Ljubljana is amazing. Small, compact and beautiful. Again I had not done much research into what was here apart from a quick google image search. It looked lovely. Although if you google Morecombe it looks like it is a "go to" destination. However we were not dissapointed.
Plus its only two hours and a bit from Zagreb and three hours from the coast. A perfect staging post.
The bed and breakfast is first class and perfectly located. A real find if you happen to stop off here. Its a conveted attic space that now contains ten lovely apartments in the roof of an old apartment building. Its called Atticus for obvious reasons and is perfect for our needs. Yesterday after arriving we strolled around the town and we saw what few sights there were to see. Apart from the castle there are no particular sights of merit but the entire place is gorgeous. A river runs through the centre and is the main attraction. Bars and cafes line its banks along the city section. I say city but its much more of a town. It is really small and quaint. If a place is as gorgeous as this then you dont really need "sights". Both Crispy and I agree that it reminds us of the back streets of Venice. A place we both hold dear.
Today we had decided to get a bus north into the Slovenian alps to visit
Lake Bled. Everyone I spoke to before commencing this little adventure insisted that we couldn't possibly pass so close to Bled without seeing it. So we saw it.
We caught the ten o-clock bus from the main bus station and arrived at Bled forty minutes later. We are sooooo pleased we went there.
I use the term beautiful a lot to describe the the things we've seen but in respect of Bled I use it in its fullest sense. Breathtakingly beautifully.
Imagine Ambleside in the middle of forested mountains under azure blue skies and your not to far off the mark. Oh, and throw in a fairytale castle and a cathedral on an island. Now you get the picture.
It was spectacular and the temperature was in the low thirties.
We missed out on a boat ride in Konigsee so decided to make up for it here. We hired a row boat for a couple of hours. Me rowing of course while Crispy sat in the stern like a medievsl princess. We (I) rowed out to the cathedral in the lake for a romantic five minutes amidst all of this natural splendor. On arriving at the island I expertly navigated us to the dock. As i was serenely mooring our little boat Princess Crispy lunged for the shore and grabbed a mooring post. "No wait, sit down" I shouted in vain. It was too late. She was stretched between the gunwale and the dock when the laws of physics took over and the boat slipped away, the dock remained stationary and Crispy plunged, breast first, into the crystal blue waters of the lake. SPLOOOOSH. it was all over in a second and I had no time to whip out the eye pod for an action shot. The people on the island who witnessed this spectacle never bat an eye. They looked over disinterested and carried on with their day as if nothing had happened. I suppose they get used to it.
After a few moments I had Crispy back on dry land but she was soaked to the bone. The boat trip was supposedly for an hour but we had to go around the lake three times till she dried out in the brilliant sunshine. The only consolation was that she held up her wet bra and knickers like a sail to dry in the sun and the wind power assisted my rowing. Perhaps this is how the ancients developed sailing ships. It makes you wonder.....
Back to Ljublijana for a shower and dry clothes. Once refreshed we again hit the streets and hired bicycles for a couple of hours to see the parts of the city we had not yet managed to see. This involved a few bars, of course, for medicinal purposes to avoid poor Crispy catching a chill...
Tonight marks the end of part one of the trip. We have travelled through central Europe and taken in five cities. An amazing trip and I think one of our best to date. Tomorrow at 07:10 we board a bus for Porec at the very top of the Dalmation coast to commence our Croation expedition down to Dubrovnik. Crispy is so excited at the prospect of a few days on the beach. I dont blame her as travelling is exhausting and she has earned a little rest...........
Bare and Crispy signing of, Lubjuljana, Slovenia
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