Portoroz

Time to move on. We liked Ljubljana but there is so much to see in Slovenia, we wanted to make the best of the time we had here.

We got off to an early start and arrived at the car rental office early. Turns out not a good thing. The clerk wasn’t there and when he did finally get back he had another customer to deal with before us. So we waited and waited. About an hour later we finally got the car and started on our road trip.

It was a relatively short drive time, about 2 hrs, to the next location, so we had time to explore along the route. It was a difficult decision to pick one thing to see. There are castles, caves, old towns, churches everywhere and horses.

So I picked horses. We went to see the famous Lipizzan horses in Lipica. Unfortunately, they were closed for some unknown reason. Although I didn’t get to see the show or wander the grounds, I did see the horses. This is the original stud farm for these horses. They have quite a few buildings to breed and train the horses. Although they have moved a few times and have other locations in Europe this is where the original breeding stock was established in 1580. They have added a hotel and casino next to the stud farm. We thought we’d take a quick walk though the casino, you know, bathroom break. Turns out not that quick. It was necessary for us to register at the entrance with photo id and a picture and then given a registration document. Very different.

On our route to the hotel, we travelled through a couple of very long tunnels through the hills, bypassed Koper and arrived at our hotel in Portoroz. Portoroz is a resort community, much like a condensed Waikiki, with hotels, restaurants and shops lining the coast. Our hotel is nice, we have a large room with a balcony and partial ocean view.

After settling in we opted to drive to a residential area that had a local Slovenian restaurant. We had thought about walking to the strip to eat but that would have meant 3 long flights of stairs downward, and I didn’t think Ed’s back and my knees were up to it.

We had soup, salad and weiner schnitzel, which we shared and our Slovenian beverages. Which was a good thing as we still couldn’t finish it all.Read more