Chasing the dragon in Ljubljana

Slovenia is a neat little country wedged between Italy, Austria, and Croatia. It formerly was the northwest hind of Yugoslavia. Because of its former political association, for those unfamiliar, we may be likely to pity it, associating Yugoslavia with the Iron Curtain, Europe's last continental war (until the present, unfortunate civil war in eastern Ukraine), ethnic cleansing, and the laughable Yugo car. But it's far from pitiable; in fact it's prosperous.

On the Triple Bridge right in the heart of Ljubljana's center, at the base of the castle. We regrettably walked (trudged?) up that hill a few days later.

I admit I didn't know much about the place and have in the past confused Slovenia with Slovakia, both of which were part of Yugoslavia. Slovenia should stand out, though. When you visit, its confidence and health are palpable. No wonder it was the first Eastern Block country to join the Eurozone (i.e., switched its currency to the euro, in 2007) and amongst the first to join the European Union (in 2004). Check out the evidence-based proof below.

We ended up visiting Ljubljana mostly because we wanted to visit Trieste, in far eastern Italy. There were no direct flights between London and Trieste but there were between London and Ljubljana. The Balkans were on our original fantasy trek (that is, the great northern Mediterranean arc), so we left one Balkan on the route.

We enjoyed the relatively low prices and stayed in Ljubljana's grand dame hotel, the Grand Hotel Union, hoping to find something like the Grand Budapest Hotel, and we just about nearly did. We stayed three nights before catching a bus to Trieste over the hills dividing Slovenia and Italy, including a continental divide, with a high ridge very near the Adriatic, with hills spilling down quickly to the sea, Trieste perched just on the edge.

Ljubljana, the city

Ljubljana looks how you expect a European capital to look. Again, no wonder the Europeans wanted it in the union. It could pass for a smaller Copenhagen but with more sunlight. The streets are clean, paved with stone, mostly pedestrianized. The musical history of the place was noticeable, with talented musicians around the central areas, busking, one with an accordian, one with a violin, another lady with an incredible voice belting out some arias (opera). All around town we saw musicians with various instruments in tow, often on bicycles.





In the center of town sits a castle on a hilltop in a river bend, and while the castle looks to be made of Medieval stone, crumbling in some places, it has been accented with museums and restaurants within its walls. The new structures consist of elegant and lightweight designs, made of smooth limestone slabs, with steel support structures, offering modern conveniences with minimal intrusion to the heavier medieval structures. We struggled to walk to the hilltop, after missing the turn to the funicular, but we rode down in that little tram, which seemed to be made mostly of glass and offered excellent views of the valley in which Ljubljana sits. Bobby was enthralled.

The Grand Hotel Union was indeed grand. It was less baroque and even frumpier than the Hotel National in Moscow; it hinted at prosperous belle epoque years, with polished marble, a bit spare in design, without much ornamentation, but also had a modern wing that looked more Soviet. It offered a huge breakfast buffet where Bobby had his favorite "dinosaur eggs," which you may know as scrambled eggs. We frequently availed ourselves to the services of the hotel's concierge, Gregor, who we learned has been admitted to the elite association of concierges, the Golden Keys (les Cléfs d'Or). He booked a bus for us to Trieste and helped us to ship some mail and a package. Upon leaving the Grand Hotel Union, we left him a thank you card, a tip, and a Strand (NYC bookstore) bookmark. It is a good gift for a traveler! (I'd rank it as one of the top bookstores in the world, so it's a tourist destination that a good concierge should know.)

In addition, Gregor pointed us to a restaurant in the town center and made reservations for us at one of Ljubljana's best restaurants, Cubo, where we had tuna, baked fish from the Adriatic, and slow roasted lamb chop that melted off the bone. Slovenian food seemed Mediteranean but with extra heartiness. I also had Slovenian sparkling rosé (Bjana) and a white, and they were cheap and delicious, as was the meal overall. Bobby had too much fun after dinner, just jumping on the bed like a broken robotic rabbit toy, as is his bedtime habit, and threw up his pasta on me. Since then he's been telling me to not play around after dinner or I'll throw up; he also tells me to be careful of throwing up if I burp.

Ljubljana doesn't have the drunken young energy and chaos (or mass crowds) of Prague. In fact, it seems to be most popular with golden age travellers. I guess they appreciate the sophisticated calm of the elegant old town. We heard a lot of US accents from these gray-haired travellers, dressed in their hiking shoes and rain-resistant clothing. (Maybe they were planning to hike from the town center to the hills outside of town?)

Posing at the front door of the grand dame. Don't get too used to it, kids. We won't be staying at too many 4-star hotels! (4-stars aren't so reasonably priced in, say, Florence.)

Ljubljanica River cutting through the center of the old town. Such a peaceful little capital tucked into the hills.

Here we can see the elegant additions to the bulky Medieval castle. I mean the steps, not the men.

National and natural history

As our plane approached Ljubljana airport, the ample forests and hills of Slovenia were noticeable. We learned more about the place by visiting the national museum and the natural history museum, both in the same building. Apparently the country is rich in timber and water. In fact, the hilly landscape, running from Slovenia to the Italian coast, gives English the word karst. Karst is the German name for the region, defined by jagged hills caused by dissolution of limestone bedrock below the surface and in Italian is called Carso. It's interesting to us Asians since we encounter karst topography in southern China and Vietnam.

The natural history museum covers the natural world of Slovenia. The museum had a very old world quality to it, reminding us of pictures of the Natural History Museum in London during the Victorian age, full of glass cases and taxidermied animals (and, actually, are still in that museum, though the London one also has many more modern exhibits too). As you might expect in a region of karst topography, with subterranean limestone being washed away, there are a lot of caves in Slovenia. We went into a model cave in the museum, and in fact we went in and out repeatedly because Bobby was looking for bears. If you've ever read We're Going on a Bear Hunt, you know (spoiler alert) that family finds a bear in a cave after being forced to go "right through" the cave. In fact, Slovenia does host cave bears and in fact has one of the largest and diverse cave ecosystems in the world. The wood and glass cases also made excellent race tracks for the cars permanently attached to Bobby's hands.

The national museum focuses on the history of Slovenia; the exhibits are being updated, so we only learned about the pre-history, Roman, and medieval periods. Various invaders often marched over the territory, and while the museum didn't cover it, it seems to be true even in the modern era, Slovenia always being part of others' empires: Roman, Napoleonic, Austrian, Yugoslavian. The center of town did have a Hapsburg feel to it.

Explorations in Slovenian natural history

Slovenia in context

I am embarrassed I didn't know that Slovenia was the first of the Yugoslav republics to industrialize or that it was among the wealthiest, healthiest places behind the Iron Curtain. You can see in the statistics I gathered, below, the wealth and success of the place. The UN's Human Development Index measures a combination of life expectancy, education, and per capita income of a country's people (more about the Human Development Index). GDP per capita shows the average income per person in a country. Slovenia does well against the other countries on our trip and is actually much higher than the other former Yugoslav republics. (I downloaded data for only as far back in time as the databases have; for the US and the UK, GPD per capital is available for much longer periods.)

from Maddison's long-term GDP project statistical database

Ljubljana photo essay

Here we see a vintage Cockta ad. I had never heard of this beverage, but apparently it was a soft drink invented in Slovenia back in those dark days before Coca-Cola was available in Yugoslavia. Cocka is a carbonated beverage flavoured with various herbs; it tastes a bit like a softer Jägermeister . I prefer Coca-Cola... But Red Bull also improves Jäger's taste...

A dragon statue on the Dragon Bridge. The dragon is a symbol of Ljubljana, so all around town you'll see various dragon images, statues, and schwag to buy. We almost did buy some dragon paraphernalia! The legend is that somehow dragons came to Ljubljana as part of the Greek legend of Jason and the Argonauts. Bobby became dragon-obsessed once he realized dragons are like dinosaurs. We watched How to Train Your Dragon on repeat. This was surprising because I thought he would only watch shows where vehicles talk. After a few days, however, we were back to shows with talking monster trucks and airplanes. While we didn't buy any stuffed-dragons (almost did), but we did buy some model cars: one from West Germany (VW bus) and one from East German (Trabant). Interestingly, the West German one broke first, but within a few days, they were both confined to the dustbin of history, after being dropped on too many European cobblestones.

Ljubljana is all fixed up real nice and pretty, but we wandered down a few streets that are in the process of still being fixed up. How edgy are these two hipsters? 

We happened across a hands-on science museum (like the erstwhile Science Station in Cedar Rapids). It was a big hit. Here, Bobby is learning about Bernoulli's principle -- notice the ball floating above the cone, which is shooting a stream of air upwards. We spent quite a bit of time building dams with sand and learning how water finds the path of least resistance down hills. We blew bubbles and learned about surface tension. All three of us had a lot of fun.

We found there was a train museum in Ljubljana, so we went there immediately. It was nowhere near as polished as the National Railway Museum in York. Outdoors, we saw these rusting hulks. (In York, there was no rust anywhere on display) Inside the museum we saw some huge, old, black steam locomotives. All of them were German made for old Slovenian or Yugoslavian national railways, mostly from the early 20th century. Bobby was engrossed.

In addition to studying institutions while we travel, we also study pizza. Here, we have the first Yugoslavian-style pizza, Parma Pizzeria. We read in a free tourist brochure that this place opened in 1974, and it was a big deal because in those days, you had to go to Italy to get pizza. And apparently, blueberry juice was drank along with the pizza, though we didn't see anyone with that tipple in the restaurant. (Berries being amongst locally abundant produce.) The crust was a bit thicker than what you might expect in Italy; probably it was just an imitation of Italian pizza that became uniquely Yugoslavian through mis-translation. The atmosphere of the place was like a tavern, reminding me of the old Midwestern taverns that serve pizza, such as the Chicago tavern style pizza.

Some of the karst topography seen from our bus as we topped the continental divide in far western Slovenia before heading down the steep ridge to Trieste. Excitement was high for Bobby, where he planned to eat pashta every day in Italy.