Slovenia is a small country near some of the power houses of Europe. The biggest city is the capital Ljubljana and the most popular place to visit will be Bled. We decided to put our base in Bled and explore the natural beauty that Slovenia has to offer. Ljubljana is an hour away from Bled so exploring the city is also possible from here.

Slovenia was a part of the Austria-Hungarian empire and has seen a lot of war throughout its history. They became a part of Yugoslavia in 1918. Slovenia was the first of them to get independence and the disintegration of Yugoslavia started with the formation of Slovenia in 1991. Gradually the other five nations followed suite forming Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. We met someone during the trip who was from Slovenia and also a part of Yugoslavia army. He was asked to fight against the independence movement of his homeland. He escaped from the army and became a part of the newly formed nation which is his home now. They produce some good sportsmen, have excellent tourism infrastructure and are one of the leading timber suppliers to the neighbouring countries.

Things to do:

• Lake Bled: Most of the hotels and restaurants in Bled are located in the periphery of the lake. Needless to say, they are pretty expensive but it’s worth paying more to stay close to the lake than saving some money and getting an accommodation somewhere inside the village. In the morning people enjoy a nice walk along the lake and see the sunrise. During the day time you can have a dip in the lake, swim and relax under the sun. Then have lunch at one of the restaurants with a view of the lake, the mountains and the island. Rest a bit at the hotel and then enjoy the evening stroll followed by dinner and sit at the park to see the sun go down. You can repeat this for many days and it will never get boring. This was the prettiest small town that we visited during the trip.

• Vintgar Gorge: The entry point of this gorge is easily accessible from the town center by the tourist shuttle which will cost you one Euro. The entry tickets will cost 10 Euros. Then its nearly a 30-40 minutes’ walk along the lovely stream which ends in a nice waterfall. They have created a good walking path along the rocks and you will keep taking a lot of pictures in between which will make the walk take more than one hour. But you won’t regret it at all. There is a nice restaurant near the entrance and you can enjoy your dinner here after you are back. The last tourist shuttle from Vintgar leaves at 10 PM but the frequency is not that great. We asked the waiter to call a taxi around 9 and it costed us 15 Euros.

• Ojstrica View Point: This is a view point from where you can get the classic Bled picture of the island and the mountains in the background. The starting point is at the periphery of the lake and there is a tourist toy train going in circles around the lake which can take you to that point. The tickets are 5 Euros and you can get off and join in again to complete the round trip. We got down at the second stop after the town center and started the hike. It was a short but steep climb but the view was beautiful. There are couple of more view points after this but not sure if they provide a very different view.

• Island tour: The island is located at the center of the lake. It is possible to take a short boat ride and reach the Island to visit the cathedral.

• Bled castle: This one is located at the top of a hill at the edge of the lake. The tourist shuttle bus connects to this point. At night it is very beautifully decorated with lights and is visible from almost every point in Bled.

• Triglav National Park: This was the highlight of our time in Slovenia. We wanted to explore the national park and visit some of the cave waterfalls here. Doing it on our own seemed difficult as the transport to the other corner of the national park seemed very tricky and expensive. Thankfully we found an agency (suggested by a taxi driver) which was offering a full day trip with guide showing all the good places in the park. Mamut agency charged 79 Euros per person and did a complete circle of the national park (image below).

They take maximum eight people so that they can interact with all of us and answer our questions. Everything in our wish list (and more) was included in the trip.

• Lake Jasna: This was our first stop in the Triglav National Park tour. It’s a pretty lake surrounded by mountains. The lake is close to the parking lot so not much of calories needed here to reach the viewpoint. We spent 20-25 minutes taking a leisurely stroll and clicking pictures. The guide was always with us and he was proudly narrating the history of his country and the efforts that are going into promoting tourism.

• Russian Chapel: After we started driving to the top of the mountain we visited this chapel after few turns. It was made completely out of wood and is a small but very beautiful church. The road work on this mountain was done as forced labor from the Russian Prisoners of War during first world war. There was an avalanche once and it killed 300 of them. The church was built in memory of these people in 1917. Every year some delegates from Russia come to pay homage to this place and Putin visited here few years back. Most of the wood that we saw there was more than a hundred years old.

• Vrisic Pass: This was the highest road in Slovenia and gives beautiful view of the Triglov mountains. We saw many people who were using this as a starting point to climb the top of the mountain. It seemed far away and looked almost like a vertical climb.

• Source of Soca River: Most of our trip was going to be along the banks of this river so the guide took us to its source. It was a scary hike. There was very less space to put our foot. They had steel ropes in the difficult parts of the hike otherwise I don’t think we would have gone for it. The water was crystal clear here and you can directly drink it. We filled our bottles from a tap at the entrance which is connected to the stream. At the end you can see the cave inside which the river is being formed. The water passes through limestone and acts as a filter to convert it to clean drinking water. The hike was around 30 minutes long and it has a very difficult terrain to cross.

• The Emerald View: It was the most beautifully coloured river that we have ever seen. This part of the Soca river gets this colour because of the mineral stones below it. It is also a good spot for diving and swimming. It felt like one of the typical postcard pictures that we see of rocks and blue water from Europe.

• Adventure Sports: The trip also had an option for adventure sports and you can choose between rafting, zip lining, sky diving etc. We had already done all of them so we chose nothing. While one couple went for rafting, the guide took us to Boka waterfall.

• Boka Waterfall: It was high up in the mountains and the fall was very long. Here the water is blocked by dolomite rock as it is less permeable and it flows under it forming a horizontal stream under the rocks. After that it flows along the mountains and then forms this beautiful waterfall. From the parking lot it will be a 20 minutes’ hike with moderate difficulty.

• Kozjak Waterfall: This was the place which compelled us to explore different ways to cross the national park and finally go with this tour. The waterfall is small but the surrounding landscape is absolutely fantastic. It is located inside a cave and surrounded with dense forest. It feels like one of the nature documentaries that we see in travel shows. Reaching the waterfall took us around 25-30 minutes and the walk was pretty much flat.

• Ride on the freight train: We crossed a big mountain to get to the final destination and taking the same way back would have taken a lot of time. But there is a tunnel which crosses under the mountains and only freight trains use that. So our guide drove our mini-van on top of the train and we were sitting inside during the train ride. We crossed many tunnels and it was dark inside. The guide was playing amazing songs and this part of the tour was a pleasant surprise for us.

• Lake Bohinj: This is much larger than Lake Bled but not as popular. There are couple of hotels and even the surrounding area of the lake is not that well developed. Nevertheless, it is equally beautiful. One of the locals has taken up the task to renovate the hotels and promote tourism. Hope he is successful in his task.

Moving around in Bled: There is not much of a public transportation system connecting places within Bled or to the nearby areas. Below are few options that will come very handy.

• Tourist Train: This train takes a complete circle around the Lake Bled. It starts from the town center next to Hotel Panorama. The tourist information center is also located very close to it and anyone can point you to that place. The cost is 5 Euros.
• Shuttle: This shuttle covers most of the important places close to Bled. But it will take a lot of detour and a place that is 15 minutes away might take 30 minutes or even up to an hour. The tickets are just 1 Euro for a trip. The route map is available in the tourist information center.

Quick tips:

• Based on our experience we think it is a good idea to locate yourself at Bled and cover other places (including Ljubljana) from here.
• Do check out the shuttle timings very carefully to plan your trips near Bled.
• Have the bled taxi number handy. You can get the most recent one from the tourist center.