We sLOVEnia – Ljubljana and the Mines of Moria

We spent some time in the Slovenian capital, Ljubljana (a gold star for anyone who can pronounce it correctly). We were fairly tired by the time we arrived so didn’t hit it with the same intensity as we have other cities, preferring instead to have a long morning tea, shortly followed by a long lunch. Nevertheless, Ljubljana was buzzing with a young student population and very few tourists.

We finished up our time in Slovenia by visiting the Škocjan Caves – described as ‘ranking among the most important caves in the world’. It was amazing walking through massive chambers of stalagmites and stalactites and then over a bridge spanning a 100 meter deep underground canyon and raging underground river. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take pictures, so click here for some examples.

As a side point, for anyone out there who is a Lord of the Rings fan, the caves were very much like what we imagine the Mines of Moria to be like. You could picture Gandalf and the Belrog falling into the abyss from the tiny bridge that we had to cross. Very cool…in a nerdy kind of way :)

As a very brief closing comment on Slovenia, we absolutely loved it. We didn’t know much about it before going, and really only decided to go because it was on our route, but it was thoroughly worthwhile. It is an amazingly green and beautiful country.  

Vintgar Gorge

After our stroll around Lake Bled, we drove 15 minutes up the road and walked through the Vintgar Gorge. It was quite stunning. 

The two faces of Lake Bled - Part 2

It says in the bible that we can put anything before God in prayer and he will listen. Does that mean that you can pray for a car park when you’re in a hurry? What about praying for nice weather? What happens if you pray for no rain, but there is a farmer up the road who desperately needs rain? Does God listen to such trivial prayers? Doesn’t he have more important prayers to listen to?

Anyway, after spending the previous day in horribly drab and overcast weather, we prayed for some sunshine.

We woke up and to our disappointment, nothing much had changed. We packed up the van and started driving to the lake, still determined to enjoy it for what it was.

We made it half way along the road to Bled and on the horizon we saw the faintest hint of blue sky just beginning to poke out from behind the cloud. We kept driving and by the time we reached the lake all the cloud and mist had cleared and it was sitting under a perfectly blue and radiant sky.

We parked the car and enjoyed the 6km stroll around the lake, very grateful for the opportunity to see the beautiful Lake Bled in all its resplendent glory.

Who says God doesn’t listen to small and trivial prayers?

The two faces of Lake Bled - Part 1

We arrived in Slovenia and our first stop was Lake Bled. Variously described as ‘impossibly beautiful’ and ‘postcard perfect’, Lake Bled is a perfectly still lake sitting at the foot of Slovenia’s highest mountain peaks with a castle perched up on a hill and an island in the middle with a gorgeous Baroque church. Needless to say, we were quite excited. The only issue was that the dense and heavy cloud that had been following us for the past week or so seemed as thick and heavy as ever.

We had a very lazy morning before seeing the castle in the afternoon, hoping against hope that the cloud would clear the next day.