Visiting the Adriatic seaside in the third decade of May has most
advantages of low season. Though on Saturday and Sunday some locals and
probably some visitors from central parts of Slovenia, popped over for a weekend
rest, droves of sun-thirsty tourist were unseen. On Thursday the beach looked
like that. The snap is somewhat misleading since we were not the only
holidaymakers around. There were less than plenty but more than few tourists
from Germany (judging by licence plates of cars, not only language audible) and
Russia.
After a day of sunbathing and swimming in the sea (water temperature
around 20C, similar to what one can enjoy in Polish lakes in July or August, so
bearable, not yet comfortably warm) we marched towards Piran, the historic
Italian town which in the wake of political decisions was adjoined to bygone
Yugoslavia in 1954. The architecture reminds of Italian roots of this place.
The town has its climate, especially near sunset (a pity we did not take an
evening trip there), but when the heat reaches +30C sightseeing conditions are
not at their best, yet we were in Mediterranean climate, it should not have
been chilly actually.
Each evening we took a bottle of local wine (less than 2 EUR per litre,
an excellent beverage for my not refined taste) and sauntered to a promontory
to observe the sun going down into the sea. Unfortunately, each day the western
sky was kind of cloudy and clouds lingered above the horizon, so we missed the
breathtaking sight, being out of luck just as in January we missed out on
Northern Lights, but a week after we few back a massive aurora explosion was
witnessed in Tromso. Yet sipping wine and staring at the smooth sea was a sheer
bliss anyway.
Monday, 28 May 2018
After spending four full days in Portoroz, we headed back towards
Poland. The first stop, recommended by a friend who had also travelled to
Slovenia by car in 2016, was Bled lake, one of two picturesque lakes (the other
is Bohinj) in the central, hilly part of the country. Out stopover there lasted
just an hour, enough to catch the climate of the place and grow fond of it,
yearning to come back for more one day.
On the same day we turned up to Maribor. The accommo-dation there, a
three-star, just refurbished apartment one mile from the very city center set
us back mere 42 EUR (cheapie!). Maribor is the second biggest city in Slovenia,
yet it smacks of a bigger town and I must say one afternoon is absolutely
sufficient to get about it. We roamed around town, but climbed up a hill called
"pyramid" (due to its shape), from which we could lap up another city
view from above. We pitched up atop more than one hour before sunset (not the
most magical time of the day), yet gazing at such landscape compensates the
strain ascent involves.
Tuesday, 29 May 2018
The last stop (actually the penultimate one, before spending two days in
Bielsko-Biała again) was the capital of Slovakia, which was the let-down of the
trip. My memories are negatively skewed as all cards were stacked against us.
As we were driving in, a massive downpour hit the city, then it cleared up, but
air humidity was far higher and temperature hit +30C - not a conducive
temperature for sightseeing. Our hotel (Hotel Turist) turned out to not to have
undergone a renovation since the split of Czechoslovakia (in Poland one would
struggle hard to find hotels where time stopped before the collapse of
communism), odour of cigarettes was in the air, breakfast was worse than
indecent. Fortunately we just stayed one night there (but escaped on Wednesday
before 8 a.m.) and the location was two miles from old town. I did not even
bother to take out a camera too many times. Had I taken pictures of Bratislavia
and stripped them off advertisements and modern cars, the photos would have
been easily eligible for Michael's old-school photo challenge. Truth be told, I
recommend visiting Bratislava to nobody.
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