljana
small alley in Ljubljana

Ljubljana
Tea shop

Ljubljana
The poet and his muse, too naked for the churche, but ok nowadays

Bled
Gondola waiting to take turists out to the monastry

Bled
The Church of Assumption on the island in the middle of Lake Bled

Bled
Gondolas lined up in Lake Bled

Bled
Clock tower with wishing bell

Bled
Roses on wall at The Church of Assumption