Ljubljana

13/09/2008
Wow! How good you feel after a decent nights sleep and a full tummy! Couldn't work out if we were supposed to pay for breakfast but the heavies didn't arrive so assumed it was a free for all!
Time to tour the town and get orientated! Things look so much better in daylight... easy peasy when you know where you are.
Found TI and got a decent map. As soon as we arrive we are planning our escape. Got our bus ticket for the next leg of the adventure... to Rovinj, Croatia on Monday.
Did our own walking tour using our guide book. Ljubljana is old world and charming. It has some lovely fashionable shops and the market is a delight to stroll through with some interesting stalls from souvenirs and local produce. The market hall has delicious aromas emanating from the bakehouse pastries and delicatessens. A gelato is highly recommended!
There is an attractive laid back feel to this place. We love strolling the streets and laneways. They serve a fairly good cappuccino at the cafes which are great to sit and people watch, especially the stylishly dressed Slovenians.
We were down to our last change of clean clothes and got our washing done this afternoon. Luckily timed this well as only one machine and dryer for guests to use and a queue formed after we started. Great clean clothes again.... small luxuries!!
We dodged puddles and pouring rain when we went out for a bite to eat. Certainly I didn't want to walk far and pulled Bob into the first - not too posh - restaurant to get out of the rain. Turned out to be a good choice "Juljana's"- very dutch in decor. Meal was good nice salmon and veg and Bob had seabass. Beer and wine was very good and slovenian cake for sweets. Yum!

Are we there yet?

12/09/2008
Hungarian red chairs
We had awhile to wait for our train to Slovenia, so had some time to catch up with postcards. We found the only place to sit was on some rather unusual red moulded plastic chairs. The chairs did not have legs in the front but were joined back to back on a sort of rocker. When I sat down it moved a little like a see-saw. I sat precariously on mine and started to write a postcard and Bob wandered off to have a look around.
A rather large gentleman sat down on the other side of my chair. Postcards went flying and I let out a yelp as I was catapulted into the air. He jumped up apologising profusely in Hungarian I suppose, and I said "That's okay... I'm not used to these strange Hungarian chairs left by the communists obviously, for unsuspecting Australian tourists..." well, no I didn't say that, just got to that's okay. So I recovered my postcards and he sat down and up I went again, trying not to yelp or laugh as he wriggled around on his side of the chair, apologising while he gave me a very rocky ride.
Bob came back and I waited with amused expectation as he sat down and jostled with his "red chair partner" until he got fed up and went to find out if our train had arrived. As luck would have it had and we were able to board, so could leave the crazy hungarian red chairs behind.

Now we are on our way to Ljubljana, Slovenia by train and it is a nice one too, very impressed! Too good to be true... and it was. The first sign of things to come was when the conductor handed Bob a card written in English stating "Due to maintenance passengers will be transfered by bus for approximately an hour before meeting another train and the journey will continue" or words to that effect. That was okay.
Then we came to a sudden halt... then a couple of jolts and then nothing. So we waited and waited... The conductor was no help, he just shrugged. After half an hour passengers were getting a bit towie and getting off the train and walking up to the engine. Finally, we got underway again after nearly an hour.
It was another hour before we switched to the buses. This made a change from the train as we raced through the countryside. Villagers looked in surprise as 2 large tour buses hurtled through their streets like the devil was after them. It was quite a contrast seeing the villages compared to the towns on the train line. They are certainly not destitute but obviously still catching up after the fall of communism.
We finally arrived at a large city.... with hardly a clue as to where we were. I did see one sign that said Zagreb and I thought that was a bit out of our way. We were whisked off the bus and onto a train within 5 minutes and straight away we were off. We hoped everyone got on board as some passengers had to stopped to buy a bite to eat... but the train was not waiting!
The carriage was quite comfortable but we soon found - the usual story (sent Bob along to check them out first), the toilets were gross! We have a theory... the buck gets passed from one country to the other and no one will take responsibility for cleaning them.
It was a very slow trip.... the engines were changed, then changed again and we wondered what border is this one? Then we worked out we must have gone from Hungary to Croatia back to Hungary, then Slovenia. Talk about the long way around.
At night we saw lots of towns with castles and churches lit up in the dark and thought we had arrived, would start getting our packs ready only to go choofing past. Then the thunder and lightning started and finally... finally, we arrived at Ljubljana... at 10.45pm in the pouring rain 2 and a half hours late. We felt completely out of it and hoped against hope the hotel had not let our room.
We walked out of the station, disregarding our notes and memorised route to the hotel and went completely the wrong way. Stood in the rain disorientated and feeling like water-logged lost souls, then retraced our steps and started again... on track this time and mostly went the right way. We passed some boisterous, noisy, exuberant drunks and a fountain that looked like a group of guys standing in a circle peeing on each other.... must be hallucinating now as haven't eaten since breakfast. It took us 20 minutes walk instead of 10 to get to the Park Hotel. We were so relieved that they had kept our room. They had other people asking for rooms and had turned them away we were told.
We settled in then Bob ducked out to buy a pizza from a shop we had passed back past the strange fountain and boisterous drinkers, who were now turning ugly - so he put his head down and powered on. That pizza was so good! We flaked and didn't wake until after 8am. Lucky breakfast is on until 10.