A Sunday drive in Slovenia.

Lovely Ljubljana was pretty well closed for business again this Sunday morning, but there was a street market of sorts, with vendors selling antiques (or maybe it was just old junk), used books, and art. It was fun to browse. I bought a small framed print of the city, to go with my collection of these things.

After wandering around (and watching many people eating ice cream cones for breakfast), we decided to hike up the hill to Ljubljana Castle, which dates from the 16th century. It was a nice steep walk, and we found some gorgeous views (and more people eating ice cream) at the top. The castle has been restored, and many modern additions such as metal handrails and glass have been added, so the thing seemed very…sanitized. Steve called it the Disney Castle, because it seemed like a rendition of something historic …not real.

After climbing back down I decided I deserved a treat for all my hard work and finally had an ice cream cone myself. Yes, it was very good.

A beautiful castle/lake photo we had seen earlier in the tourist office prompted us to do a little research on its subject, Lake Bled. When we learned that it was only 50 km (31 miles) away, we decided to make a Sunday drive of it. Although we hit a patch of bad traffic (road construction), it was a gorgeous drive. Clear blue skies, sunshine…perfect.

The lake was truly beautiful, but the area was very busy with pedestrians and car traffic. The people who run this area have really figured out how to make money. The road is lined with posts, so you can’t pull over except in their designated areas, where you must pay 5 Euros for parking! I drove around the lake twice trying to beat this system, and in the end we ended up just taking some photos from the car and leaving. We saw what we had come to see.

As we were leaving the area, we noticed a lot of small aircraft flying in the area. This caught my attention! So we followed them, driving through several small farm communities in the process. It was very pretty and picturesque, all with a mountain backdrop. We eventually found the airport, which had a small but very busy grass runway. Many guys were bringing in gliders on trailers and the place was really hopping! Along the side, some guys were flying RC planes, and parachutes were being prepared in the grass for an upcoming jump. I loved, loved, loved this place! It reminded me of the convivial atmosphere of the small “general aviation” airports at home. Fantastic.

All this made me REALLY want to go up in a plane. I haven’t flown (as a pilot I mean) at all on this trip and I miss it. There were signs advertising some overpriced panoramic tourist flights, and we walked this way and that way trying to find more information. I knew there was little chance that I’d get to fly myself, but just going up and sitting in right seat would be fine.  It didn’t work out though. The guy who runs the trips was “at a meeting” somewhere. So we sat at the edge of the field chatting with an Irish guy who had just made a parachute jump (“never again” he said) and longingly watching everyone else enjoy their Sunday flying. Then we got back in the car and finished our Sunday drive, back to Ljubljana.