5/10/2008

As it was a Sunday, it was a good time to go to Bohinj. It was a beautiful clear day in Bled and I was hoping it would be the same in Bohinj, so I could carry on to Vogel and take the ski lift to the top. Vogel is a ski resort, with 26 metres of ski runs and sits right in the middle of Triglav National Park. To the west of Triglav is the Italian border, to the north is the Austrian border and all along the south are the beautiful Julian Alps. I got the bus straight to Vogel and had to wait half an hour for the next cable car. It actually started to snow, for about 5 seconds and then stopped. I was waiting for the ski lift and who walked up the stairs, only Michelle and Zoe, the two New Zealand girls who I got talking to at dinner on Friday night. They were staying in Bohinj for three or four nights from Saturday, so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised that they were there. It is a small world!

The cable car was at 12.30pm and when we got up there, the view back to Bled and the mountains to the east was beautiful. The sun was out but some of the mountaintops were blotted out temporarily by clouds skidding by. The valley was gorgeous, with its green vales, the little houses dotted here and there and the mountains the whole length of the valley to the east. God it was breathtaking. We took a few photos and then went into the restaurant to get something to eat or drink. The view was great but I must admit, Chamonix and Mont Blanc beats it. But saying that, it was autumn now, everything was green and fresh. It must still be lovely here in the middle of the winter, with everything covered in snow. Now, only the mountaintops had a dusting of snow on them, as it had snowed on Saturday night.

We had something to eat in the restaurant, well, the girls did, I just had a coffee. After that, we went out to the other side of the terrace and had a look out there. You could just see the start of the hiking trail from here. It wasn’t as pretty a view here, as from the other side. It was freezing too, the temperature showed two degrees celsius. No wonder it was friggin’ cold! We decided to go back inside and have a coffee and some cake, instead of going back down straight away. Michelle and Zoe had apple strudel and I had chocolate pancakes. My stomach was a bit funny still, from the motion sickness on the bus, so I couldn’t finish the pancakes. They were huge though.

The girls were just on holiday for a few more days. Zoe and Michelle both work on cruise ships:Zoe now works on a ship in Monaco and Michelle in New Zealand. They both took the season off to go on holiday and were going to Croatia for a few days before heading back to work. We got the cable car down at 2 o’ clock and I was going to walk back to Bohinj via the lake road but decided to take the boat instead. But before that, we came across an old World War One cemetery for all of the soldiers in the area who had died in the war. There was about sixty graves there, with just wooden crosses sitting on top of the graves and the names of the people who died and a ribbon with the Slovenian colours around the cross.There was one grave marked “Unbekant” which I think means unknown. That was sad to see.

At this point, Zoe, Michelle and I parted company. We gave each other hugs and said goodbye. It was nice to bump into them again. I took the boat back to Bohinj. It wasn’t all that special, especially as the commentary was all in Slovenian. I must have been the only tourist on the boat. Bohinj is a very small little village. The lake, in comparison to Bled, has very few buildings on the shorefront, as building is prohibited along the shore. Canoeing, kayaking and other water activities are well catered for and in winter, it’s far more likely to freeze over, allowing more opportunities for skating.

The scenery on the way back from Bohinj was glorious! The rolling countryside was so green but the colour of the leaves on the trees, as they were changing colour from green to orange, was beautiful. You’re also surrounded by mountains, on all sides and high mountains at that, some of them snowcapped. God it was food for the soul. There were also a lot of stables, with horses galloping around in the fields.

At 6.45pm I went to the restaurant to see if they had a table free for dinner. Not! But David, who works in the restaurant/bar asked me what I wanted to eat and when it was ready, made a space for me at one of the big tables. They’re great here, really. I didn’t really like the dinner though. I ordered grilled sausage, with buckwheat mush (a bit like fried breadcrumbs) and white cabbage. Frank was in the bar, without Margaret. She was sick and Frank didn’t feel the best either. They had both eaten bad cream cakes earlier in the day and had been sick for the rest of the evening. What he ate, didn’t stay down and he was as white as a ghost. The poor man. After dinner, I got talking to Margot and John, an Australian couple who were waiting for a table and another couple from Cardiff, Wales. It’s a great place for meeting people, both locals and travellers on holiday.

I was sitting outside for a while afterwards and every now and again, you’d hear a splash from the well. I went over to have a look and there were about ten fish in the well! They were fish from the Sava Bohinjska river – trout. They weren’t there on Monday when I arrived. The owners fill up the well with fish every two or three days and use them for the restaurant. At about 11 o’clock, Mike, a local who was in the bar the other night and the cute looking guy, who rowed our pletna boat walked by. It looks like the cute guy lives next door to the pension! It was so nice though, to sit outside especially as it was a clear night and you could see the stars spread out like a blanket across the sky.