| Predjama Castle |
Are your clients finding it hard to decide where to take a
holiday or short break? Don’t want to fly too far? Torn
between mountain and lake; coast and culture; city break or
countryside?
A landlocked country roughly the size of Wales, Slovenia offers a
veritable Dolly Mixture of European favourites. The country shares
borders with Hungary, Austria, Croatia and Italy, with Venice a
short hydrofoil ride away. The Austrian capital Vienna can be
reached within three hours’ drive.
In Slovenia itself nothing is too far away. From the capital
Ljubljana you can be in the heart of the western Slovenian Alps,
and in winter on the ski slopes, in an hour. The underground caves
and sinkholes of the Karst region can be reached in 30 minutes, and
the coastal resorts of the Adriatic are a couple of hours’
drive south.
Slovenia’s mountains aren’t on the scale of the
Austrian or Swiss Alps but there’s skiing in Bohinj and Lake
Bled. The Alpine countryside is peppered with picturesque chalets
reminiscent of Switzerland, and no-one could deny Lake Bled, with
its fairytale island, medieval castle and balletic boatmen, or Lake
Bohinj at the foot of the Julian Alps, their place in
Europe’s league of picture-postcard lakes.
Slovenia claims only a tiny slice of coast but Piran, with its
Venetian balconies and bustling harbour, is its undisputed jewel.
Jutting out on a peninsula into the Adriatic, the town might have
been plucked from a Tuscan hilltop.
Flying into Ljubljana and pausing at a pavement café in the
old town for a cappuccino and some people watching, you could be in
Madrid – except its baroque and art nouveau-style influences
make it resemble a pocket-sized Prague – without the tourist
hordes.
Home to museums, theatres, galleries and markets, Ljubljana manages
to retain a large-town feel with all the benefits of a capital
city. We must like it – British guests made more overnight
stays in the Slovenian capital last year than any other inbound
market.
The climate, too, resembles Europe in miniature. When it’s
raining and blowing a mountain gale in Lake Bled, it’s quite
likely to be 20C and baking just 90 minutes away on the coast. In
case you’re wondering what makes Slovenia different, its
unique attractions include the magnificent underground Postojna
caves. With a ‘concert hall’ holding up to 10,000
people during live performances, this is the destination’s
most visited attraction. Allow a minimum 90 minutes to do it any
kind of justice. Postojna is a mere appetiser for the castle around
the corner. Built into a cave, the gravity-defying Predjama Castle
literally clings to a rock face, and is a masterpiece of medieval
planning.
Driving through the countryside past fields of sunflowers and
washboard hayracks, clients can catch a glimpse of a rural Europe
that in many other countries has been lost forever.
The Istrian hinterland is home to charming villages with tourist
farms where you can charge your batteries while sampling the local
vino, cheeses, hams and organically grown vegetables, and watch
olives being processed in traditional presses.
Hearty three-course meals for under a fiver are the norm, while on
the coast a main course fish dish costs around £5 and a carafe
of wine £3.50.
Cuisine is surprisingly good, in fact it’s almost worth
visiting Lake Bled just to sample one of its extraordinary
three-storey cream cake ‘towers’.
The resort of Portoroz, with its long promenade, has a French
Riviera air about it, and it makes an excellent base for coastal
excursions.
The typical Mediterranean town of Izola features a
fishermen’s harbour in a natural bay sheltered among old
houses and palaces, and tucked around the coast from its larger
resort neighbour is Piran, a labyrinth of winding narrow streets
and higgeldy-piggeldy terracotta rooftops.
Here the legacy of 500 years of Venetian rule is laid bare in its
picturesque squares, monasteries and no fewer than 10 churches. In
Tartini square, named after the Italian composer, even the bell
tower is a replica of the one on Piazza San Marco. The
‘Musical Evenings’ in Piran in July and August are a
must.
Often confused with Slovakia, Slovenia gained independence from the
former Yugoslavia in 1991. Although only on the international
tourist market around 15 years, its tradition as a tourist
destination stretches way back – the stirrings of spa tourism
in Bled, for example, began in 1855 when the Swiss hydropath Arnold
Rikli launched the bathing season there. In 1905, Bled was chosen
as the healthiest spot in Europe.
It’s taken a while but, 100 years later, it seems we’ve
finally caught on.
