Slovenia: A Hidden Gem

A few weeks ago, Kyle and I took a great little road trip to Slovenia.  It's a country that's a bit off the radar for most Americans, but we had heard wonderful things about it and decided to spend some time there.  It was about a six hour drive to get to where we were staying on Lake Bled, and it was worth every minute of the drive.  Slovenia is definitely a small treasure of a country!  The people were warm and friendly, it was clean, the roads were great and of course the scenery was amazing!

The good thing about visiting a small country like Slovenia is that you can easily visit most everything within a short one to two hour drive.  We made Lake Bled our home base, and did a couple of day trips from there.  We stayed at a neat historic villa that was just a short walk away from the lake.  We arrived in the afternoon, dropped off our stuff and headed straight to the lake.  

There is an easy four mile walk around the lake that's paved most of the way.  Around every curve is a new gorgeous view, especially of the castle or Bled Island, which has a quaint, little pilgrimage church on it.  (The legend of the island is really interesting.  Check it out here.)  It was really hard to choose pictures since the whole lake is so photogenic!  Kyle got tons of great shots!

These traditional little boats take you out to Bled Island to see the church

What a brave dog we have!

Later that evening we drove up to see the castle.  The price was a bit steep for what you actually got to see of the castle, but we did have some amazing views during the sunset!

The next morning we headed out to see Slovenia's short 43 kilometer (27 mile) long coastline on the Adriatic Sea.  Slovenia's little coast is right between Italy and Croatia, and the Italian (specifically Venetian) influence can definitely be seen in the small coastal towns.  (Further north where we were staying, there was a more Austrian feel, reflecting the influence of Slovenia's neighbor to the north.)  Our first stop of the day was Piran.  It is such a gorgeous little town with a great, relaxed atmosphere.  We took our time, enjoying the beautiful colors of the sea and the small, narrow streets of the old town.  I had to keep reminding myself that I wasn't in Italy, but it sure felt like it!

Crystal clear waters!

The perfect spot for dining al fresco!

Our next stop was to see the small port town of Koper.  There actually is a modern, industrial port in Koper, but you would never guess it while wondering around the quiet, old streets!  We had some coffee and gelato while checking out the town.

Last stop of the day was Italia!  (Come on, we couldn't be that close to Italy without dropping by!)  I had heard good things about the city of Trieste right on the coast, so we decided to check it out.  It was a much larger city than I was expecting!  We didn't have an itinerary of things to see, so we just went whichever way looked interesting.  We came across some pretty awesome stuff, including Roman ruins, an expansive piazza, a cathedral dating back to the 6th century and the 15th century Castle San Giusto.  Trieste also has a very interesting World War history.  What incredible layers of the past!

Roman ruins of an amphitheater built by Trajan ~100AD

Castello San Giusto

Busy sketching.  Age doesn't stop her!

I spy a cat!

On our way back to Bled, we stopped to see Predjama Castle, built into a cliff!  It was too late to go inside, but it was pretty awesome.  It's not everyday you get to see a cliff castle!

We didn't get as lucky with the sun on our third day, but luckily the rain held off for us!  We went to see Škofja Loka, Slovenia's best preserved medieval town. It was so beautiful and peaceful. It is off the beaten path, so it wasn't too crowded with tourists. It was a great find!

These walkways to the shops during construction would never happen in America!

From there, we headed to see Slovenia's capital, Ljubljana.  It was pretty chilly, and we were tired of walking so we didn't do the town justice.  It is a beautiful place that deserved more time than we gave it, but sometimes you just have to know when to give in!

The famous Triple bridge, connecting the old and new towns.

Gnocchi for Kyle...some Italian influence.  I had sausage with mustard and polenta...some German/Austrian and Italian influence.

We decided that we couldn't visit Lake Bled without going to see Bled Island, so that's what we did when we got back.  The sun decided to come out a little bit, making the paddle boat ride very enjoyable.  (Especially since we didn't have to do any of the paddling!)

A wedding on the island, how pretty!

Slovenia was formerly part of Yugoslavia.  Josip Broz Tito was President/dictator of Yugoslavia between 1953 and 1980.  He built his vacation home on Lake Bled, where he brought all of the important people that came to visit.  You can see his villa in the picture below.  It's now a hotel.  We went inside to take a look.

Tito's desk

Amazingly delicious Bled creme cake, created for Tito by two of his chefs.

Tito knew how to choose a place with a view!

Kyle and I were so impressed with Slovenia!  It is a hidden gem that is definitely worth travelling to.  (We didn't even get to hike the Julian Alps!  Next time!)  I guess if too many people found out about how nice it is, it might become swarming with tourists...maybe I should just keep this all to myself... :-)

Croatia

Kyle and I recently had great friends from DC make the trip over here for a visit.  As you know from the previous post, we spent the first few days on day trips to Rothenburg, France, and a day at the pool. The highlight of their time here was definitely our trip to Croatia.  Kyle had four days off, which was the perfect amount of time to soak up the sun on the Dalmatian coast!

Our flight into Split arrived at 7:30 in the morning, so we had our entire first day to take in the sites.  Before our trip, I really didn't know anything about Croatia other than it was part of Yugoslavia, so our guide book came in handy!  Also, a Facebook friend from Croatia made an entire itinerary for us, complete with where to eat and drink.  So we were set!  We started off renting a car at the tiny airport, and headed to Split to see the city.  It's located right on the coast of the Adriatic sea.  The highlight of Split is definitely Diocletian's Palace, built by the Roman Emperor Diocletian beginning in the early 4th century.  It's not really a palace anymore, but many parts of the palace still exist, such as portals, courtyards, a temple, and colonnades.  It was so cool to walk through the narrow Roman streets and imagine what it must have been like.  Now there are shops, cafes, and gladiators trying to get you to take a picture with them, but it has an amazing atmosphere.

As we walked through a beautiful courtyard in the palace, we caught our first glimpse of the Adriatic sea.  It is absolutely gorgeous, with all shades of blue from turquoise, to teal, cerulean and all shades in between.  We walked along the seaside promenade and back to the car to get our swimsuits.  It was a hot day in the mid 90s, so nothing sounded better than to cool off in the sea!   We went for a quick dip before heading to the town of Trogir where we would be staying for the next few nights.

Trogir is a beautiful ancient town, first founded by Greek colonists in the 3rd century BC.  The historic part of town and the harbor are located on a small island.  Our hotel was less than a 5 minute walk from the island, so it was a perfect location.  The owner of the hotel didn't speak a word of English.  He did however speak German and Croatian.  Jason speaks Czech, which sounds a lot like Croatian, so between his Czech and our little bit of German, we were kinda sorta able to communicate, along with many gestures!  After checking in, we went to walk around the historic little town.  It seems like every corner we turned through the narrow cobblestone streets was another photo op.  Once you make your way through the maze of streets to the other side of the island, there's a beautiful little harbor lined by cafes, bars, and multi-million dollar yachts!  We relaxed at a nice bar by the harbor with tropical drinks, enjoying the sea breeze.  We went back to the apartment to rest and clean up before heading back to the island for dinner.  We ate a delicious meal in a beautiful little courtyard restaurant.   It was a perfect end to our first evening in Croatia!

A lovely place for dinner!

The next day we were heading about an hour north of Trogir to a park called Krka.  It's very similar to the more well known Plitvice Lakes waterfalls, but I can't imagine that Plitvice would be any more beautiful than Krka!  The park is along the Krka river, where there are many trails, boat rides and such to see, but the waterfalls are the main attraction.  As you walk along boardwalks over lake and river, you get to see a series of waterfalls and cascades of the beautiful emerald water.  It's much more impressive than it sounds!  Along the way there are little pools that have fish flecked with gold scales that shimmer in the sun.  They seemed like magical fish!

Heading down to the river valley

Come on Kyle!  We wanna swim!!

Near the end of a trail is a huge outdoor restaurant where we ate a great lunch before swimming in front of the largest of the falls.  It was a VERY hot day, in the upper 90s, so a swim by the falls sounded like heaven!  The water was surprisingly cold, but it was so refreshing!  It was absolutely perfect swimming in the crystal clear water, right in front of the prettiest waterfall I've ever seen!

I'm glad we saw this water snake AFTER we went swimming!

On our way back to Trogir from the park, we stopped in a beautiful little village called Primošten.  It's a gorgeous town that sticks out on a little peninsula into the sea.  It's very small, with a lot of restaurants and beach shops, but the historic town center has kept it's character and is topped with a simple, elegant, small church.  We stopped for drinks at a small market to enjoy while relaxing for a bit on the rocky beach.  We snoozed in the sun before heading back to Trogir.

After cleaning up, we went out for a great dinner at Pizzeria Coccolo, just down the street from our hotel.  We went out for an evening stroll and drinks by the harbor after dinner.  Just as we were finishing our drinks, the wind started picking up and we could see lightening in the distance.  We went back to the hotel to sit on our balcony and enjoyed watching the storm.

Kyle really wished he had his tripod, but this is still pretty cool!

We were all in the mood for a beach day on our last full day in Croatia.  The beach in Primošten was beautiful, so we headed back there.  This time, we stopped in a beach shop to pick up some cheap inflatable rafts to make lying on the rocky beach more comfortable.  We found a great spot, and as we were all struggling to blow up our rafts, a nice lady took pity on us and brought us a pump to finish the job.  It was another hot day, but there was a nice cool breeze blowing off the water the entire time.  The water was too cold for Kyle, but I loved taking a nice refreshing dip in the sea!

Primošten in the distance

Liz, trying to decide if she would brave the cold water

She went for it! (pic from Jason's camera)

Taking in the beauty (Jason's pic)

I don't think any of us were ready to leave, but we had dinner reservations at 8 for a great restaurant in a town about 45 minutes away from our hotel.  The Pelegrini restaurant is a favorite of my Facebook friend that wrote the itinerary.  It's in an awesome town called Šibenik.  We were running a bit late.  The parking lot I found on the GPS isn't exactly what Americans would call a parking lot.  It was full, so we parked illegally (and got a ticket for it, even though it seemed like the whole town was parked illegally!) and started the search for the restaurant.  We only had a small map in the guidebook and the address of the place.  The tiny, winding medieval streets were not even labelled on the GPS.  As we were searching, there was a gorgeous sunset over the water, so we kept stopping to try and get some quick shots on the way.  After walking through winding streets and up stairs that lead to nowhere, we finally found the restaurant and were about 40 minutes late.  Luckily they still had a table for us, and it was all so worth it!  We ate in an amazing courtyard outside that had candles, a fountain, twinkly lights, a view of the sunset and eventually the starry sky.  The food was superb and had an Italian/Mediterranean flair.  We had a wonderful bottle of local red wine and a perfect dinner, and a perfect end to our trip.

View of Trogir on our way to dinner

Šibenik

Pic from Jason's camera.  Love these guys!

Our flight was early the next day, so we didn't have time to do anything.  We dropped off the rental car, tried to figure out how to pay the parking ticket, and were back in Germany at 9:30, where we spent the rest of the day relaxing.  Croatia is such an awesome place.  They definitely spoke the least English out of all of the places we've traveled in Europe, but I guess that makes the experience a bit more exciting. We had gorgeous scenery, sunny skies, excellent food and drinks, and fabulous friends to travel with.  I think our trip was a great success, and as usual, I can't wait to go back!