Slovenia! This was a country I went kind of out of my way to visit. I wanted to experience the Slovenian outdoors firsthand, as the rivers, mountains and lakes looked stunning.
I started off my trip here with a day in the capital city, Ljubljana (pronounced loo-bee-aa-nuh). Unfortunately, I timed my one day here with a major marathon which certainly made getting around the city difficult. And it was raining. But I did what I could. It’s a smaller city, so I still saw most of it within the day.
My hostel was located right next to the Metelkova Mesto cultural centre which was interesting. It’s an autonomous social space that historically was used as army barracks, and now it represents a self-governed, alternative community. It gave off a bit of a weird vibe, with plenty of street art, drugs and interesting personalities around. While it is widely considered to be a safe area, it was not my vibe. The city itself had an underlying feel of unrest, and I was less comfortable here than I had been across most of Europe. The old town of the city was cool, it was very busy though due to the marathon. My biggest take away point from Ljubljana was the pizza I had. Even after spending 2.5 weeks in Italy, I think it is the best pizza I’ve ever had, and that was at Pop’s Pizza. Once again, because of the marathon there were crazy wait times, but it was well worth it the pizza was amazing!
So after my day in Ljubljana, I headed north to Lake Bled. When I arrived in the small town, the weather was fantastic, so I took the opportunity to walk the 6km around the lake, and even go for a sunset swim. It is every bit as beautiful as it seems in the photos. The lake and surrounding environment did remind me a bit of New Zealand landscapes. It was so peaceful and idyllic. However, it did piss down for the next few days while I was there. I’m not just talking a little bit of rain either, I’m talking severe rain, wind and thunderstorm warnings, flooding, closures, and so on. My hostel wasn’t very big either, so there was really not much else to do but stay in bed and hang out with my roommates. At the same time I was hit with a cold, so the timing wasn’t the worst thing in the world. It meant I could stay in bed guilt free. What was the worst, was discovering a bed bug infestation after I woke up covered in bites all up my ankles, legs, wrists, neck and back. This marked a low point in my travels really. It was raining, I was sick, I was itchy, it was very unpleasant. Even now, after I’ve washed EVERYTHING and changed hostels I’m still itching and feeling paranoid about the bugs. Hopefully I can evade them for the rest of my trip, especially in Paris.
Bled was a cute township, but late October is low season so a lot of shops and restaurants were closed. I can only imagine how busy the town gets in summer! The lake is even used for Olympic Rowing training. Something else I noticed is the lack of motor boats. I didn’t even see any electric ones. It’s rowboats, kayaks and paddle boards only. There were also only select areas of the lake you could swim in, while it’s fair enough, it’s so different from home.
Slovenia is a county with beautiful landscapes. Even though the weather wasn’t ideal, I enjoyed my time here and am glad I went.
~ Nikita’s Nomadic Notes
Nikita’s Nomadic Notes 