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Published: September 30th 2013
What an amazing little country Slovenia is, from cosmopolitan Ljubljana to the beauty of Lake Bled and the Julian Alps, and all within a couple of hours driving! Slovenia is also where we discovered Airbnb.com, a website that allows you to rent an entire apartment for about the same cost as a hotel/hostel room! What a brilliant idea! In Ljubljana we stayed at Gasper’s little one bed apartment near the Roznik-Tivoli reserve. We spent four nights in this beautiful little city in total, which was possibly more than you need there but with Ben still sick we just wanted to stop and relax for a while. Plus, it rained. A lot. So we hid out a bit as well.
Ljubljana is a small but perfect city. With only about 300,000 people it is not much bigger than Hobart. We decided the best way to look around would be on a bike tour so booking that online we turned up to discover that it was just us! We had our own private guide in Nina, which is definitely a great way to discover a new city! Ljubljana is clean, beautiful and the people are friendly, although we had a few residents
Ljubljana
Cooking up a storm at our apartment in Ljubljanatell us that there is still a bit of corruption there which is not good. Education is free and during the course of our tour we checked out one of the local universities...apparently the average length of attendance at university is about 8 years as it is free and students get excellent discounts around Ljubljana. We really enjoyed the tour actually, it lasted about 3 hours and gave us our bearings in the city....plus we got beer at the end. Well, I did, Ben was feeling a little worse for wear again by the time the tour ended, so I sat in the park with Nina and drank beer while Ben had a coke. What a role reversal! But alas, I think the physical exertion was perhaps a bit too much for Ben who thought he was on the mend but had a bit of a relapse. After spending another couple of nights in pain and unable to sleep we decided to call our travel insurance emergency line which was manned by medical professionals. Speaking to a nurse in Australia on behalf of Ben, she recommended some more things that we could try, so off to the pharmacy we went
to purchase a multitude of devices, juices, vitamins...you name it, we bought it with fingers crossed that they would help! And back home to try them out. Enough said.
We only had four more nights in Slovenia so we decided to leave Ljubljana and hire a car to explore the rest of the country. Now that was a trek in itself. We walked to the car hire place thinking it would only take 40 minutes or so and that the exercise would be good for Ben....3 hours later we arrived! I swear, Ben was stopping every 50 metres to rest and take a break, but eventually we made it. We picked up our little Renault Megane and hooned it back to our apartment to collect our packs. Luckily our host Gasper was understanding as we were now a couple of hours past our check out time, but he knew Ben was sick – he had even dropped off some medication to us one night when Ben was ill to save me walking out to the pharmacy by myself! What a lovely guy.
So we were off! The roads are fantastic and within an hour and a half we
were in Bled. We actually stayed in a little village outside of Bled called Bohinjska Bela at Janja’s place, another apartment booked through Airbnb. We absolutely loved it here. It was a 3 bed apartment that we had to ourselves, and it looked just like Grandma’s place! Really cosy, welcoming and comfortable, with beautiful views of the mountains and Janja, our host, was so friendly, even doing our washing for us! It was just the place for Ben to recover, which he promptly started to do jumping in bed while I took one of the bicycles available and rode into Bled. It was only about a 15 minute ride and although I huffed and puffed a bit, I did make it and manage to avoid being run off the road by any cars. Bled...what can I say...what an absolutely magical place. It is just so picturesque. The whole country is really and I don’t think words, or our pictures, will do it justice. Suffice it to say that anyone travelling to this part of the world should definitely include it on their itinerary!! After a bit of a cycle around the lake I was starting to be in a bit
of pain...and not your average sore muscle pain, but more of a “oh my god this seat is really narrow and it is rubbing” kind of pain. Ouch. So I headed back to our apartment to relax with Ben, who was still suffering a bit. We actually went to a doctor again the following day and got some stronger medication for him, before he dropped me off at the castle and went back to the apartment while I explored a bit more by my lonesome, checking out the castle, walking around the lake and rewarding myself with some Kremsnita - yum. But, and this is a big BUT, that was the last day I had to! Hooray!!! The medication was helping and Ben was finally on the mend...for real this time. Woop woop! So the following day (together!) we actually went and did a bit of car exploration, heading to Kranjska Gora, up and over the 1611m Vršič Pass to Bovec and back again. It was a wonderful day, travelling through a beautiful country and NOT BY MYSELF!
But it was time to leave 😞 We had time for one more little sightseeing trip to Bohinj and for a
couple of races down the toboggan-type ride in Bled before heading back to Ljubljana to catch an overnight train to Munich. The train didn’t leave until near midnight so to kill some time we went to the cinema - twice! It was an easy way to relax when we had our packs and stuff. Then it was onto the train and onto a new country! We were in a 6 bed berth this time, although no photos of this one as there were people already asleep when we got on...and that would have been rude. We arrived in Munich at 6am after a good rest and were greeted at the station by a Starbucks...aaahhhhh...soy latte here we come!
So that was it for our sojourn through Slovenia! We were now officially leaving what is considered to be Eastern Europe and heading into the west! A couple of thoughts first though which haven’t really fit anywhere specific...excellent shower pressure and delicious fruit! Really....so juicy and yummy! I have never tasted such delicious non-tropical fruit!! 😊
TTFN – ta ta for now!
Sarah and Ben xxx
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