Austria

Trip Report - DC Mom

Days 1 and 2: Washington, DC to Vienna, Austria

My daughter and I flew out of Washington, DC’s Dulles Airport on Air France to Paris, connecting with another AF flight to Vienna, Austria. Although our outbound flight departed an hour late, it arrived in Paris only ten minutes behind schedule. However, we were off-loaded far from the terminal and bused in. The whole process took 40 minutes, and then there was a very long line in security at Charles de Gaulle Airport. We made it to our connecting gate with only five minutes to spare and were among the last five people to board.

When we arrived in Vienna to a cool and rainy day, we took the S-bahn to Wien Mitte station and bought our train tickets for the next day’s journey to Slovenia. We traveled to Karlsplatz/Oper and found our hotel, the Pension Suzanne. Our previously confirmed room rate was 94 Euros including breakfast, and the manager told me not to worry about the price I’d see posted in the room, that he was only going to charge us 94 Euros. It turned out we were given a large, lovely suite-like room that normally went for 115 Euros. We went out to explore Vienna, following the two-hour city walk that’s listed in the Eyewitness Guide to Vienna and walked all over the Stadtpark, to Schwarzenbergplatz, Ressel Park, Karlsplatz and the Karlskirche, the Naschmarkt and the Otto Wagner buildings on Linke Wienzeile, and on to the Fillgrader Steps that are in the movie “The Third Man”, finally ending at the Secession Building. We stopped in the Karlskirche on our walk and took an elevator most of the way to the ceiling to see the ongoing restoration of the frescoes. My daughter bravely climbed the scaffold six more stories to look out over the city while I waited on the platform. By this time we were ready for dinner so we found the Gösser Brauerei on Elisabethstrasse and had very good dinners.   Day 3: Vienna to Maribor, Slovenia

After breakfast we checked out of Pension Suzanne but left our bags there while we explored Vienna again. We headed first to the Stephansdom (it had been closed to tourists on our previous visit to Vienna), but it was very crowded and we found that we could only visit the perimeter of the nave unless we paid for an audioguide and neither of us was interested. It was another rainy and cool day, and we traveled to the Upper Belvedere to see the art collection. We enjoyed the Renoirs, Monets, Klimts, and Munchs but didn’t care much for the rest. We walked around the gardens and returned to the hotel, stopping for lunch at a pizza restaurant nearby.

We picked up our bags and went to the Südbahnhof to board the train to Maribor. The train departed on time and traveled through lovely country, and ticket checks by conductors were frequent. Everyone changed train cars at Graz, and the train stopped at the border for passport checks by both Austrian and Slovenian officials. We arrived in Maribor around 7:45 p.m., and most travel services were closed with the exception of the railway information office. The woman there and I settled on speaking to each other in German and she told us to take bus #6 to our hotel, but we checked out the map she gave us and decided that it didn’t look like that long of a walk so we set out on foot. Wrong decision. It was longer than we thought, and by the time we were halfway there it was dark and it had been raining all day so it was misty, too. We finally reached a street corner where we thought we should turn but weren’t sure so I asked a young man who’d been walking behind us if we were at the right street to turn, and he said yes (conversation in Slovene and English). We continued walking for several blocks, and I stopped in a bar to ask if we were near the hotel. The woman there spoke English and said yes, the hotel was just a short way farther. We finally arrived at 8:45 p.m. to a friendly welcome at Hotel Tabor. The woman at the reception gave us directions to an Italian restaurant nearby, but either I didn’t understand her or we made a wrong turn because we didn’t find it. We ended up at Pizzeria Cu-Cu (those Cs are supposed to have curved lines above them, making the pronunciation "choo-choo," and the restaurant had a railroad theme).  
Day 4: Maribor, Logarska Dolina, Gornji Grad, Ljubljana

We woke up to a sunny and nice day, checked out of Hotel Tabor, took the bus to the train station, and then walked to the nearby Avis car rental office to pick up our car. We got an automatic Opel Meriva with AC, and the folks at the Avis office were very helpful, explaining all the basic functions and particularly the operation of the automatic shift - park the car by using the handbrake and shifting into neutral, push a button on the stick to shift into reverse, and the rest of the time drive on “A” for automatic. I also learned that in spite of compulsory CDW insurance, there would be a 550 Euro deductible for any damage. The car was comfy, and we set off down the autoroute (toll road) toward Ljubljana but took the Šentrupert exit and drove toward Logarska Dolina.

Driving in Slovenia deserves its own chapter, but I’ll make some general observations here. We took with us the Freytag & Berndt road map for Slovenia (1:250,000), and I would recommend it. The autoroutes are wonderful, just like German autobahns, well made, well surfaced, well signed, same driving rules, no speed limit unless posted in places. They are toll roads, but the tolls aren’t unduly expensive. The main roads (red and yellow on the F&B map) are also good for the most part, well signed and usually well surfaced. However ... those gentle curving lines on the F&B map don’t come close to depicting the continuous curviness of roads in Slovenia, even in fairly flat valleys. There are usually no shoulders and many blind curves, and roads can be very narrow, even one lane with (hopefully) a sign in advance advising which direction has priority. It’s compulsory to drive with headlights on in all weather. The secondary roads on the F&B map (white) can be paved and signed ... or not ... and good luck if they aren’t. Additionally, Slovenes love cycling, and you have to be careful to always keep an eye out for cyclists, especially on blind curves. There were so many cyclists that we think there ought to be a Slovene Tour de France champion any year now.

The drive to Logarska Dolina goes through a canyon and is lovely in itself. We kept saying, “wow, look at this scenery ... Slovenia is gorgeous!” When we reached the Alpine valley, it, too, was lovely with rock-sided mountains and forests. We reached the end where the Rinka Waterfall (Slap Rinka) is located and climbed the steep and rocky path to its base. A fair number of people were there, most of whom seemed to be Slovene. After our hike we drove to a pension halfway down the valley for lunch.

We left the valley and drove toward Ljubljana via a scenic route, stopping at Gornji Grad on our way to see the Church of Sts. Hermagoras and Fortunatus. We drove on toward Kamnik, and the route wound up over the mountains with spectacular scenery all around. We managed to find the right road going around Ljubljana toward the northwest via Vodice, but when we reached Celovška cesta, the main divided highway into the city, we should’ve turned right toward Pension Jelen. Instead we turned left, and I stopped at a gas station for directions. The manager told me (in German) to turn around and head north toward the suburb of Jelen and I would find the pension. I found it, but something looked wrong and when I pulled into the parking lot and asked a young man there about it (in Slovene and English), he said it had burned down recently. I asked him for hotel advice, and he said to turn around toward the city and I would find signs for hotels along the way. I really hadn’t wanted to drive in the city so my daughter and I consulted our Rough Guide (2004) and Lonely Planet (2001) guidebooks and found the M Hotel seemed to be closest to where we were. By now the young man’s girlfriend had arrived, and I asked both of them about M Hotel. They gave me general directions and said if I didn’t find it, I should stop at McDonald’s. Of course, I didn’t find it and McDonald’s was on the other side of the highway so we drove past it, turning around again, and the manager there gave me more specific directions in English. Naturally, M Hotel was on the other side of the highway so we made another U-turn, found it, and got room there. This whole process had taken two hours due to the fact that it was rush hour and Celovška cesta was jammed with cars in both directions.

The hotel management told us how to take a bus into the city (buy a token from the tobacco stand, the bus drivers won’t give exact change), and we went downtown and walked to Prešeren Square. It seemed that a festival was going on, and there were street performances and many people in the city. We stopped at the tourist information center near the Triple Bridge and got a town map. We tried to visit the Church of the Annunciation, but a mass was in process and we didn’t want to disturb the worshippers. We were hungry for dinner and found a restaurant along the riverside, but after sitting for some time without any wait staff in sight, we left and wandered about until we found Cantina Mexicana where we had dinner.   Day 5: Ljubljana, Škofja Loka, and Bled

We were lucky to have another sunny and warm day so we checked out of the hotel but left the car in the parking lot and took the bus downtown. We tried to visit the Ursuline Church, but mass was in progress. We were learning that Slovenia is a strongly Catholic country, mass is well-attended, and churches are used for prayer and quiet contemplation. We walked through Kongresni Trg and across Shoemakers Bridge to the old town, walking through it to the huge and colorful market. We stopped at St. Nicholas Cathedral, crossed the Triple Bridge to see the Church of the Annunciation, and walked to the Dragon Bridge and back through the market. We then took the tourist train to the castle and talked briefly to a family from Oregon, the first Americans we’d encountered in Slovenia. We climbed the castle’s clock tower for great views of the city and then returned on the train to Prešeren Square where we bought some ice cream for lunch and then took the bus back to our hotel. There was a deli market behind the hotel where we bought snacks and drinks to take with us on our drive to Lake Bled.

We drove to Bled via Škofja Loka and stopped at the town, but it was late afternoon and not much was going on there. The churches were closed, very few people were about, and everything was rather quiet. I think we were expecting something more like Rothenburg ob der Tauber. We climbed up to the castle, and we took some photos of the nearby village of Puštal. Part of the community in PA where I live was heavily populated by Slovenian immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and I’d learned accidentally on the Internet that one of the more prominent families had come from Puštal so it was interesting to see the town where their ancestors had lived. On leaving Škofja Loka we made a wrong turn and ended up traveling to Bled over the mountaintop via Železniki, Dražgoše, and Kropa. The small squiggles on the F&B map turned out to be many hairpin turns and an extremely narrow and winding road, but wow! The views were amazing along the way. I really don’t recommend this route, however. Between Dražgoše and Kropa the road surface isn’t well-maintained, and if you’re traveling north the way we did, you drive on the outer edge with many sheer drop-offs, no shoulder, blind curves, and frequent one-lane type of driving. Thank heavens the only other vehicles I encountered were bicycles, which together with the road conditions leads me to think this part of the road isn’t used a lot.

We arrived in Bled to find it was very much built-up, more than I expected, but we found our hotel, Vila Prešeren, on the quieter side of the lovely lake. After settling in, we went down to the hotel restaurant for dinner and noted a bride and groom in traditional dress were having their pictures taken in the park. It turned out that the church behind our hotel was very popular for weddings. We had a very good dinner at the hotel restaurant, and afterward we walked along the lakefront to check out the busier side before returning to the hotel for the night.   Day 6: Lake Bled and Lake Bohinj

We woke up to a cloudy and cooler day and started off by driving up to the castle on the clifftop above Bled. We walked all around it, enjoying the views and visiting the museum and chapel. We noted that contrary to the description in our Rough Guide, the museum exhibits were labeled in Slovene and English, and we thought the displays were interesting. We returned to our hotel and walked to the market in the shopping center on the other side of the lake to buy sandwiches and drinks for a lakeside picnic. The cashier’s name tag showed her surname to be the same as a girl with whom I went to school so I told her that there were people with her name in my town, and she grinned. The folks who serve tourists in Bled seem to be fluent in English and German as there were lots of Brits and Germans and some Americans in addition to us visiting there, and no one seemed to have any problem communicating. Afterward we rode with others on a pletna to the island in the middle of the lake and visited the church there. It was Saturday, and both the church behind our hotel and the church on the island were busy with weddings. We saw four wedding parties during the day on the lakeside near our hotel, and there were two more on the island.

Rain was arriving, and after we returned to the lakeside from the island, we decided to drive to Lake Bohinj. We parked the car at Ribcev Laz (C with the curved mark above it) and walked across the bridge toward the church in time to hear a group of French tourists singing a lovely folk song in front of the church. We walked along the lakeshore for about a half mile or so through rain showers, enjoying the beauty and more quiet atmosphere of Lake Bohinj, and by the time we returned to Ribcev Laz, it was raining pretty hard. The church there had been closed when we went off on our walk, but according to our guidebooks, it was supposed to open again at 5 p.m. We walked to the tourist office to ask if the church would be open at five, but we were told it was closed for restoration so we returned to Bled. We walked up the hill to Pizzeria Rustika where we had dinner and then took a long way back to the hotel, meandering through town and finally walking along the lakeshore.  
Day 7: Triglav National Park, the Soca (C with the curved mark above it) Valley, Kobarid, and Idrija

The day dawned with most disappointing weather - rain, clouds, and fog. This was our day to drive over the Vršic Pass (C with the curved mark above it) in the Alps, and I could tell we weren’t going to see much alpine scenery along the way. We took a wrong turn as we drove out of Bled, but I stopped for directions (Slovene, German, and English) and soon we were on the right road to Kranjska Gora. We started up the east side of the mountain road and learned we weren’t the only tourists who decided to make the trip in spite of the weather. Our first stop was the Russian Chapel which was fenced off for restoration, but we climbed up to it as far as we could and contemplated the 300 Russian men who helped build the mountain road while prisoners in World War I and then died in an avalanche. Soon we were stopped by a flock of sheep taking their time to cross the road, and we stopped further up the mountain at the small military cemetery where some of the Russian prisoners are buried. By the time we returned to our car, the sheep had arrived and surrounded it. It was fun to watch the leaders, one in front and one behind, who kept them together and kept an eye on us as we waited for them to pass by.

We finally reached the Vršic Pass, and even though it was raining and foggy the whole time, the mist would clear a little now and then so we could see just a bit of what we were missing. We never saw Mt. Triglav, not even on the previous day in Bled, because clouds were hiding it. Descending into the Trenta Valley was steeper and even more twisting than the climb up the east side, and we crossed the upper Soca River (C with the curved mark above it). The Mlinarica Gorge and the river are very beautiful, even on a rainy, foggy day. We stopped at the Church of St. Joseph in Soca, hoping to see the paintings of Mussolini and Hitler on the Stations of the Cross and the other nationalistic symbols, but the Stations had been removed and scaffolding was in place throughout the nave for restoration. We were coming to the conclusion that Slovenia seemed to be in the process of restoring many things in advance of 2007 when they will adopt the Euro as their currency. We stopped to take some pictures of the Boka Waterfall and finally reached Kobarid. We were hungry for lunch, but it was Sunday and the market was closed so we first went to the Kotlar Restaurant which was jam-packed with people. We left there and went to the Topli Val where we had a very good lunch. Both of these restaurants are some of the best in Slovenia, and they seemed to be “destination spots,” i.e. most of the folks were ordering multi-course lunches that were clearly their main meal of the day.

After lunch we went to the excellent Kobarid Museum that tells the story of the battle of the Soca/Isonzo front that was the setting of Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms. There was an excellent film, shown at various times in various languages, and rooms arranged thematically so that it’s easy to understand the history of what happened in the Kobarid area during the war. If the weather hadn’t been so poor, we would’ve liked to have gone on the Kobarid historical walk outlined in the Rough Guide, but instead we simply drove up the hill to the Italian Charnel House where 7,000 soldiers are buried and briefly went into the chapel. Note that the entrance to the driveway to this site can be found on the main square in Kobarid with a star on one side of it and a cross on the other. The road is narrow and twisting - beware that cars may be coming down toward you as you start up.

Finally we ended our day in Idrija, arriving in the middle of their annual lace festival. We stayed at Gostišce Barbara (C with the curved mark above it) which was located across the street from the main square where the principal part of the festival was taking place, and the area was set up with food booths and a stage with polka, folk song, and some pop song groups performing. It was quite festive in spite of the rain, and we walked through it on our way to Gostilna Pri Škafarju where we ate the local specialty, žlikrofi, which are potato balls wrapped in thin pastry and served with various sauces, and we also had another Slovenian specialty, chocolate palacinke (C with a curved mark above it, the word means filled pancakes), for dessert. The music of the bands accompanied our evening in the hotel ... until 12:30 a.m.!   Day 8: Franja Partisan Hospital, Predjama Castle, Štanjel, and Piran

Our day began with more rain, and after checking out of the pension, we drove north toward Cerkno and the Franja Partisan Hospital. From the parking lot we hiked along a trail uphill into the heart of the Pasica gorge through an increasingly heavy rain. We were the first tourists to arrive and thus had the place to ourselves. The history behind this site is that it was built in December 1943 for wounded soldiers of the Slovene Partisan Army and operated until the end of World War II, during which time it treated more than 500 Partisans as well as soldiers from Italy, Russia, and America. We were utterly fascinated with the location and what had been accomplished here. The Cerinšcica River rushes down through the gorge and among the buildings, and we could only imagine how cold and damp it must have been in the winters and wondered how the patients and staff were able to keep warm without being detected by Germans seeing the smoke from fires or stoves. When patients were brought to the hospital, they were blindfolded so they would never be able to reveal the location if they were captured, and food supplies were lowered down the cliff face by neighboring farmers. We very much recommend a visit to this place, and I told the managing person at the entrance (in German, the language we settled on to communicate) that it was well done and most interesting, and he smiled. As we were leaving, a bus tour of Brits was arriving. We returned to Idrija and stopped at the Galerija Idrijske Cipke where I bought a piece of lace hand-made in the town and was given a 10% discount for paying in cash. We also stopped at the Mercator market and had sandwiches made in their deli so we could have a car picnic; this had become our lunch of preference since it was quick and cheap.

We consulted the F&B map to see how best to reach our next destination, Predjama Castle, and it seemed like we could take a route on a secondary road that would cut a corner and save us time. We saw that there were two possible secondary roads so that if we missed the first turn, we could take the second one and still arrive there without much difference in time or distance. In time we reached the village where we knew the second turn to be and realized we'd missed the first turn, but neither of the road options in the village seemed to be correct because both of them were gravel. I parked the car at a closed bar café and walked across the road to the nearest house, planning to ring the bell and inquire as to the correct route. I could hear a video game in operation through the open window and thought, "Good, a young person who will hopefully speak English." My ringing of the doorbell was answered by a diminutive elderly woman, and immediately my plans to speak English went out the window. I said in Slovene, "Excuse me, please, English," then in English while pointing to myself, "American," and finally, "Predjama." The woman smiled, nodded, and said "Predjama" while pointing across the road to one of the gravel roads. Then she said in Italian, "Straight ahead, don't take the first turn, straight ahead to Predjama." I thanked her in Italian, and we turned onto the gravel road she indicated. After some time of traveling downhill through a forest and passing no other vehicles or buildings we came to a fork with several wooden signs, none of which said "Predjama." We continued in the direction that seemed like it was the main one and came to a paved road and the town of Bukovje. The problem was that according to the map, we shouldn't have come to Bukovje and instead should have come to the castle along the gravel road. We turned around, thinking we should have turned at the fork, and headed off down that road, but after traveling a few kilometers we didn't come to Predjama and the road was rising back uphill which we didn't sense was the right direction. We turned around again in the direction we'd come and saw a wooden arrow sign saying "Predjama" that pointed to a grass track heading into the woods. We debated whether this was right or wrong, but since it was the only sign we'd seen and it was clear other vehicles had traveled into the woods, we headed off into the trees. About 1/4 mile into the woods the increasingly narrow grass track ended in a hiking trail. I turned the car around carefully, all the while mindful that CDW insurance still included a 550E deductible and it had been raining for most of three days, making it possible that we could get stuck in mud on the way out. We emerged unscathed with the exception of much mud all over the car and turned back toward Bukovje, determined to find someone who could help us find Predjama since we now figured it was somewhere between Bukovje and the hiking trail. As we drove into the village, we came to a Predjama direction sign and found the castle with no further problems. We enjoyed our visit to the castle and its unique location at the mouth of a cave, and it's very popular with tourists - parking for cars was at a premium, and bad weather seemed to have no effect on the crowds.

As we drove away from Predjama and toward the Adriatic coast, the weather finally began to clear. We wound our way up through the Karst to the medieval fortified town of Štanjel, a picturesque Karst village that we explored for about an hour. In addition to the church with its unusually shaped steeple, there is the Karst House in vernacular architecture and the Ferrari Garden from which there are great views across the Karst and toward Italy.

We traveled on to Piran, our final destination for the day. Parking and driving are difficult in this tiny Venetian-style seaside town on the Adriatic, and tourists' parking options are limited to the two pay parking lots at the entrance to the town or a new parking facility above the town. The seaside parking lots are easy to find, and there's a free shuttle bus that travels into the center of Piran. We had made a reservation at this hotel and were told via our email confirmation to drive to it, unload our bags, and then park the car in a parking facility afterward. We tried to do this, but cars completely blocked the entrance to the street where the hotel was located so we parked the car in the parking lot closest to the town entrance and walked to the hotel. When we arrived, it was closed, although the door's window was open and we could hear a radio playing inside. We rang the bell repeatedly and called "hello" as loudly as we could through the window, but no one answered. A boy across the street told us he'd seen the owner leave earlier. This was frustrating because I'd told the owner we would arrive between 6 - 7 p.m., and we arrived at 6:15 p.m. There was a sign on the door with the owner's cell phone number, but we had no phone with us. While we were debating what to do, two people arrived with a key to the door, asked if we had a reservation, and told us to come in the breakfast room to wait, that they were sure the owner would return very soon. We did this, and they went upstairs into one of the upper floors. We sat down and noted stacks of pornographic magazines on a low shelf in the front window next to the breakfast tables and chairs. We looked at each other uneasily but decided this was Europe after all, no big thing. As time went on and no one came downstairs, the owner and no other guests arrived, and we didn't see a phone at the check-in desk from which we might try to call the owner's cell phone, we became more uncomfortable and worried about whether we really did have a reservation after all. It was growing dark, and we were concerned that we wouldn't find another room since accommodations in Piran are at a premium in the summer. We waited until 7:30 and then walked to Hotel Piran and were able to get their last available room. I told the woman at the front desk about our experience with the other hotel, and she smiled and said she'd heard similar stories from other guests who'd ended up at Hotel Piran. After settling into our room, we walked to Mario's and had delicious shrimp dinners.   Day 9: Piran and Portorož

We began our beautifully sunny day by walking along the seafront, past Piran's concrete and rock "beaches," and toward St. Clement's Church and the Punta Lighthouse. We could see all the way to Trieste and the Italian coast. We wound our way through town, passing the Scuola Musica di Pirano, the Trg 1 Maja with its cistern, the Dolphin Gate, and the market, finally arriving in Tartini Square. In spite of tour groups, Piran was much quieter than it had been the evening before when we arrived. We stopped in to see St. Peter's Church and learned that the churches of Piran can only be visited from behind grillwork just inside their entrances because they've suffered too much vandalism over the years.

We began to climb uphill and stopped at St. Francis' Church, the Minorite Monastery, and the Church of Our Lady of the Snows. Finally we arrived at the top of the town and turned left to walk along the high street, visit the Baptistery of St. George's Church, and climb the belltower for views over Piran, the Adriatic, and the Italian coast. We hadn't paid attention to the time of day, and suddenly the tower bells began to chime the noon hour. We burst out laughing because we were so startled and wondered if we'd be deaf after they were finished gonging. We were able to go a little way inside St. George's Church before workmen who were restoring it came to us and smilingly asked us to please leave so we wouldn't be in danger of injury. We continued on our walk, heading downhill to the "beaches" again, and stopped at Bistro Bonazza for a pleasant al fresco lunch. We wondered how the sea and sun bathers could possibly be comfortable lying on the concrete and rocks, but there was no shortage of people taking advantage of them.

After lunch we walked back into the center of Piran, stopping at some shops there, and we decided to take the bus to Portorož to see what it was like. While Piran reminds one of Venice without the canals, Portorož is very much a modern but pleasant resort town. We walked along the main street, checking out the beaches and shops and people watching. We returned to Piran, and dinner that evening was al fresco at Okrepcevalnica Pizeria Riva on the seafront.    Day 10: Hrastovlje, Škocjan Cave, Šticna (C with a curved mark above it) Monastery, and Crnomelj (another C with a curved mark above it)

We woke to another lovely sunny day and left Piran to head east to the town of Hrastovlje and the Church of the Holy Trinity. I had found a picture of its interior on the Internet some months before our trip and was determined to see its 15th century frescoes. There was no one there but the guide/caretaker when we arrived, and she popped an English language CD into a player and proceeded to give us a personal tour, walking around the interior with us and pointing to each fresco as it was illustrated by the narration on the CD. The church is most known for its Dance of Death fresco which is excellent, but I also very much enjoyed the frescoes depicting the calendar year because they had scenes from the daily life of the people and really give an insight into the area's past. The guide was just great and spoke as much English to us as she could while she was pointing out the frescoes, and we thanked her very much for our tour. As we were leaving the church, an elderly couple was arriving, and the man must have heard us speaking English with the guide because he asked in perfect English where we were from and told us his son lived in Boston. He asked if the Trinity Church is well known in the U.S., and I got the sense that he was very surprised to see Americans visiting. I told him I'd seen pictures of it on the Internet and then told him about the Slovene settlers in my community in earlier times and the Slovenian Club that still exists there today. I reeled off one Slovenian name after another of kids with whom I'd attended school, and he laughed and said "Oh, yes, some of those are very well known names in Slovenia!" He then pointed out a tower high on the mountainside above the church and told us that a series of those towers had marked the border between the Venetian and Austrian empires in the old days. We parted with him telling me to give his "regards to the States," and we were very glad to have met him.

We drove on to Škocjan Cave, arriving just in time for the noon tour but with no time to have lunch first so we fortified ourselves with water and chocolate and set off with two guides and a fairly large group of visitors to see the cave. At the entrance we were divided into two groups, and the Slovenian/German language group entered first while our Italian/English language group was given an orientation. There are really two caves, the Silent Cave and the Murmuring Cave. It's hard to describe the beauty and wonderment of these caves, especially the Murmuring Cave with the Reka River flowing through it. It's a UNESCO site so that should tell anyone interested in it that it's considered to be a very special place, and so it is. Walking and climbing through it was one of the most fantastic experiences we've ever had, and we'd recommend no one visit Slovenia without seeing it. The visit takes 1-1/2 hours - wear good walking/hiking shoes or boots for the 2km walk and take along a light jacket.

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