Next stop on our trip, Ljubljana Slovenia! First things first, it’s pronounced Loo-blee-ana. Mastering that took a bit of practice. Secondly, Slovenia completely blew my mind. I did not have many expectations going there and I was blown away by how beautiful the small country is. Additionally, I learned that Slovenia has some incredible wines, more on that later.
Ljubljana is the capital of Slovenia and is pretty small in terms of European capitals but is a very nice city. We spent the first night wandering around the Old City area and checking out some beautiful architecture. We also got some excellent burgers at a restaurant that had been recommended, it was my first cheeseburger in months and didn’t disappoint. The next day we hiked up to the Ljubljana castle for some great views of the city along with a museum. After that, we did a wine tasting, which was really awesome and we learned alot about Slovenian wines. Fun fact, Slovenia has some amazing wine. They are actually ranked as the 3rd best wine producing country in the world, but nobody knows about it because they drink it all themselves. About 95% of the wine produced in Slovenia is also consumed in Slovenia. They drink the highest amount of wine per capita of any country on earth and that only makes up about 50% of the alcohol they consume, with beer being the other major beverage of choice. Also, apparently their national anthem is just a song about wine, which I find incredible and hilarious. Party on Slovenia. Slovenia is well known for their orange wines, which I was a big fan of. They taste initially like a white wine but the finish is more like red wine. Apparently they are made from pinot grigio grapes, but they keep the skins on them during fermentation that gives them their unique color and taste. This was invented initially by a Slovenian wine maker who didn’t know what he was doing and has now become a tradition. They’ve also got an interesting wine called cvicek, which is made by mixing white and red wines together. This is considered a wine sin by the purists out there, but it was actually pretty tasty and is apparently a very popular wine in Slovenia. I don’t know a whole lot about wine and always assumed that is how rosé is made but I learned that is not true during our wine tasting. Rosé gets it pink color due to the fact that the grape skins are left with the grape juice for the first 24 hours and then removed. The more you know!
After spending 2 days in Ljubljana, we rented a car and drove to Bled, a small picturesque city that sits on the edge of a beautiful lake. On the way there we stopped to hike the Vintgar Gorge. Yet again, we failed to look at any maps prior to this hike and accidentally hiked the path backwards. We didn’t realize this error until about 3/4ths of the way into the hike, where we reached the gorge itself and there was a gate preventing us from entering because it was a narrow pathway with one way traffic going the opposite way. So we hiked out to a small town and caught a shuttle to the proper entrance in order to hike through the gorge. Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice, I’m an idiot 😂. The gorge was really cool however and it was worth doubling back to get to see it.
We spent the 2nd day in Bled checking out Lake Bled. We rented a rowboat to go out to this beautiful island in the middle of the lake that has a centuries old church on it and then swam in the lake. After taking a nice dip, we hiked around the lake and checked out the Bled castle and some amazing viewpoints overlooking the lake. As previously mentioned, Slovenia wasn’t on my radar at all but I really enjoyed it. I highly recommend spending a few days there checking it out if you’re vacationing nearby. After 4 days in Slovenia, it was time to break off from my friends and go solo again for a couple weeks. On to Budapest!
