And on to Slovenia

It was a slow drive through the mountains of northern Croatia on very winding roads. After a couple hours we arrived at the border crossing to Slovenia. It has a few different rules regarding driving, including the requirement for vignettes, or a little sticker that acts like an EZ-pass for tolls on the highways and such. Now, this isn't said anywhere. You are just supposed to know. Despite the requirement, it took me three gas stations to actually find a place that actually had them in stock.

Eventually we made our way to Lake Bled. It is a sort of tourist resort area featuring a lake that has a church on an island in the middle of it. There is also a castle overlooking the lake. Beyond that, it's just a series of chalets, restaurants, and shops. The architecture has markedly changed since leaving the coastal area of Croatia. The buildings are looking more alpine and German.

From lake level, you can't really tell that there is actually an island in the middle of the lake because you don't really get any depth. We set out to remedy this problem, but first things first. Cake. Lake Bled is apparently known for a special kind of custard cake called Blejska Kremsnita. It's nothing terribly unique and it's a taste I've had before in French pastries and sweets, though they insist you can only get them here in Bled. I ate it in its entirety, so it's not really a complaint, just an observation.

After finishing the cake, we began our venture to find a vantage point overlooking the lake. It is harder than you'd think it would be. Each time the streets went up a hill, trees would block the view or a building would be in the way. We are convinced it was planned this way.

The only way to get to a point looking down on the island is from Bled Castle. This required walking up a series of switchbacks until reaching the entrance to the castle, which was charging 10 euro per person to get in. And of course, you still couldn't look toward the lake from the switchbacks, because they figured out a way to block it the entire time... unless you went into the castle. We were able to use our old student IDs to get a small discount, so that helped a bit.

Our efforts and money paid off to finally verify that there is indeed an island down there. I couldn't honestly tell you why the castle is there since our whole focus was just to get in to find an edge to take pictures from.

It was quite windy and as you can tell not exactly warm out, but manageable. After the long journey back down, we did a wee bit of shopping, got our Slovenian ornament and relaxed the rest of the evening. We had pizza again for dinner, which has become our dinner basically every night for a week. Perhaps Austria will bring some variety when we arrive tomorrow evening. Hopefully everything with the car drop off goes smoothly since a guy has to drive up from Zagreb and meet us at the train station in Ljubljana by 9am. Wish us luck as we bid our final adieus to the Porsche.