Hotel Balnea Superior Dolenjske Toplice

... to the archbishop who founded the stables and also was a big protector of animals. <br><br>Afetr the tour we see a great horse show - women, men, carts, dressage (see the videos). Then we send some postcards (Romain's brother Baptiste has his birthday on the 11th August so HAPPY BIRTHDAY little big brother!). <br><br>After we drive to Koper still in Slovenia, on the coast (btw Slovenia has just 44km of coast, all the rest is taken by Italy and Croatia) - not ...

... do you think is writing this paragraph? ;-))))<br>During the dinner at the truck we are having a nice visit by a local lunatic. He is very generous and chatty but can not get that we do not really speak Slovenian. The bits Alena understands is something about his family living in Chicago, his trip to Croatia, his sister living in Frankfurt, that there are bears around the lake (looking forward to ...

Well, I managed to catch the train to Sutla without too many problems. Slavko was waiting for me and we headed off to &#381;eljko's mother's ancestral village. (Notice the correct spelling of &#381;eljko's name... one of the advantages of writing up the blog in Croatia)<br><br>This place might not be very far from Zagreb (well, Tasmania's bigger than Croatia, so nothing's going to be that ...

Well, I finally met up with Slavko.<br><br>Actually Marko had assured me that his phone would work in Europe and I'd thus be able to contact everyone... But he didn't tell me that the phone that he'd previously used in Europe fell out of his pocket one day and while it was lying on the ground he ran over it. Apparently when he got a new sim and phone for some strange reason global roaming was no longer active.<br><br>Luckily I had the idea of ...

We spent April 16-18 in the small town of Lescovec with the wonderful Pevec family (Steph's cousins). This was Steph's second visit to Slovenia and Mike's first. It was a terrific stay and we hope the first of many trips to Slovenia. Steph's cousin Borut was our host. He's quite a guy--full of life and full of pride for his country and family (as well he should be). Mike and Steph

From Salzburg I took the train down through Austria and into Slovenia. The route down especially on the Austrian side was absoultley stunning with high mountains covered in snow. When we crossed the border into Solvenia you could feel the change straight away in terms of arcitecture and the feeling about the place. It reminded me of the time when I went to Prague the old communist buildings that greeted me when I was there. When I arrived at the ...

... we got off the path and onto a road. We ran into some lovely hikers and they suggested a trip to the waterfall just 4 km away- which on a bike is not much of an effort. Now, having put in quite a sturdy effort till this point, we were anxious for an easy ride to the falls on what was now a paved road. The road turned quickly into what we had hoped we had left behind...an endless uphill ride in a "riverbed" of sliding rocks ...

... old part of town and all, but there were so few people around, it was eerie... After a good wander around, I headed back down the steps in search of the theatre as I had heard it was housed in an attractive building... looking north from the train station there is a horse-shoe shaped arrangement of buildings and parks known as Lenuci's horseshoe, and it's here that there is some of the best architecture in Zagreb. Check out the piccies for evidence. I tried my Croatian ...

... Laurie with that lactic acid burn "come on, just a few more!". We had NO idea where this little woman was because from on top of the wall we knew there were 14 streets connecting this huge maze and she could be anywhere! It did not take that sleuth Ryan long to get us there and within 10 minutes and 500 steep steps, we found her, knitting away like mad! The sweat was pouring off of both of us (evident in the picture posted of the sweaty arm!) and we had fun looking (and ...

... a bridge 50m high which we were rather hoping would be rope (preferably a bit frayed!) but it was disappointingly reassuringly solid but still very impressive. As we got closer to the exit of the caves, the formations became weirder in shape due to the effects of airflow in the caverns and we had to dodge the bat guano falling from the roof. Back to the campsite in the afternoon, Mark snoozed in the hammock and I read and we got ready to move further east.