Bled is a small town that has a small lake as its focal centre point and in the middle of the lake is a small island housing a monastery with bell towers that tourists and the like can pay a small fee to annoyingly ring all through the day. How the monks don’t lose their minds with the constant ringing of bells I don’t know! Towering over the lake is a 1000 year old castle perched on top of a cliff which makes for a stunning backdrop. We were very happy arriving into town and seeing such beauty!
The first night we arrived quite late so after a recommendation from quite possibly the friendliest hostel owner in living history we headed into town for dinner. Well, it is no secret that we love food and the dinner we experienced was to die for. Chris predictably went straight for the dish that had the most meat content (he was very happy when he was presented with a plate of mixed meat goodies…) and I went for a seafood risotto. Both were morsels of pure happiness and delight, especially as they didn’t have the hefty price tag to go along with it.
After going to bed full and content we woke early to a brisk but sunny morning and grabbed the free bikes from the hostel for a jaunt to the Vintar George which was rumoured to be a 2km distance from town. Expecting a leisurely ride to the start of the gorge walk we were quickly heaving our screaming legs uphill for at least 4km, both of us not wanting to admit to being desperate to get off and walk. But, as they say it was worth it. Hardly a soul in sight we wandered our way around the wooden walkway through the spectacular gorge. It was nice to smell the air, a mix of trees, leaves, water and freshness, something we have been without for quite some time. We are used to smelling urine, smog and a hideous mix of takeaway fried food everywhere in London. At the end we were treated to a waterfall which was small by Huka Falls standards but we marvelled all the same. Best part about it was the downhill ride back to town through small farming villages – I have not smelt silage in a long time (I realised I didn’t miss it…not even a little bit).
After our small bout of exercise we deemed ourselves worthy of trying one of Slovenias delicacies which is basically a big layered tower of pastry, custard and cream piled so high it was impossible to eat without ending up with a pile of custardy goodness going everywhere (think custard square with masses of cream!) Yeah, so that lasted all of 20 seconds…we are not ones for savouring.
As the sun shone on we took the opportunity to get our walk around the lake in (which takes about 2 hours not including the 50 photo stops you end up taking along the way so more like 3 hours). We were planning on doing the touristy thing of getting our lazy selves rowed across the island on a boat by some old Slovenian dude, but we decided it was more fun (and cheaper) to hire a little boat and row ourselves across. It has to be said that Chris and I are not particularly good at rowing…in fact we are laughable at it. It would be great if we wanted to go around in circles, but not particularly useful when you have a destination in mind. It went to show that we both have one stronger side than the other so it ended up being 2 normal rows, then 2 with your left side only, then 2 normal and so on…don’t think we will be the next NZ hopefuls for the 2012 Olympic team!
All that activity just meant we were ready for (wait for it) more food! We contemplated going back to the same place as the night before but decided to go to a pub that has started in 1903. After some ridiculously cheap drinks we opted for pizza upstairs (although not traditional it was very tasty) before heading back down for more cheap beverages. The pub was decked out in number plates and we managed to find one from NZ. We were trying to leave before the landlord declared we couldn’t leave without trying the locally made blueberry schnapps – on the house. How could we refuse? It was extremely tasty.
Now I have mentioned that the constant bell ringing from the island could be annoying, but not as annoying as the church bells clanging for a good loud 15mins early on a Sunday morning. Not even a nice chime or two, it was more like a threat to all those in town with its aggressive tone and degree of urgency – much along the lines of “get up and get to church NOW!” kind of thing. Not amused – at all. 
Being our last day we had to get up to the castle for a look see. Another gorgeous day, another morning starting off with a burn to the legs with the hill climb to the top of the cliff. All was going well until we spied the tour buses lined up at the entranceway. It has to be said – I hate tour groups. They seem to have no awareness of other tourists and just end up dominating the attraction they are in purely as they have the numbers to hog space and block entrances and view points. Anyway, I digress, the castle was interesting and the view (once we glared enough at the tour groups to get through to see it that is) was worth it. We were inspired to walk around the lake once more before leaving, just to soak in as much of the wonderfulness that is Lake Bled.
Again, we left feeling that we didn’t have enough time to appreciate Slovenia and that Lake Bled was just a snippet of what the country had to offer. These weekend trips certainly do leave you feeling both cheated and lucky at the same time as we are fortunate to even be seeing such places even though they are for such a small amount of time. It goes on the list of favourites though for sure.
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