... in Slovenia

 

The Adventures of the Anonymous One (and a bit) in Slovenia

 

As result of what can only be described as unfortunate planning, on Friday evening we went to a performance of Spamalot in London. The journey home became particularly drawn out as the A3 was closed due to an accident. We finally got home and to bed for around 2am. The alarm went off at 5.20am. At this point Husband possibly regretted offering to give us a lift to the airport.

We had time for a coffee and bit of shopping – where the mother (hereafter referred to as M) demonstrated her foolproof way of knowing her pin number. It was saved in her phone against a friend’s name as a phone number. The flaw in the plan is that she had to know the friend, had to recognise the real and pretend numbers and then had to know which 4 digits in the pretend number was the pin. They were not of course the last 4. She believed she could locate the correct number as she knew the pin did not contain a 0 or 7. We also had time for a visit to the ladies which was all very high tech and hands free. I suggested that at some point in the future you would be able to go to the loo merely by swiping your hand in front of your bladder.

With minimal hanging around at Gatwick, we boarded the plane on time and promptly sat there for about half an hour for no particular reason at all.

To our surprise we were given food during the flight which consisted of a rather tired salad, extremely stale roll and choice of two dressings – a vinaigrette style or oil and vinegar. I opted for the former. M inadvertently opened the later. To avoid the now opened sachet spilling its contents she then rummaged through her bum bag to locate a paperclip with which to keep it closed. After eating the food we were curious about the contents of the sachet and whether the vinegar was balsamic – which was frankly unlikely. So we poured it into an empty cup. It looked like a sperm sample, off white and viscous. And it smelt terrible. Definitely not balsamic vinegar.

We landed and went to a nearby waiting bus which drove us all of 20 metres to the airport arrivals. It was hot. After collecting luggage we met Jim, one of the leaders for the week and were directed to the coach that would take us to the hotel.

We passed through reasonably lush meadows which contained curious wooden structures used for drying grass to make hay for winter months.

 

At the hotel we were allocated our rooms – all of which had twin beds pushed together and although made up as separate beds, had bedcovers on which made them look like doubles. The beds were incredibly heavy and difficult to move but I managed to move them a few inches apart. And then promptly walked into the corner of my bed significantly bruising my shin.

We went for a wander prior to the orientation walk due later in the afternoon. Opposite the hotel was a river and small, man made waterfall. There wasn’t much water and what was there was freezing – as discovered by M who took her sandals off and wandered across the river to take a photo. By the time she came back she could barely feel her feet. She had also realised that wet limestone was slippery – and I was slightly concerned that she would lose balance and go over the top of the waterfall. Given the events to come during the week, this was not an unreasonable concern to have.

We then walked down the road trying to find the village – not at that point realising we could access it via a small lane next to the hotel. Having successfully located the centre we visited the supermarket to stock up on supplies of rolls, local cheese, ham and local apple strudel for the following day.

We returned to the hotel and almost immediately set off again for the orientation walk (where we were informed that Austria began on the ridge behind the hotel and Italy was two miles down the road) after which we had a drink in a café in the square. Next to our table a pot plant was lying down. M stood it up and spent the next half hour fiddling with it as it insisted on constantly falling over into her. I suggested that she lay it back down again, but she propped it up against another table instead. It was a couple of hours until dinner and we were slightly peckish so M enquired from the waitress if they had any traditional cakes – but nothing too big. The girl suggested something which she promised was the size of three walnuts, and on this advice M ordered two rather than one between us. After a few minutes two dishes appeared with three slices of warm cake – each one considerably larger than any walnut I have ever seen. One was brown and two were cream but different in texture. They were delicious but very rich and heavy. Half way through eating them we had both had enough which did rather imply that one between us would be have been more than adequate, however, valiantly we carried on although neither of us could actually finish them. I looked at the menu to see what these delicacies were – Slovenian dumplings that appeared to be nut flavoured.

 

We meandered back to the hotel where M divested herself of the dumplings.

Each evening we had a talk at 6.45 to brief us on the walk options for the following day. We met Jayne – the other leader – whose surname was Walker Cull which seemed an unfortunate name for someone who worked as a walk leader.

There was a choice of easy walk and hard walk – most of us opted for hard walk which involved a rather hard chairlift ascent.

Dinner, which followed, was a sumptuous affair. It was self service which provided the option to be extremely greedy, but as any food consumption was in the name of fuel for the tough chairlift climb in the morning, there was no guilt associated with the scoffing. For starter there was a choice of soup (we never had any but by all accounts it was always very good), masses of bowls of various salad concoctions and a hot starter which quite often was a traditional Slovenian dish. When I say ‘choice’ of starter – there was no suggestion that you had to pick one thing. Some people did in fact have soup followed by salad. I usually had the salad and hot starter.

Main course involved at least 2 types of meat, various gravies, potatoes and vegetables. Again you were quite welcome to have something of everything. There was also wine of the day – a Slovenian wine which was surprisingly pleasant.

As it was our first night we were welcomed with a shot of liqueur in a fantastically pissed glass which leaned drunkenly due to the deliberately uneven base.

As the hotel offered free internet access I took the opportunity to send Husband an email. However, this proved a little complex as the keyboard was arranged in a slightly different format. The @ symbol was on the V key and needed Alt Gr depressed to access it (I worked that one out all by myself) and the Z and Y keys were swapped over. This meant that my message to Husband referred to my being verz verz tired.

The following day we got up and dressed for business. Breakfast was also self service and included a huge range of meats and cheeses, bread, rolls, croissants, fruit, yogurt and cooked breakfast. The weather was cooler and clouds lingered on the tops of the mountains.

We walked through the village to the chairlift. The journey was in two stages – firstly a 4 seater ride half way and then a single seater ride to the top. Below us was the toboggan run and downhill mountain bike track complete with jumps.

Getting off the 4 seater was more complicated than it should have been as the instructions were to get off on one side only and run across the front of the seat whilst avoiding being picked up and taken back down the mountain. Amy Dorrit managed to get her head clunked as a result of this process. However, I did notice that anyone who appeared to be on the older side was hoiked out by the attendant and allowed to walk behind the seat instead.

We changed onto the single seater – a considerably older contraption and it took me a minute or two to work out how to close the safety barrier as I hadn’t initially been able to look it closed because of the rucksack I was carrying on my front. We rose up, slowly and peacefully into the cloud. Soon visibility was minimal.

 

We reached the top of the forested Vitranc Ridge. M – who was behind me – couldn’t get her safety bar to open (they were linked to the foot bar and she was still pushing on that with her feet) so there was some last minute scrabbling about with the attendant to get her out.

We set off into the gloom for our walk along the ridge to the peak of Ciprnik. It was very forested and the path meandered though the trees which still clung onto the cloud. It ascended gradually but enough for us to warm up and shed some of the layers we had worn for the chairlift ride. As we approach Ciprnik we started to rise slightly above the tree line and walking on bare rock rather than soft forest floor. The way ahead was littered with exposed tree roots and rocky scrambles which required constant attention. As we came out of the trees the sun also started to break through the cloud and it was now distinctly hot.

M and I reached the summit first. The brochure had promised ‘an unforgettable panorama and opportunity to orientate yourself with the topography of the surrounding peaks and valleys. What we saw wasn’t quite that, but it was a fantastic view of cloud filled valleys. We were now well above the cloud and enjoying bright sunshine and a clear blue sky. All around us mountain peaks punctured through the cloud layer, rising skyward. The cloud constantly moved and shifted, making the mountains suddenly disappear from view before gradually re-exposing them. We waited for everyone else to arrive and paused for some light refreshments.

 

Florence Dombey ate her chocolate croissant but commented that perhaps keeping it in the same lunchbox as her salami hadn’t been such a good idea.

Here, as along the whole path, there were vast numbers of extremely large ants that crawled over us, into rucksacks – and gave out nasty bites as well. After signing the visitor that lived on the summit we started the long descent. To avoid the worst of the rock scrambles there was an alternative pathway down a small part of the route. However, this was liberally strewn with branches and you couldn’t hold the trees and bushes to steady yourself as they were crawling with killer ants.

Rather than descend on the chairlift we walked down through the woods. Now and then the thickly wooded path would have a sudden clearing allowing us a view of the valley below which was now clear of cloud, as well as the ridge peak that we had come from. As the afternoon was warming up it was nice to be in the shade of the trees.

Ahead of me were Florence Dombey and Rosa Bud who had noticed various droppings by the side of the path. Rosa Bud asked Florence Dombey whether she knew what animal they had come from. Florence Dombey, who had a fantastically wrinkled face and wry sense of humour replied that she would know what it was from if she had seen the animal doing it.

After some time of zig zagging descent we stopped for lunch in a small space by the edge of the path, above a large ravine. We all settled down and dug out our lunch boxes. M promptly dropped hers which rolled down into the ravine before lodging in a bush. She decided to climb down and retrieve it which ended up being a more perilous task than it initially appeared. Needing hands and feet for the climb back up she had no option but to shove the lunch box down her top and returned, covered in various scrapes and scratches. Almost as soon as she had sat down she then dropped her brand new, unworn £150 waterproof, tied up in its micro bag making it – well, ball-shaped. Being ball-shaped, this rolled a considerable distance down the ravine, and out of sight. The group as a whole discouraged M from attempting to climb down and retrieve it. She then remembered that a used film was in the pocket which added to her general frustration about the loss. Naturally it was then all my fault for picking this spot – not that there was any flat space.

After lunch I gathered together her remaining belongings to avoid her jettisoning anything further. We continued on down through the forest, walking on a narrow path of soft leaf much that clung to the hillside. The leaves from last autumn’s fall still had not decomposed and looked as though they had only fallen in the last few days. The path was precariously held in place by the occasional tree root and in places there wasn’t much else underneath and it just overhung the slope.

I discovered that the thing with walking with people of a certain age is that they know the names of all the various flowers we saw, and often there were mini gatherings around a plant with discussions about whether it was A or B and who had it in their garden.

We stopped for a break whereupon Estella dropped her waterproof – similarly encased in a ball shaped bad. It too rolled down the hill but became lodged on a tree root a few metres down, and was retrieved by her husband. I told M not to put anything down or get anything out of her rucksack, but she did feel slightly redeemed by Estella’s mishap. She was adamant that she had never lost anything before, although I did point out that she still wasn’t entirely sure where she had put her marbles. This seemed to amuse the group – none of whom were remotely surprised by M’s antics, which told a story in itself.

We finally got to the bottom of the hill and to the welcome sight of a hut for a much needed cup of tea – or beer. M had managed to hurt her knee in the descent which was bothering her as it might impact on what walk she could do the following day.

We waited for the rest of the group to come down. Amy Dorrit was taking some time as her thighs had gone wobbly and she needed time during the descent to sit down and rest them properly. In true Chinese whispers style, this news was passed round the group and mutated to such an extent that by the time she appeared the rumour was that she had had some sort of breakdown – a suggestion she instantly dismissed as being complete nonsense.

I looked up the stats so far on my GPS and the group were disheartened to know that the total stop time was about an hour less than the total moving time (2.5hrs moving, 3.5hrs stopped). In fairness, the GPS was measuring my movement and I had been scampering ahead, then pausing to wait rather than maintaining a steady, continuous plod which perhaps many of the other had done.

M wanted to show me the distance walked as recorded on her pedometer. She took if of her waistband and as she did so, pulled the back off, the battery dropped out and all the data was immediately lost.

The rest of the walk was on the flat – we ambled down the path through a beautiful alpine meadow. The ridge we had ‘climbed’ towered over us behind the meadow. We paused again at a junction to wait for stragglers – which happened to be M intensely nattering to someone else. The group took it upon themselves to tell Jayne about M as she had been concerned that M was having a bad week. The group said that this was completely normal and Jayne then sincerely hoped that M would then not have a bad week this week. I put their minds at ease by confirming that I already had a home booked. However, the group were then concerned that the home might not have fully appreciated the extent of what they were taking on.

We walked on and before long the route number we were following vanished. After a few false starts down other paths we adopted plan B and followed a different path which brought us onto the cycle track we were aiming for, but a bit farther along than intended. All that followed was a long and dull walk back to the hotel under the glare of the now rather hot sun. We eventually picked up signs for our route again, and there was also a post marking route 12 but the signs seemed to go in every direction and were on each side of the post so I surmised that route 12 was merely a walk around the post.

Finally we arrived back at the hotel. It was only our second evening but already M had three pairs of washed knickers draped around the bathroom to dry.

We showered and headed to the meeting room for our 6.45 briefing. By now M could barely walk, particularly up and down stairs. Our room was on the second floor but the lift rather brilliantly only went to the first floor, and you needed to go up steps to get it at ground floor level.

The two walks were offered – easy walk around some lakes in Italy and the hard walk which set off from the top of the Vrisic pass. The walks board went round. Three people needed to sign up to a walk for it to operate. Esther Summerson and I had both opted for the hard walk. Given M’s walking issues she had reluctantly opted for the easy walk rather than cause further damage. There was only Mrs Todgers left to choose – and she saved the day by selecting the hard walk.

We went off for dinner. The dining room reserved tables for us which sat between 4 and 5 people and at each meal we mixed ourselves around. So now is probably a good time to introduce the group at large.

I didn’t get to know all of them as some people did the easy walks all week. Those I did get to know were as follows.

Florence Dombey – fantastically good humoured and alarming fit woman with skin so wonderfully winkled that it looked like paper that had been screwed up and then flattened out again. Had suffered from bowel cancer which everyone seemed to know but no one knew that everyone else knew.

Rosa Bud – very glamorous and always immaculately dressed lady in her 80’s. Another good walker and used a pole that was usually set at the wrong length for the task in hand. Took enormous and genuine interest in everyone.

Esther Summerson and John Jarndyce – both tall and fit although John had some issues with his knee and therefore didn’t always do the same walks as Esther Summerson. Often host the reunion parties.

Nicholas Nickleby – bearded and bespectacled. Always good humoured.

 

Uriah Heep – curious old chap with tufty, unkempt hair. Very knowledgable about a lot of stuff and apparently a good walker although he did rather resemble someone wearing a truss that was a fraction too tight. When his school closed he was rather proud that English Heritage took the kitchen in its entirety as it was so thoroughly ancient.

Amy Dorrit – prim and proper no nonsense sort of person but always game for a laugh. Also hurt her knee on the first day and limited on walk options thereafter.

Estella and Pip – northern couple. Pip was another bearded and bespectacled man who would stride out quite fast and bounded up mountains rather speedily. Very nice legs. Estella had a more reasonable level of fitness.

Martin Chuzzlewit – old boy who I rather suspect had parkinsons, so bravo for attending the week at all.

Miss Havisham - librarian spinster. Source of knowledge about a huge range of utterly random stuff. Very sincere. Intent listener.

Nancy – jovial lady who looked young, partly due to wearing her hair tied back with an alice band.

Miss Larkin – best friend of Nancy. Gets coach sick. Enormously good fun.

Mrs Todgers – frail looking lady covered in bruises who organised the trip. Good humoured and charming but a bit dappy.

Jayne – Leader. Very pleasant person with very nice legs

Jim – Leader. Shambolick arrangement of teeth, again pleasant but with slightly more forceful opinions and leadership style. Apparently he also had good legs but I didn’t notice.

The following day it was again cloudy. Our leader for the day was Jim and the coach drove us up to the top of the Vrisic pass with expert precision through the forested mountains – all of which were covered with sycamore, fir and larch. Each hairpin was numbered – there being 50 in total up and down the mountain. Not every bend was numbered – it had to be a full on hairpin, and some bends that were quite sharp were not considered sharp enough to qualify. The pass was built by the Russians during the First World War. There were moments of the journey up being a little hairy, but the driver never needed to reverse – which would have a most unpleasant sensation – and before long we arrived at the top of the pass, which was thickly coated in cloud.

We started to climb to the coll. Slowly and steadily ascending the rocky limestone path. When we arrived at the top of the coll we were still in dense cloud and Jim gave us the option of starting the walk back or carrying on. We all chose to carry on. The contouring route ahead was stunning. We walked through what seemed like make believe scenery made more interesting by the distinct absence of a view, huge boulders from which twisted, knarled trees grew out, tree roots artistically arranging themselves over the path, broken trunks, leafless skeletons all standing silently in the swirling cloud. It was ethereal and almost like discovering a whole new land.

 

 

We passed a rock that had been stained purple as a result of the damp weather spreading a dropping from a bird who had clearly been eating berries.

It was still very misty when we started the final climb to the summit of Slemenova Spica – which apparently would normally offer expansive views along a chain of mountains. Jim’s card informed him that the top was sheepy. Certainly there was evidence of sheep in the grass and we could hear their bells. As we neared the summit the overpowering smell of ammonia hit us. The summit was muddy – all the grass eaten or trodden into the ground by the sheep – and littered with sheep poo and, judging by the smell, gallons of sheep pee. We were rewarded with a fantastic view of the inside of a cloud.

 

Given the smell Jim suggested descending a bit to stop for lunch. For a moment it looked as though the cloud would lift so I ran back up to the top – but on a false promise. The brightness yielded nothing further of the alleged view. Apparently from here we could have seen the ridge from the previous day.

As we returned to the coll the cloud occasionally lifted, but the views down to the valley below were not especially spectacular – somehow wooded mountains just aren’t very beautiful.

The path crossed limestone scree slopes that at certain times of the year would be torrents of water and the paths actually needed to be re-constructed each season. Now completely dry it was hard to imagine.

The path down squeezed its way along between thick, stumpy bushes that were determined to take over all the available space. Back at the pass we could see the harsh rock faces of the surrounding mountains that had been hidden from view when we first arrived. Initially Esther Summerson thought that they were all flat topped until we noticed that way above the cloud line the mountain peaks were jutting out. It was stunning and somehow made more beautiful by the ribbon of cloud wrapped round them.

Esther Summerson, Mrs Todgers and Jim engaged in a discussion that I was unable to take much of an active part in about what they had had to give up since getting older.

 

We went down to a hut which sat alongside Russian graves to have a drink and lunch. We also made use of the facilities which became rather interesting as none of us could actually find the light so had to do what we needed to do in complete darkness.

A series of bikers roared along the pass, destroying the peace and quiet. After visiting another war cemetery around the corner from the hut we started the long walk back, dropping into the woods between the hair pin bends – the sound of the bikers always in the background and we eventually decided that they were spending the day going up and down the pass. Clearly fuel in Slovenia was still far too cheap.

Our woodland walk eventually brought us down to the Russian church. Still the bike engines growled in the background. As we walked on Jim pointed out an anthill, which Mrs Todgers immediately mocked as being considerably smaller than anything we had seen the previous day. Jim then became quite competitive about it and kept his eyes peeled for something more impressive. The path followed a small stream down hill, sometime actually in the stream and Jim commented that ‘that woman in the sandals wouldn’t have liked this’ not realising that said woman was my mother. I made no comment.

 

As the stream widened into, well, a wider stream, there was a plank balanced on the banks for us to walk over into a lush green pasture of the Planica Valley, towered over by the dramatic limestone peaks. A sandstone red scar was on the side of one, where a large chunk of the rockface had come away. In this field was a small hut built as a monument to fallen climbers. Each climber had a small plaque. It was a stark reminder of the danger that lurked in these beautiful mountains.

What followed was a long walk back along a limestone road which gleamed unbearably in the sunlight. We passed another hut decorated with jaws and horns of various animals before arriving at the lakes which were just up the road from the hotel – fronted by a statue of an ibex.

 

The hot afternoon sun from the two days walking had contributed to my getting a bit of sunburn on the backs of my knees which was mildly uncomfortable and distinctly odd.

Back at the hotel it seemed that a party of old folk from Kent had arrived after a two day coach journey – not that they had the faintest idea where they had spent the previous two days. M had been chatting up the two coach drivers, pumping them for information.

After washing, changing and attending the walks brief we went down to dinner. We sat at a table with Jayne – who had done the easy walk with M that day. I enquired as to whether M had behaved herself. M claimed she had. Well, said Jayne, except for that incident with the ice cream. It transpired that after the walk the group had gone to Charlie’s for ice cream. As M came out of the shop, the ribbons over the door caught her ice cream and then dragged across her face, covering her in ice cream. She has also apparently gone paddling in the river and come over a bit unsteady. But other than that, M had been perfectly well behaved.

During dinner Kent were stroppy, somehow feeling that we had invaded their private buffet. Admittedly, while they all queued patiently behind each other, trying to work out the system, we just barged ahead.

 

Again we opted for wine of the day from the sparkly eyed waiter – Slovenian wine is actually rather nice. When he brought it over for me to try, I took a sip and then exclaimed it was absolutely disgusting. He took a second to realise I was joking.

I woke up a number of times during the night from the sound of the heavy rain. However, by morning it had all cleared.

At breakfast Kent were still out of sorts, moaning that there wasn’t any fruit. Miss Haversham  smiled sweetly at them, and said yes there was and pointed them in the right direction.

Tuesday’s walk was a gorge walk, and both groups did the same bit of the walk initially (although not together). From the village of Stara Fuzina on the shore of Lake Bohinj we set off along the Mostnica Gorge. We passed initially through a meadow in which there was what looked like an old fashioned gypsy caravan, but was actually a series of brightly coloured bee hives.

The walk then started through the woods, along the edge of the fantastically deep gorge through which the Mostnica river had sculpted a dramatic course with a labyrinth of water carved features and turbulent waters. Deep turquoise pools interconnected by shallow tunnels overhung by intricate rock amphitheatres. It was a warm morning and I would happily have climbed into the crystal clear waters and done the gorge walk from within the gorge itself.

Florence Dombey led us along a path which before long was quite clearly was not the correct one – it was a tiny, narrow strip that teetered above the gorge drop and was regularly bisected by tree trunks. I slipped over at one point, trying to negotiate a tree that had decided to grow across the path. However, it came out alright in the end as we joined the main path, and did slightly wonder how we had missed it. Florence Dombey hadn’t minded at all, considering the diversion to have been fun and commenting that those of us at the front had made a management decision about which way to go. Jim retired himself from future management decisions. We carried on through the woods and up to the flat grassy plateau, habited by a small farming community. The lush meadow nestled in amongst the surrounding mountain peaks and we knew that we would have to climb one of the slopes that now surrounded us. It was a correct assumption to make.

 

Before bracing ourselves for the climb we stopped at a hut for a drink whereupon they produced apple strudel fresh from the oven. I rather suspected that there was some form of high tech communication method whereby the hut could be informed of impending walkers and set the strudel to bake. The plot, if indeed there was one, had worked and we all succumbed to a slice of strudel accompanied by a mug of herb tea – apparently made from the herbs in the fields around us. Jayne advised against eating too much given the extent of the climb to come. While waiting for the strudel to cool I decided to walk up to the nearby waterfall – apparently a 10 minute walk, but actually nearer to 3 minutes. It was only small but the cascading wander made a thunderous sound in the enclosed gorge.

 

We left John Jarndyce at the hut to walk back with the easy group. He had lost his glasses – which was Muriel’s fault as she had wanted him to take a photo so he had put his glasses briefly in the top pocket of his shirt. Forgetting they were there he later dropped them while bending over looking at things, but didn’t realise this until too late. If he hadn’t had to take the photo, of course, they would still have been on his face.

We nearly left Florence Dombey behind as well as she was flicking through a comprehensive flower book, determined to identify the blue plant which grew with such abundance in the mountains.

Walking passed the overflow loos, we went into the woods and immediately started our ascent.  It started as it meant to go on – very steeply. Everyone went quiet as we plodded up the slippery, narrow path following Jayne’s very good pace. Much as it was hurting I kept looking back at the others and thought, well if they can keep going, then so can I. And being younger than the rest, I would let my down my generation enormously by showing any weakness. When we came to a bit of the path that was ever so slightly flat Jayne paused for a break. Most of the route was too steep to enable a pause. We were all hot and sweaty, Jayne described herself as sweating in a most unladylike fashion. Before long we started nattering which was Jayne’s signal that we were all well rested and could therefore carry on.

She had told us that the ascent was anticipated to take about an hour. We had been going for around 15 minutes and I’m sure that I wasn’t the only person who was clock watching. The total climb comprised 400m of up in less than a mile.

As we went on even the path seemed to find the going tough and no longer attempted to zig zag up the hill, but rather just went straight up. Well, Mrs Todgers had wanted up hills – surely this must count.

 

In our second pause Muriel stood on the edge of the path and very nearly tipped herself back down the hill as the weight of her rucksack pulled her perilously backwards. We could hear rain through the trees. The canopy itself was thick enough to shelter us from the rain, and we were so hot and sweaty that is was actually quite refreshing. I grabbed another handful of energy boosting jelly babies – and noticed that there were girl and boy babies. It seemed a rather extravagant effort to have gone to.

With one final surge of effort we reached the to of the Uskovnic ridge and were rewarded with absolutely no view whatsoever as the summit was so wooded that you couldn’t see anything. The rain was coming down a bit harder, and being in the open we donned our waterproofs – except Nicholas Nickleby who took the view that no matter how much it rained, he couldn’t possibly get any wetter than he already was.  Before long he was shown to have made the right decision as we were all hot, and the rain eased off more or less as soon as we had all got our waterproofs on.

Florence Dombey had struggled a little on the uphill, but set off apace now that we were at the top. We followed the path through the woods which was littered with some fantastic growths of fungi. Some looked like spaghetti growing out of the ground, others were huge mushrooms. We also saw a black squirrel.

 

We stopped for lunch on a glacier meadow in which stood a wonderful wooden hut complete with entirely wooden furniture. The glacier meadow was very dimpled and bumpy from the ice that once covered it. Florence Dombey was delighted to have seen it – having heard about them in the talk that was given one evening in Kranjska Gora. Rather gallingly, in the field next to us were several vans and builders. We could have just driven up here rather than undertake the strenuous climb.

After lunch we continued along the ridge top before starting our ascent. There was a lot of habitation, scattering of huts and houses as well as enormous numbers of cattle with huge, loud cow bells. There was a vague discussion about whether cow bells were cruel – how would it feel to make such a loud noise every time you moved.

To while away the time Pip orally re-wrote the HF book description of the walk – you have a very steep climb to see a house and then come back down. It more or less summed it up.

The descent was rather dull as it followed the limestone road. The sun had now come out making it very hot, as well as reflecting blindingly brightly off the limestone.

Eventually we diverted off into the woods and the welcome relief of some shade. The descent now became as steep as the ascent had been, but was compounded further by the loose stones underfoot as well as the wet mud and leaves that covered them. Ever present in our minds was the thought of ice cream back in the village.

Finally we arrived back in the village – utterly disorientated and happy to wander off in a completely different direction until Jayne corrected us. Almost immediately we found the other group who had already located the ice cream shop which meant that our group could go scurrying off to the right places rather than frantic searching.

The easy group had found John Jarndyce’s glasses during their walk.

Back at the hotel we washed and changed, and were let off from having our briefing meeting as the following day was a free day. So we rushed down to dinner to try and get there before Kent. Dinner was dumplings – after the dumpling festival in Beijing, M had never wanted to see another dumpling. We were served again by the flirty waiter – and ‘entertained’ by a man with an accordion. He came to our end of the restaurant only briefly, seeming to prefer playing to the Kent crowd. Which suited us fine.

I enquired again whether M had been well behaved during the day. She assured me that she had. ‘Except for that incident at the gorge’ murmured Amy Dorrit. M scowled in an attempt to stop her divulging anything further. But it was too late. M had leant over to look at a plant or mushroom near the edge of the gorge. In doing so, she managed to launch her water bottle down the ravine. Determined not to part company with any more of her personal possessions, she then climbed down to retrieve it. She was emerging from the ravine when Jim – leader of her group – happened along. To avoid the embarrassment of admitting that she was jettisoning her stuff yet again, she claimed that she had just climbed down a little way to photograph a mushroom.

Over dinner it also transpired that Nicholas Nickleby had a regular stream of the group’s women coming to his room. He claimed that they all just wanted to use his fridge – which was clearly a euphemism for something much more filthy.

The following day – Wednesday – we were going to Bled for our day off. It was a glorious sunny morning and mountains rose resplendently above the morning mist and glistened in the sunlight.

We had a few amusing moments identifying the correct bus and even what time it was due. We enlisted the help of a bus driver – who couldn’t understand the timetable either.

However, soon a few people were gathering at the bus stop, including some of our group so we were confident that it would all be ok in the end.

 

On arrival at Bled we were slightly undecided about the plan for the day as there wouldn’t be time to do all the things on M’s list. However, we knew we wanted to see the castle and decided to head there first. There were three paths up to the castle (one of which was described as arduous – which we didn’t want), and after initially heading towards the lake to take a path from there, I re-checked the guide book and found that we were very near one of the other paths. As we were already a little way up the hill it seemed sensible to cut across from where we were via a small church. Bled castle teeters on the edge of a tall rock edifice, 100m above the lake and the path up to it was steep. It was a hot and sweaty climb despite being shaded by trees, and to do it early in the day before the full heat of the sun had built up was definitely a sensible decision. As soon as we arrived, we forced ourselves to sit down and relax for a moment with an ice cream – and cool off a little.

From the castle there were fantastic views over the lake and to the surrounding mountains. Apparently you could see Triglav, but it didn’t know what it looked like or what direction it was in. Bled castle is the oldest in Slovenia and is first recorded in sources dating back 1000 years and is everything a castle should be with towers and turrets. We had a quick look round the castle, in the small church and museum before wandering back down the path, but this time going straight down to the lake. Having emerged from the trees at the bottom, I’m not entirely sure that we would have found this path from the lakeside.

 

 

People were swimming in the lake in a large lido area that had been sectioned off – although one or two people were beyond the boundary of this. The turquoise water was warm and apparently generated from a thermal spring. Willow trees overhung the water edge, where ducks sheltered from the sun and picked at the fish who were doing the same thing.

Seeing a gondola that was already filled with a number of people we decided to go to the island in the lake – Slovenia’s only island. We had to wait several minutes for enough people to fill the gondola, but it seemed that some of the people in there had been waiting for considerably longer. Once full, the tanned and very muscular young man stood at the back of the gondola and rowed us across the lake with the use of two beautiful wooden oars. Sweat was dripping off him, but the crossing was wonderfully peaceful.

The island consists of little more than a church and a restaurant we had half an hour before the gondola was rowed back – which did make me wonder how the restaurant ever managed to do any business. M wanted to go into the church where you could ring the bell in return for a wish – for a small fee. That explained the perpetual and erratic bell ringing that was going on. I looked into the church through the window at the end of the nave apparently saw from there as much as there was to see. 

 

We walked around the edge of the island, jutting out from which there were numerous small jettys. Some people had rowed themselves over – or even swam. From a large jetty at the other end of the island rose the sweeping ornamental staircase – 91 steps high and apparently a groom must carry his bride up these steps to the church at the top if he wants to marry her. This must surely be a cunning plot to ensure that unmarried women stay slim and that unmarried men stay fit and able, and is a very good anti selection scheme to avoid fat ladies and unfit or old men from marrying and procreating.

After being rowed back to the town we decided against walking around the whole lake on the basis that it was a long way, it was very hot and we had seen much of the edge of the lake from the castle and our boat trip and it didn’t look particularly exciting. So instead we went in search of food – and found the cream cake which was a delicacy of Bled. The cake was about 4 inches high and consisted of a pasty base and flaky pastry top, between which was a thick layer of cream and a thick layer of something custardy. It was surprisingly light and utterly delicious.

 

We went to the bus stop to await our return bus. The return trip necessitated changing bus half way. Back in the town, M and I walked up to the hut that I had passed on the second day with the various antlers on it. It was further away than I had recalled, and when there I walked round the back and found various jaw bones that we hadn’t initially noticed. We returned to the hotel closely followed by blackening clouds that had entirely eclipsed the mountains from view.

In the hotel car park we had a brief chat with Kent’s coach drivers. They had been up to the pass that day but as the driver pointed out, they didn’t know where they had been or where they were or where they were going and none of them were doing anything as energetic as walking. I decided that this must be a cheaper option than an old people’s home and informed M that when she became old, infirm and incapable I would send her on countless coach trips around Europe.

In the evening briefing about the walk Jayne told us that the hard walk was a summit. There was an up and a down. The up was first, followed by the down.

We sat with Uriah Heep again over dinner where he informed us that on one trip he had travelled light and ended up washing his hair in clothes detergent, and that this was something a woman was unlikely to do. He was absolutely right – and given the state of his hair (or rather absence of it) I wasn’t entirely sure that the detergent had done it any favours.

Over breakfast Nancy and Miss Larkin wondered whether they had disturbed us the previous evening. It seems that while sitting in bed reading a fly had flown past Nancy who thwacked it with her book. It headed over to Miss Larkin who thwacked it back. After brief fly tennis it gave up and flew out of the window but not before reducing the girls to hysterical laughter.

We had another bus journey to the walk, dropping the easy group at Bled while we went on to the Poljuka forest. The bus wound up the road which twisted its way through the woods taking us to Rudno Polje. When we got out the air was fresh and distinctly cooler but we soon warmed up with the uphill climb under the drag lift – which unfortunately wasn’t operating as there was no snow.  Before long we had risen above the tree line and started to be rewarded with views across the alps. It was wet and muddy underfoot. Mostly the path was stone paved but in some places it was mud, and combined with the steep hillside this did result in some potentially messy situations.

I followed Jayne and saw her step over a large thing on the path that I suddenly realised was a toad. I called out to everyone to have a look. He was huge and it surprised me that he was sitting in the sun. Jayne had almost stepped on him. Jim – who had walked a little further on ahead – wondered whether all the excitement was worth coming back down for. Nancy removed herself from the path and walked up the grassy hillside instead, admitting that she suffered from toadophobia. We never really established why – perhaps an unfortunate incident with Wind in the Willows as a child.

 

Jayne had said that today’s walk would not be as steep as the previous day. I wasn’t entirely sure that that was correct, but the exertion was certainly well worth the effort on this occasion.  Pip had opted not to bring heavy binoculars with him and was pleased with the decision to avoid carrying them all the way up the mountain.

We reached a small ridge top and had a view of what we were heading for – it didn’t look too bad. Although the views were tempting, the wind was strong and cold so we were inclined to keep moving. At least that way we kept warm and sweaty – as Muriel pointed out, we each had our own individual fly swarm. Now completely out of the trees, the hillside was covered with stumpy bushes squatting in the wind.

 

We climbed further to the rim of the ridge with spectacular views over the mountains. Jayne paused for everyone to catch up. As the wind was chilling, but climbing was hot, Pip and I decided to press on to the summit rather than get cold. I followed Pip, utterly confident in his navigation skills. We arrived at the summit by a most circuitous route, more or less entirely circumnavigating it first. Jayne and the rest of the group came up via a much short option. We sat on the top admiring the view, and looking down on large birds of prey, trying to identify them. If only we had a pair of binoculars. I put on considerably more clothes, and phoned Husband. We could see Triglav and a hut perched on the side of it for climbers to shelter from the weather.

Talking of which, the clouds were starting to look threatening. Although they scudded across the sky quickly in the brisk wind, there was a distinct darkening. Jayne decided it was probably time to move off the summit. The onward path went along the rim of a very narrow and rocky ridge. The combination of this and the fierce, gusty winds that grabbed and pushed at you, suddenly and forcefully, made the whole venture fraught with danger, and Muriel was particularly affected by it. No sooner had we set off than the rain started. It wasn’t raining hard, so initially I just put on an extra jumper and my waterproof. But  before long the rain was pelting us with ferocity and as I felt my body temperature plunge I opted for plan B, putting on waterproof trousers, hat and gloves. In fact, all the clothes I was carrying. Jayne had tried to put the zip off legs of her trousers back on, but had got too cold in the process so also just went straight for waterproofs and warm clothes. Naturally the rain stopped as soon as we were all dressed up. But due to the loss of body heat I was happy to stay as I was until I started to warm up again. We scrambled on – quite literally – over boulders and scree. Pip helped Muriel every step of the way. At one point there was a bit of a climb down through a gap in the rocks with a reasonable drop the other side. Being limestone there were various lumps and bumps that you could use as hand holds and foot holds. Jayne instructed Pip to stand at the bottom, and for the women to fall into his arms rather than risk hurting themselves trying to negotiate this.

We went a little further down and stopped for lunch out of the wind, gazing up at the summit we had just been on. Another group were crossing the ridge top and it made us realise the enormity of it when we saw how tiny they appeared. To put Nancy’s mind at rest, we had to undertake a toad check before sitting down.

 

Jayne must have become conscious of time pressing on as we embarked on a brisk, pacy walk down through the woodland, often being afforded with stunning views back at the ridge we had climbed. From a distance is seemed perilously steep and narrow.

At one point the air was filled with a pungent, strong smell. Jayne commented that there must be a dead animal in the vicinity, so I went for a quick forage for it. And she was right. A little way down the slope, below the path, was the rotting carcass of a sheep. M would have liked the skeleton, but I wasn’t allowed to bring it back.

 

The woods were wonderfully quiet and still, and the pine needle covered ground underfoot was luxuriously springy. There were also frequent crops of large, bright, exotic looking mushrooms.

The pace, if anything, picked up and we yomped along to the sound of Pip’s creaky boot, and he made use of the creak to have a sneaky fart. The creaking boot was soon joined by the creaks of the tall pines as they gently swayed in the afternoon breeze. Pip was kept going by the mirage of a hut that was ever before him. With the end finally in sight, Esther Summerson tripped over a tree root. Our sterling efforts paid off and we returned to the rendevous fractionally before time so forced down a beer while waiting for the coach. Mrs Todgers decided that she liked an up and a down on a walk.

That evening there was another raucous dinner, complete with some rather uninspiring semolina croquettes. M wondered how I could eat them, but I pointed out that I had been brought up to finish my dinner. Several coachloads of the WI were in the dining room. M got into conversation with them, and as it always does, the conversation came round to life drawing which inevitably led to discussions about naked men. M let the WI know that her top tip for drawing the dangly bits was to trace them.  Apparently M was behaving herself this trip!

After dinner she went for a walk into town with the group. Nicholas Nickleby wanted to tag along as well in a little while, and she told him to follow the noise – which apparently he could hear from the 3^rd floor.

During the night there was ferocious rain and thunder. It was still raining quite heavily in the morning and we wondered if the walk would be on. It was and today it involved a steep ascent to the Luknja Pass at 1758m.

The early part of the path had a 6 foot high karabiner as a memorial to the partisans killed during the struggle for independence at the end of the last war. There were also a number of monuments and plaques dedicated to fallen climbers. It was a sobering reminder of the dangers and that we were small, and not always able to tackle nature. However, with the grey storm clouds overhead, the steep cliffs of the valley on either side of us did indeed look menacing rather than soft and welcoming.

 

 

The walk was a continual ascent, with the end ever in our sights but never appearing to get any closer. Rather than have a long lunch stop Jim’s plan (he was leader for the day) was to stop for frequent, short food top ups. It also avoided us getting too cold in the breaks.

Everything along the walk was short, stunted and stocky. The beech trees grew with their trunks curving over the ground to provide protection from avalanches. Suddenly the vegetation stopped and a steep scree slope rose up before us. Jim sent us off in small groups, the faster ones at the front, so as not to hold anyone up, and also to maintain spaces between everyone given the likelihood of rocks cascading down the slope.

 

A suggestion of a path zig zagged its way through this, but the path itself moved under your feet and there was no way of knowing how steep the ground underneath was until the covering scree slid away underneath you. It was slow, unsteady going. Rosa Bud had joined us on this walk and Jim stayed with her. I bounded on ahead and turned the corner for the final ascent. I was faced by a huge outcrop of rock with small gulleys on either side. Initially neither of these gulleys looked that easy to climb. I went over to one side – but to get to the gulley I needed to get onto a smooth, wet boulder that came up to my hips. With the obvious lack of grip and nothing to hold onto I doubted my chances, and went over to the other side. Here the gully was narrow, but it was also liberally rock strewn and I reckoned that using the chimney effect of the gap, I could scrabble my way up. I clambered onto the first protruding rock and gripped onto the rocks either side. Suddenly, the rock beneath my feet sheered off, and I was left hanging by my fingertips for a moment or two before re-gaining my footing. Admittedly I was only dangling about 3 feet off the ground, but the ground was a very steep scree slope. Had I fallen, I would have potentially travelled some way back down the mountain. In the meantime, the large piece of rock that had come away was hurtling dangerously down the scree slope – into the path of the rest of the group. In my rush to make myself safe, I had not called out a warning. And now I heard Jim’s voice calling up (they were still out of sight) to check if I was ok, assuming that the falling rock had also come past me rather than being caused by me.

 

I continued the climb up the gully and sat on the overhanging rock above to wait for the others so that we could complete the final few metres of the climb to the top of the coll together.

As they came up I told them what had happened regarding the rock. M pointed out that ever since she had given me power of attorney, I had tried to kill or maim her.

As a group, we continued to the top where we were afforded with a stunning view of absolutely nothing, so thick was the cloud. There was also a biting cold wind that was strong enough to lift you off your feet, and rain started to fall. Donned in full waterproofs, we headed back down.

 

Again we were set off down the scree slope in pairs, and advised to stay at least one zig-zag apart to minimise the danger from falling rocks – or indeed falling people. Having run a monumental scree slope in Morocco, I set off first and ran down. M initially tried to walk but realised that coming down, especially with faltering steps, was harder than going up. Soon she too was gently jogging down the slope.

We reached the bottom of the screen and looked back up to see most of the rest of the group still fairly near the top.

 

Once we had all re-grouped back onto solid ground, we set off back down the rest of the way – even though M managed to get us onto entirely the wrong path at one point. It was worrying that she sometimes acted as route leader for walks back in England.

Finally we arrived back at the hut and rewarded ourselves with jam pancakes. The walk was meant to continue on down the Vrata valley, through the woods alongside the river, past the base of two waterfalls. However, with the additional time our walk had taken as result of the weather and getting Rosa Bud up and down the scree slope, we had run out of both time and inclination. We left it to Jim and Jayne between them to call the coach company and make the necessary arrangements. In the meantime, we looked back up at the coll which was aptly re-named Rosa Bud’s redoubt.

We waited in the car park for the coach, and were a source of curiosity to a local cow who came over – alarmingly quickly – to have a look at us.

It was our final evening, so we finished dinner early and packed. Our morning call was at 3.45am. During the night it poured with rain, which came flooding in through the open skylight window (that opened on a central pivot so both the top and the bottom of the window were open). We only realised this in the morning when M went to dress and found all her clothes were wet as they had been on a chair under the window. So she hastily had to dig something out of the suitcase that wasn’t too dirty, and push the wet stuff in.

We collected our packed breakfast and settled down in the coach for the hour long journey to the airport. We were clearly one of the early flights – most of the lights in the waiting area weren’t even turned on and the café wasn’t open. Instead there was a small coffee machine, and M managed to be served the only drink which came complete with a plastic stick that nearly took her eye out. When the café did finally open, we got drinks at about the same time our flight gave suggestions of being called for boarding, so downed the boiling hot drinks rapidly only to be left waiting for several more minutes.

Eventually however, we boarded the plane and flew back to England, where Husband was waiting .