Sleeping until 11 AM after no sleep on the train was just fine for me, thankfully. We are in Slovenia, the country that owns a 1/4 of my blood, and 1/2 of my dad's blood. This is the place that I've wanted to go all my life. We couldn't miss Lake Bled, so we took the hour bus ride to Bled. There, we marveled at the natural beauty of it all. The lake was from a glacier, it is a clear, perfect blue and the mountains make a beautiful back drop. The little, many different colored houses dotted the miraculously green hills surrounding the lake. The island settled in the middle of the lake and held the church, standing strong and powerful, just adding to how wonderful everything looked. It took an hour and a half to walk around the whole lake; with, of course, a few stops for pictures. The only problem was my camera was running out of battery, fast, so I could only take a few pictures. When we finished the hike around Lake Bled, we had to speed walk to the bus stop. While waiting for the bus, we looked in the tourist shop and bought a few postcards for some of the Udovich's. Back at our hotel, we hung out.
Today, the 20th, we had to wake up early, 5:30 AM, to make the train to Rijeka, Croatia. It wasn't at all like we expected, mostly because we weren't in any of the beautiful spots that people talk about, we were in a city. We spent a few hours in the city, looking around and attempting to look at the Adriatic Sea which was so close, but really not part of the city like it could be. There was some kind of event going on, because all of the shops had sales. When it came time, we took the 3 hour train back to Ljubljana. We met a college student from CSU who is traveling until September and then doing a year of his studies in Prague. he will actually pay less going to school overseas then he would at CSU because he pays out of state tuition. He showed us 100s of pictures of the national park near Rijeka, they where amazing and reminded me of the Pacific NW.
We decided to walk around the main park back in Ljubljana. There was mini golf, a soccer field, a basketball court, a bachi ball area, tennis courts, and beautiful running trails. We stopped to watch the soccer a little bit, a small indoor like field with built in nets. They were playing 5 v 5 and had great foot skills. The courts are cool, enclosed ... Wish we had something like it, kinda like the roller hockey rinks we have in our parks.
Then, we walked through the city's centre. They have a stage set up because every night there is some kind of play/skit performed. After stopping for a few minutes to watch and wonder what it was about, the problem with not knowing the language, we decided to walk across the famous three bridges. Suddenly, I heard my name. Extremely unusual, because CeAnn isn't really a popular name. I turned around right as the name connected to my brain, and I saw Pedro, from the train, on his bike. Pedro introduced us to the lady that was showing him around, and then we all talked a bit. It was really great to run into him again. As our conversation died down, we were on our way again. My mom and I found the path to Ljubljana's famous castle, and decided to check it out. I became snap-happy, the path was the perfect place for pictures. There was something going on in the castle though, so it was closed for tourism. Luckily, the ticket lady let us in to check it out. We climbed the steps to a look out view over the city. It was a fabulous view. Unfortunately, we didn't get to see the dragon on top of the castle that is extremely popular all over the city. It was getting late, so we walked back to the hotel. We had to get to bed, because we have an early train to Austria tomorrow morning. I'm incredibly sad to say goodbye to my homeland, but I've promised it that someday I will be back. It is my dream to live here, after all.