After my week in Munich I had no plans. Head north to Berlin, west to Switzerland or south. Slovenia was one of only three eastern European countries I didn’t visit this year and given the overwhelmingly positive feedback I had heard about it I decided I needed to make the effort to visit.

I bought a EUrail pass from Munich Hauptbanhof and jumped on the afternoon train heading south. The trains passed thru Salzburg and continued to wind it’s way thru the Austrian Alps – providing gob-smacking views of mountains and valleys. The Alps ended after a while, but the gorgeous views continued as the train entered Slovenia in the afternoon.

I hopped of the train at Ljubljana but had no hostel booking. I spotted some other backpackers, said hello and decided to follow them to their hostel in town. Turns out that the hostel had one bed left!

It was already dark and raining, so I found a local cafe for for dinner and called it an early night.

In the morning the weather was not much better, but I had decided to only spend one day in the city so made the most of my time there. The WikiTravel guide for Ljubljana starts: “Ljubljana has no world-famous attractions, which is just great”, which suited me just fine.

There was a small flea market on the banks of the Ljubljanica river in which I dug for old pins, then went exploring thru the streets of the town. Ljubljana feels very modern compared to other ‘old towns’. The streets are all clean and have relaid cobblestones – everything has a distinctively modern touch to an otherwise typical old European city.

As I wandered around the streets in the light rain I stumbled upon a stage, TV cameras and an assembly of military and civilians. I’m not sure what the occasion was, nor who the people were, but it was interesting enough to watch for a while.

I soon discovered the path up the mountain to the castle on the hill. It was a bit of a hike up to the top, but the view from the top overlooked the entire city. The castle – like the city – has been modernised. There is a funicular built into the side of the hill, and the interior of the castle has been extensively renovated.

Coming down the other side of the hill and I found a few more of the city ‘sights’. The Zmajski Most (Dragon Bridge) and the Triple Bridge both span the Ljubljanica river with a very modern steel and glass bridge in between them.

Ljubljana is a tiny city, which makes it one of the smallest capital cities in Europe. Still, it is a very modern, very beautiful one and definitely worth a day exploring. I would have like to have stayed a bit longer had the weather been better, but in the afternoon I jumped on a bus and headed to my next destination.

This post is tagged Ljubljana, Slovenia