Lake Bled

Lake Bled, Slovenia

Today we headed to one of the reasons I chose this trip over the many that travel to this part of Europe – Lake Bled. This meant leaving Croatia behind us, and heading on a train through gorgeous Alpine scenery to Ljubljana, the Slovenian capital. Normally this tour stays in Ljubljana for 2 nights, and only has an afternoon in Bled. However, the hotel had given our rooms away – the women’s European basketball tournament was being held in Slovenia at this point – so we had an unexpected bonus – a night in Bled. From Ljubljana it was a quick bus ride out to Lake Bled.
We had a quick orientation walk around Bled, which if memory serves mostly involved us looking at the lake, with the island in the middle, and the castle. It was all very beautiful – clear blue water surrounded by hills and the cliff on which the castle sits.

After the orientation walk some of us headed out to Vintgar Gorge, which is about 3.5km from Bled, through lovely open Alpine countryside, dotted with lovely traditional chalets complete with balconies.

The gorge itself was spectacular – about 1.6km long, with a river and waterfalls flowing and tumbling over the rocks. Stunning. Given that it hot and sunny, it was a bit of a trek, but well worth the effort.

After I got back to Bled, I went for a walk around the lake in the gathering dusk. It was another pretty walk, with changing views of the island and castle.

That night, in our rather lovely hotel, Kayla and I slept with the window open to let in the fresh, peaceful country air – no noisy traffic here!