A very important day

Today (June 25) is a national state holiday and a work-free day - Statehood Day (Dan državnosti). We commemorate on this day the country's declaration of independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. It is the day on which the initial acts regarding independence were passed. After Slovenia's independence declaration the Ten-Day War followed, which was at the same time the first massive armed conflict in the heart of Europe after WWII - ending in victory by the Slovenian Territorial Defence Forces against the Yugoslav army.

On this day it is appropriate to tell something more about the National symbols. I found the data regarding national symbols on the Government communication office site.


Source: Crt

The national anthem is the seventh stanza of the France Prešeren poem Zdravljica (A Toast).
Listen to the anthem

The Slovenian flag consists of three colours that are in the following order: white, blue and red. Each colour occupies one third of the width of the flag. On the upper lefthand portion of the flag the national coat of arms is located such that the top half of the shield covers the white stripe while the lower half covers the blue stripe. The proportions of the width of the flag to the length are of one to two.

The national coat of arms of Slovenia is a shield in the middle of which, on a blue background, is a representation of Mount Triglav in white, under which are two undulating blue lines which represent the sea and rivers and above which are located three golden, six-pointed stars forming a downward-pointing triangle. The shield is bordered in red.

Empty pot

Empty pot
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

Did the flower bed brake? Where are the pieces then? I guess it didn't break, somebody must have needed it. Interesting. And it will be even more interesting to see, how long it will take to replace it.

Panorama of Ljubljana

Panorama of Ljubljana
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

Another shot at taking a panorama image. Stitched from a series of photographs taken from the "first floor" of the Ljubljana castle. Ascend the spiral staircase from the courtyard and you will be rewarded with a view of Ljubljana. This particular day was quite hazy, but with spring approaching, there will soon be plenty beautiful sunny days. I think the stitch came out quite well, the seems are not obvious at all.

The exhibition

The exhibition
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

So what is happening in Ljubljana lately? The weather smells like spring already and the dreaded winter fog has receded. The freezing temperatures might yet return, as in the last couple of years the "climate" is acting pretty weird and May snow is not unheard of. But for the moment, it looks very promising.
Time to visit the castle and enjoy the view. A lot of people get that idea and it's no wonder, since the spring accentuates the romantic feel of the medieval castle. Not only can you enjoy the view and have a drink on the windy/sunny terrace, but you can also visit the photography exhibition in the castle's interior. It is titled "The founding of the Slovene Photography Section at the Museum of Gorenjska" and portrays the photographic tradition in Slovenia. Check it out, if you visit the castle. It's free anyway ;)

A daytrip to Primorska region

We started early, we were up and on our way at 6.15am. Our first stop was Cerknica lake. We wanted to take a few shots of sunrise but unforunately the sky was cloudy so we moved ahead toward Socerb castle near the southwestern Italian border. We made a wrong turn near Postojnska cave and came to (in my opinion) one of the most magical slovenian castles Predjamski grad, where each year traditional Erasmus knight's tournament
is held. By now the sun was up and not covered with clouds so we made some nice pictures of the castle.



It was really nice and peaceful, but because early bird doesn't always catch the worm (the castle opens at 10am, we were there at 9.30am) we continued our way towards Socerb village, according to the plan. We got there around 11am, still quite early (it is amazing how many things you can see when getting out of bed a little earlier) and we took a look of the surroundings. The castle was first mentioned in the 13th century, it has a strategic position on the cliff where
Carst meets Šavrinska brda. The castle itself is not as spectacular as f.e. Predjama castle, it is quite small, but it offers a great view of Slovenian Istria, coastal settlements and Trieste gulf.


There is nothing but a restaurant inside the castle, which you can enter as a restaurant guest. It is also used for weddings and protocolary meetings, prince Albert of Monaco and former president Milan Kučan have among others also enjoyed their services. The surrounding area offers many great opportunities for easy hiking (the strong wind makes a scary noise through the pine trees but it didn't chase us away) and there is also a cave near where the only underworld church (chapel) in Slovenia lies. It is only opened on Sundays so we unfortunately didn't have a chance to take a look at it. We were quite hungry by now so we headed for Izola, a small town on the Slovenian coast. We ate our meal at picerija Gušt and it was quite good. The last stop was the Great cross above the Strunjan bay, which is also a national reserve (4km long) and the Moon bay, which is supposed to be an energy point. There are also many paths for hiking and great views. It was getting dark so we didn't descend down to the bay, but we will be back!

11th Ljubljana Marathon

The winner, near finish
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

Since we have no photos from the 12th marathon on account of rain, I thought I'd post one from the previous one. This is the last year's winner, not far from the final straight. It was fun this this year, too - despite being a bit cold for some of the top athletes to run their best (or so I heard).

12th Ljubljana marathon

This Sunday a traditional 12th Internatinal Ljubljana marathon was held in the centre of Ljubljana. Despite bad weather conditions more than 8000 runners applied for marathon, halfmarathon and recreational run.

It was a great event and hopefuly someday I too will join the runners.

Blejski vintgar

Vintgar
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

Blejski vintgar (gorge) is one of the top three most visited tourist locations in Slovenia. It is located near Bled lake, perhaps 15 minutes drive away at most. There is a wooden pathway along most of its lenght of some good three kilometres. The gorge is quite narrow (that's why it's a gorge) and so is the pathway. You have to watch not to bang your head at the rock face in some places. Plus be sure to wear warm clothes, as it gets quite cold if you linger. It ends with a waterfall. (Or starts, if you start your journey at the downstream entrance.) There is an entrance fee, used for maintaining the pathway and cleaning the gorge daily.

Highest Firefox visit share in Europe

We are establishing a new column on our blog called the Top 5. We will be publishing different rankings of countries where Slovenia will make it to the Top 5 list.

The first Top 5 came as a surprise to me when the XiTi published the results of a Firefox usage survey. Mozzila Firefox is the second most popular web browser in the world followed by Microsoft Internet Explorer. It is developed by the Mozzila corporation and a community of external contributors. Among all continents Oceania and Europe have the largest Firefox users base, both approaching 30% visit share.
And now our Top 5 ...
In the XiTi survey Slovenia was ranked the first among the 32 European countries included in the survey with 47,9% visit share, followed by Finland with 45,4%.
We wondered why our Firefox usage share is so high compared to the other countries but we could not make a reasonable conclusion. Could you?

A great day in Ljubljana

We are spending much of our free/holiday time in Ljubljana this year. Usually we spend it abroad (Western Europe or Croatian coast) but this year writing our dissertation thesis kept us in Ljubljana for the summer. Earlier this week we decided to relax a bit so we went to Water park Atlantis, situated in the Ljubljana shopping area (BTC City). We took the ticket for Thermal Temple, but soon figured out that besided more peace and quiet it doesn't offer much more than a baseline ticket for Adventure world. We really had fun though, enjoying the bubbles (massage pools), the adventure pool and steam sauna. Afterwards we headed for the city centre to get some more sea holidays flavour. We went to a fish reastaurant Operna klet near Ljubljana Opera house, Parliament and National Gallery right in the city centre. Day ended with the free outdoor Yoga, which is held in the Tivoli park during this summer, following the example of bigger European and American cities. I have never before attended any Yoga classes but I found it really nice and relaxing and a perfect way to end a great day in Ljubljana.

Free Yoga in the Tivoli park

A sculpture in the Tivoli park

A series of large-format photographs of lake Cerknica on Jakopič promenade in the Tivoli park

Photographs taken by: Crt

Cerkniško jezero - Lake Cerknica

Around Cerkniško jezero
Originally uploaded by Crt Ahlin

This photo is from a trip to Cerkniško jezero (Lake Cerknica) this summer. The funny thing about the lake is, it a "periodic" or "intermittent" lake (the term my dictionary offers). What does that mean? Well, the lake has periods of high and periods of low water. That is, it dries up (not completely) when there is no rain and fills up to the point of flooding some nearby villages in heavy rains.
How can that be? The lake resides on a limestone basis, which easily absorbs water through, among other things, sinkholes - like the one on the photograph. They sure look surreal to me ...

Ljubljana in august

Lots is happening in Ljubljana these days. There is the Trnfest festival in Trnovo part Ljubljana with a bunch of daily evening events (ending on the 1st of September). We went there for a stand-up comedy evening, but there were too many people there and we couldn't hear the comedians, so we quickly went on.
Then there is the sixth annual festival Sanje in the center of Ljubljana, dedicated to poetry and music with events at the Zvezda park, Pločnik coffee shop and other places in Ljubljana and around (ending on 31st of August). The picture is from Festival sanje, the concert of the group Ankaran. They were playing old songs of Frane Milčinski - Ježek and it was nice and relaxing to listen to them for a while.


And there is the "Dipping of the cheating bread baker" every (?) Saturday at 10:30 on Šuštarski bridge, where they symbolically reproduce the event, that was considered punishment for bakers whose loafs where lighter than claimed. Didn't see that one yet, but I will keep it in mind and hopefully do that sometime.

Anti-smoking law

The novel of the Anti-smoking law declares that from this day forward (Avgust 5, 2007) smoking in Slovenia is banned in all public and working places. Special smoking rooms can be installed in hotels, restaurants and bars if the owner/tenant decides to set it up, where smoking will be allowed. Though there will be no eating and drinking allowed.
Among other novelites are also:
- selling/buying of tobacco products to adolescents under 18 is banned;
- phone number for help with curing smoking addictions have to be placed on the tobacco product packages.

Bohinj 2007 and the beautiful Gorenjska region

This was our second trip this year to Bohinj. Bohinj is one of the main Slovenian (natural) attractions. The beautiful lake, high mountains and green forests are really a sight and a perfect place to rest. Due to high temperatures in the cities and on the seaside more and more people are spending their summer vacations in this cool place.

We were spending our nights in Hostel Pod Voglom in the Rodica Dependency and our days around the lake. It is written on their web page: "Hostel pod Voglom lies on one of the most beautiful locations, on the south side of the lake Bohinj. With its strategic position by the Bohinj lake, it offers an ideal accommodation for all the guests, who are coming to Bohinj for an active rest. This two star hotel is ideal for those, who like relaxed atmosphere, sport activities, natural beauties and peace."
Although we actually did spent a good time there and they do offer a wide range of activities the Hostel is really old and in need of repair. Though it is cheap and really on a beautiful location. We didn't unfortunately take advantage of the many sport activities on offer since it was a type "lay on the beach all day" vacation, but the next time we will surely go at least paddling on the lake.

You can read more about Bohinj on: http://www.bohinj.si
Below are some pictures of our trip/sights (I am very proud of my first web made slideshow). Some extra pics are added from our previous trip. In accordance to the post title there are some images of Bohinj, Bled, Korita Mostnice and Vintgar Bled.

Hostel Celica

Again, we missed a movie at the Ljubljana castle's open cinema on Friday. This time there were so many people there already, we didn't get our turn and will have to wait till next year (since the there are no more shows, at least none that would interest us). I guess more people show up, if the weather is nice. Although it did start to rain sometime in the middle of the picture, so they must had been a little disappointed, too. ;)

But we did get our turn at the free tour of the Celica hostel. Celica means "The Cell" and is so named because it used to be a military prison of the Yogoslav army. After Slovenian attainment of independence from Yugoslavia, the former barracks were "taken over" by various artist, squatters and they took matters into their own hands. The prison building has recently been converted to house travelers from all over the world in a truly different function that it used to have. It sports a flashy title of the "Hippest Hostel" in the world in the January 2006 edition of Lonely Planet Bluelist.

The picture above shows the side of the hostel, with the graffiti so typical for the area. The glass in the middle covers the outside restaurant.

Above is the hall on the ground floor. Through it you can visit a cafee in oriental style on the right and another one in western style on the left with a restaurant in the middle. The hostel tries to give a chance to many cultures and different points of view through the art in it. I haven't taken any pictures of the first floor, where the prison cells, now converted to rooms for guest, are. That's ok, since Boštjan Burger already took photographs of all the cells in 3D! You should check out his site for other interesting 3D photos of Ljubljana, Slovenija and other interesting places. Some photographs and of course other interesting stuff is also available on Celica's homepage.
The interesting thing about the rooms is, that each was designed by a different artist. Therefore, each is as unique as it gets. Another thing we found particularly interesting is a room of "peace" directly above the dungeon in the basement. It has six niches in the walls, five with artifacts of five major religions and one empty for an "unknown" religon. You can use the room for relaxation and meditation.
If you decide to stay in the cells, don't expect them to be very spacious. It was a prison, remember. It will be a memorable experience, though. I hear guest mingle and show each other rooms, when they learn each one is different. Note there is a wall with names writen on it in one of the cells - the names of former military prisoners. Some guest mistakenly think it's a wall for visitors and add their names :( The second floor has dorms for larger groups of people. It was quite hot there at the time (early afternoon), but the guide said the heat issue will be resolved shortly.
Do take a guided tour if you are in Ljubljana, it's free and you will learn more about the history and the efforts behind the hostel.

Trg revolucije

After a period of extreme heat, we finally had rain yesterday evening and through to the morning. It was much needed already; as many gardens will now be able recuperate. Unfortunately, it foiled our plan to see an evening movie on the Ljubljana castle's yard summer open-roof cinema.

We did cruise through Ljubljana on Saturday, taking pictures of stuff all around, that we will share with you through our upcoming posts. It was fun, but the heat gets to you – it is very hot and humid, and the sun gets hot at early hours (10 o'clock already). Make sure you have plenty of water with you (or buy some), but drink regularly and take other precautions against the sun. Weather reports say the heat wave will be back in the coming week, as in the rest of the Europe.

Among other things, we went by “Trg republike” or “The Square of the Republic”, which ends on one side with the TR2 and TR3 towers, visible on the first picture. One of the highest buildings in the city, they are visible from afar and the TR3 tower sports a digital clock and thermometer on the display at the top of the tower, so you can check if it’s time to move to a shade.

Above is the TR3 building in it’s full glory. There are elite business spaces and a number of foreign embassies inside. A side entrance between the main entrance and the “Cankarjev dom” cultural building leads into the “Centralna tehniška knjižnica”, the library used by students of the technical and nature sciences, and others thirsty for knowledge.

Behind the tower is the “Cankarjev dom”, the country’s prime location for various cultural events, some fairs, exhibitions, film festivals and such. Named after Ivan Cankar, a great contributor to Slovenian prose.

In front of the building is a cube that bears his name on one side and a silhuette of his face on another (as shown on the picture – notice the dark areas: the hair, eyes, moustache).

Looking across the square and the parking lot, you can see the Slovenian parliament building (“Državni zbor”). The parking lot is cleared for important national events, to accommodate for celebrations ceremonies.

The entrance to the parliament building with bronze sculptures by Karlo Putrih and Zdenko Kalin. The building was built in 1959 by design of architect Vinko Glanz. The parliament as an institution of Slovenian state was established in 1992.

The "Spomenik revolicije" monument on the side of the square pays tribute to the revolution (the fight against the axis powers in the Second World War and the establishment of the socialist state afterwards). Mind the missing letters “I” and “K” in the word “SPOMENIK” that perhaps hints at the path of the whole monument with changing ideology.

This sign next to it reminds us of the things written in the constitution (of the previous state): the farmers, workers, communist party, the liberation struggle, the falling of the social order based on exploitation, the conditions for the free and all-round development of the Slovene nation (to make it brief).

Fell free to comment. Expect further contributions in somewhat sporadic posts. But we do intend to cover important locations and events with photographs, eventualy covering Ljubljana and possibly other interesting locations in Slovenia. (Notice you can click on the pictures to enlarge them.)

The first post ...

This is our first post on our new blog, dedicated to capturing moments and images in Ljubljana and other places in Slovenia. Above is a photograph of the castle on the hill above Ljubljana, a prominent landmark of the city.