Slovenia is lovely. Our AirBnB is modern, comfortable and comes with
a) a welcome drink
b) daily breakfast of coffee, juice and toast. The toast is actually a grilled sandwich with cheese and ham. Simple. Delicious. Enough to start any day.

We are staying in Ljubljana, the capital city of Slovenia. Our little hotel room is located on the riverbank in Old Town. The river has multiple bridges crossings, like this one, the ‘famous’ Dragon bridge. I actually don’t know for sure how famous it is, but I have read about it so that’s something. It is certainly one of the most photographed and I can see why.

All along the river are outdoor restaurants. The weather has been less than friendly, so in our time here they have largely been deserted. We have opted for indoor dining almost every time.

There is a large collection of sculptures along the waterfront. The alien-looking pieces were made by Jakov Brdar, a renowned Slovenian sculptor (I had never heard of him before either).

This one is kind of cool – though still a bit… well… creepy. Our hotel is the yellow building directly behind.

The statue on the Butcher’s Bridge wass particularly disturbing. The bridge originally housed butcher shops which inspired the questionable work. I took a photo then deleted it – it just made me too uncomfortable. I share this one in it’s place.

We have been very fortunate to have few upsets or disturbances on this trip. However, the drive into, and out of, Ljubljana was a test. Trying to find a tiny parking lot for the night was almost our undoing. Google maps can only get you so far skirting around a carless Old Town with tiny streets, many one way, and some only as wide as 8 or 10 feet. We did make it, and have managed to successfully return to the same lot each day.

It was raining quite heavily and we were reticent to wander too far from the hotel. The young woman who gave us our room keys suggested ‘a good burger place’ as a dinner option. This would have been ok, though not really our style. Travelling can sometimes make us yearn for familiar food, but not today. We prefer to try new things when we are fortunate enough to be in new places. Croatian meals did not disappoint, and we expected similar in Slovenia.

We decided to use our free cocktail coupon in the little downstairs bar/breakfast room. Rick asked for a cocktail suggestion, our waitress recommended beer. This allowed us to appropriately rank her dinner suggestion of a nearby burger restaurant. She was kind and helpful, and spoke perfect English, even if we did not align with her food preferences.

With no destination in mind, we decided to strike out on our own. I broke my rule; we went left. We passed a charming looking restaurant called ‘Most’ with a 45 minute wait. There was a small bar next door, so we waited there, with an actual cocktail, until it was time for dinner.

Dinner was fabulous. We had a caprese salad to start, shared a grilled sea bass, and a fantastic bottle of wine suggested by our waiter, and new friend, David. He is pictured here, preparing our fish.

Everything he recommended was great. He invited us to return and told us to ask for him. We knew before we left that we would take him up on the suggestion. It was a lovely first night.