Ljubljana, Slovenia

[June 11 - 12]

Not surprisingly, I knew nothing about Slovenia before arrival. It's not that I don't care, but when we keep moving from one place to another, I don't have a lot of time to research the area. And our heavy Rough Guide to Europe book is only helpful for the most basic details. We did learn a little bit from some UK backpackers in our train carriage, but that was about it. I also had made a reservation, as the accommodation is rather expensive and limited. I was forced to pick Celica youth hostel, which I would never stay at again.

We arrived at the hostel, and once again, they didn't have our reservation correct. So, in what was supposed to be a very artistic place, we were in the completely undecorated handicapped room. The toilet paper was in a huge roll and didn't fit into the holder, so they placed it six feet above on a rack. So much for handicapped access. Anyway, overpriced and noisy hostel aside, Ljubljana was a great city to explore.



The town itself is quiet and doesn't have a lot of cars zooming through the center. A lazy river runs through it and the streets are a good twelve feet above the river level, quite like Utrecht in the Netherlands. We found a nice riverside restaurant and enjoyed the best mushroom soup ever.

While eating, we had a brush with celebrity. An older man stopped nearby to look at the menu board. Instantly, we both recognized him as someone we knew, but we couldn't figure out how we knew him. After a minute, we realized he must be someone in the movies and I finally figured out that it was the funny dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Not that we could remember his name, but we looked it up and sure enough, we had spotted Michael Constantine. We were too shy to take his picture, so you'll have to believe us.

Our other meals were also quite good. Dean enjoyed a nice bread roll and game meat on our last dinner here. The town also loved ice cream, so we had our fill of Italian-style sorbets.



It happened to be the free concert season, so we enjoyed small evening concerts along the river while we scanned the crowds in hopes of finding our celebrity again. No such luck.



On Sunday morning, we found a large flea market where Dean found a camera in the shape of a local beer. We decided that one camera was enough, but this would have been a fun souvenir.



Many great goods were up for grabs, like an old baby buggy, a Shakin' Stevens record, and all sorts of old currency. Who is Shakin' Stevens? The web site link will answer all your questions. He looks like he could really bust a move; I'm sure he must be related to the Dean Stevens.



But we had an agenda with our limited time, and headed off to the great expanse of Tivoli park. We were trying to find the Graphic Arts Museum, but got sidetracked at an excellent outdoor photography display, Earth From Above. It was a huge selection of large photographs taken at some level above the earth. The exhibit has toured in dozens of countries already. Each had some sort of caption related to humans' destruction of the environment. It was very captivating and we saw half of the display, but were too hungry to continue.

Back in town, we found a good ourdoor cafe but everyone smoked near us. There was no escape. One table stopped fuming next to us and we were downwind. Then as they stopped smoking, the opposite table lit up and the wind changed direction back towards us. After getting completely smoked out, it started raining. We made a stop back at the hostel to get our jackets and continue Dean's ongoing Latvian grammar lessons, provided by his favorite Latvian. He is getting quite good!

Near the hostel, we passed by a great display of graffiti on some very plain concert walls. Dean likes to appreciate it as an art, so I took a few pictures. Unfortunately, I forgot (as always) to "check the white balance" and the coloring had been previously adjusted in the manual mode. Dean says that I should switch to the automatic mode, which he really calls the "remedial mode." So now, if I get anywhere near the camera, Dean is always asking me, "Did you check the white balance?" [Dean: If you wondering, "What is white balance?" visit this page. For a larger selection of articles on how to manage white balance, visit this one.]



As we left town the next morning, we had exactly enough money for the bus ride to the airport. No souvenir bills this time. Our route to the remote airport passed some great green hills. We wished that we had scheduled some time for hiking in the area, but it was time to see Berlin.