Adventures with Julia

October 21, 2017

Yeah!  We have a day to ourselves. We are leaving Rovinj and driving ourselves to Bled, Slovenia.

If we drive nonstop, we should get to Bled in a little over 4 hours, which sounds rather nice to us as the day is clear and warm and tomorrow is expected to be cold and rainy.  If we get to Bled early enough we can walk around Bled Lake and see Bled Castle and the Baroque Church of the Assumption that stands on an island in the middle of the lake.

Our plan, however, is to drive half way and see two highly recommended Slovenian sights – the Predjama Castle and the Postojna Caves, which are only a few kilometers apart.

We agreed that we would not take time to go into the castle, but just see it from the outside and spend our time in the caves.  So far so good.

The drive there is very pleasant as the trees are in full autumn color.  We get to the castle and it is very appealing and not very crowded.  I would like to go inside, but we had agreed not to, so, I took some photos and we left.  Soon we were at the caves.  A whole other story.  There are huge parking lots full of cars and buses and people everywhere.  We knew the tour was 90 minutes and had prepared for that, but we did not know about the timed tour departures.

We arrive shortly after the 12 pm tour departed and learned that the next tour was not until 2pm.  Bummer.  This is a case where having a guide would have spared us from making a mistake.

Anyway, we considered our options and finally agree to give the caves a pass and drive on to Bled.  So, the bad news is we missed both of those sights.  The good news is we got to our large, comfortable and charming B&B, the Vila Istra, at 2pm with time to walk around the lake, see the mountain scenery, the castle, the church on the island,  which is just a couple hundred yards from our lake front room, AND relax in our room.

We did not boat over to the church or go up to the castle as we know our guide tomorrow will take us and the cost is prepaid.  It was a lovely afternoon and evening.  We walked a short distance along the lakeside to a restaurant called Sova.  I had very good pork ribs and Mark enjoyed a seafood risotto.  We are doing better with our food choices lately.  Shortly after we went to bed, the wind and rain kicked in and it was stormy all night long.   We were both glad we had done the lake walk in the clear warm day.

October 22, 2017

It was cold and rainy all day.   Our guide for the next two days, Mateja, arrived at 10am and we discussed what to do.

 

Finally, we agreed to drive up to Bled Castle and visit it, then drive to Bohinj Lake, a few miles away in a National Park, take a boat ride across that lake and visit an old gothic church in a nearby traditional village.

 

 

 

Then drive back to Lake Bled and take an ore powered boat ride to the island to visit the church and have a pastry in the café.

 

We did all those things in spite of the rain and cold.

While driving up to Bled Castle we saw the distant alpine hill tops dusted with fresh snow.  No wonder I was cold.  We walked all around the castle, staying indoors most of the time.

This castle was built by the Austrian Bishop Albuin of Brixen, who was given the land in 1004 by the German-Roman Emperor, Henry II, who wanted to be in good graces with the Pope.  It was a political maneuver that pleased the Pope, the Emperor and the Bishop.  The Bishop built the castle in 1011.

After 800+ years in the hands of the Brixen Bishops, it was sold to an aristocratic family in the 1800’s.  Later, it was nationalized by the Austrians and in 1918 it became part of the city of Bled.

There is a printing shop in the castle that has a functioning version of the Guttenberg Press.

The printmaker was there and gave us a demonstration and told us about Primoz Trubar (1508-1586), a Slovenian, protestant priest who went to Germany to escape the counter-reformation.  He wrote the first book in Slavonian.  It was about how to read and write in the Slavonian language.

He visited the castle briefly in 1561 and later died in Germany.

 

We saw a photo of the German-Roman Emperors crown that was first used in 962.  It was embellished in the 11^th and 18^th centuries and was last used by Emperor Frank II in 1804.  He resigned from being Emperor in 1896 after a battle with Napoleon.  It is a very impressive crown.

 

As we drove to Lake Bohinj, we learned several things from Mateja.

The population of the country is 2 million.  The capital, Ljubljana, has 280 thousand people.  Most people prefer to live in villages in the countryside rather than the city.

Her family is a good example.  They have a 3-story house about 12 kilometers outside of Ljubljana.  Her mother lives on the ground floor, her brother and his family on the middle floor and she has the third floor.   They collectively maintain a large edible garden and are almost self sustaining.

 

Slovenia is 40% Karst land, which means it is made up of limestone, red soil and caves, which together make up the composition of Karst.  Karst land is in many places in the world, but the science of Karst and the name, originate in Slovenia.

Melania Trump was born in Slovenia and did not leave home until she was about 20.  Trump came to Bled to meet Melania’s parents in 2002.  Now the parents live in Trump Tower.

 

The tax structure in Slovania is more complicated than many countries we visited.

If you earn up to 8K Euro, you pay 16%; between 8 and 20K you pay 27%; between 20 and 48K you pay 34% over 20K earned; between 48 and 70K you pay 39% above 48K earned; above 70K in earnings you are taxed at 50% on amount over 70K.   That is more than we pay in the US.

In addition they pay a 9% or 22% VAT tax depending on the product.  For that they do get free education through university, basic health care and retirement.  Everyone pays a small additional amount per month to have premium insurance, that covers everything medical.

It is raining and foggy when we reach Lake Bohinj, but we get on the boat anyway.  Thankfully, it is enclosed.  We can open a few windows to look out, but there is not much to see in the fog.  The lake is 4 km long x 1.2 km wide, and 45 meters deep.  I wondered why we bothered, but we follow the program.  The view, we are told, is spectacular…..when you can see it.

The boat itself is interesting as it is 61 years old and has always been electric.  Afterward, we drove through some farming villages and saw how they dry their grass on unusual and locally very traditional, hay racks.

The villages are quite pretty with the houses in each village clustered close together on irregular pathways rather than streets.   We stopped at St John the Baptist Church dating back to the 15^th and 16^th centuries.  There were some interesting frescos of angels singing with their teeth showing and two different frescos showing John’s head on a plate and his decapitated body on the ground.   Outside was a fresco of St Christopher with 6 toes.  Rather strange and even weird, I thought.

 

When we got back to Lake Bled it was raining only lightly and we decided to go for a PLetna boat ride with an oar powered boatman.

Pletna boats have a rounded sun shade across the top and carry 18-20 people at a time.  They are powered only by one man rowing in a particular manner.

He collects money and waits until the boat fills before he sets out.  There are 22 boats with the same number of families who have the tradition to row people to the island and back for a fee.  It has become a bit of a concession.

Our young ore man said his family has been doing this work for 300 years.  He has a brother and they take shifts to spell each other.  The trip to the island takes 15-20 minutes each way and he waits 40 minutes for people to see the island and get back to the boat.

 

Once on the island, our task is to climb 99 steps to get to the church and the café.  At the top, the 15^th century church is pretty uninteresting, except for the wishing bell in the middle of the nave that everyone has to try.

Make a wish and pull on the bell rope.  We did.    The cakes in the café are where the action is.  Called “Potica”, they are a cake that is made with dough filled traditionally with walnuts and honey or other sweets, then rolled and placed in a bunt pan and cooked a long time.

There were several varieties and we each picked one.  They are not hugely sweet and yet very likeable.  Unfortunately they are a local tradition and not readily available outside Bled.  Not much time to linger, we finish the cake and head back down 99 steps to the boat.  He was waiting on us and started out as soon as we arrived. In short order, we were back at the Pletna boat dock, said good bye to Mateja and agreed to meet her the next day in Ljubljana at 11am.

I was happy to get back to our room, where we had a fireplace; and get it going so we could sit by it, warm up and relax.  This was the first fireplace we have had on this trip and the perfect time and place to have one.

For our last night in Slovenia, we decided to drive to a place overlooking the lake called the Hotel Triglav.

It was full of diners, but not very noisy.  The food was pretty good, but not great.  The big thig here was the dessert.  We were told that we had to try the traditional Bled dessert, Cream Cake.  We had it, but were not crazy about it.

From top to bottom it consisted of a 4” square of; powdered sugar, a filo dough top, ½ inch layer of whipped cream, 1 ½ inch layer of vanilla pudding and a filo dough bottom.   Way too much for me, I managed about half of it.  Stuffed again, we went back to our room and the cozy fireplace.  We have only one last day, tomorrow, the 23rd, to complete this adventure before we start the journey home.  I will have to send the final chapter from there as there is not time to finish before then.