Leaving Slovenia

May 8, 2005-Spelunking
(photos:Human fish,
Adriatic from our hotel,
Typical architecture-Opatija)

We traveled to the Karst region of Slovenia before leaving the country. It’s an area where the limestone is extremely porous & where caves have formed. There are 7,500 caves in Slovenia. We went to the Postojne Caves. The timing of our tours has been impeccable. We got there before the major inundation of tour buses, but it was still a crush of bodies.
We walked past a string of gift shops & fast food stands to board a “train” that carried us into the caves. The train was a series of flatbed platforms with yellow park benches fastened on top. There was no protection for heads or arms & we moved along at a fast clip for 10-15 minutes. The temperature in the cave is a constant 48 degrees & the breeze from the moving train made it darn cold.

When we got to the platform inside the cave we were divided by language groups. For those who chose to there was an hour walking tour. Others could stay on the train & return to the entrance. We walked. The steep uphill grade of the manmade walkway made it difficult in the beginning but it soon leveled out. The best way I can describe the rooms we passed through is that they looked like one phallus hall after another. The “spaghetti” room where thousands of white stringy stalactites hung broke the mood. It was surprising to see how many people ignored instructions not to use flash or videography. Then there were those who just had to touch the formations. The pools that formed from the constant dripping were littered with coins. The guide told me that people couldn’t pass water without throwing money into it. She said that some Euro coins had nickel in them & the heavy metal was leaching into the water of the underground river.
The national animal of Slovenia is only found in the cave water. It’s a salamander-like amphibious creature nicknamed the human fish because it has a pale flesh color. There’s a legend that they’re really baby dragons. It’s eyeless, has four legs, is amphibian, & lays eggs…sort of. If conditions aren’t suitable it will keep the egg in its body until it hatches internally & then have a live birth. It lives for sixty to one hundred years & only has to eat every two to three years. One group went as long as eleven years without eating but they were in a scientific study.

Lunch was sausage & sauerkraut. It was the first time our “food allergy” request was put to the test. When we booked the trip we explained that we didn’t eat pork or shellfish. The home office decided the best way to call it to the attention of the group leader was to say we had allergies. We ended up with sauerkraut & chicken. That sausage really looked good.

After lunch we drove past grazing land & learned that this part of Slovenia wasn’t agricultural. The soil is shallow & rocky. Dig too deep & you ended up in a cave. We followed the lower Alps & forests to the sea where red-roofed houses dipped down the hills & almost into the startling blue Adriatic.

Slovenia only has a 30-mile coastline. That’s one inch/Slovenian. It’s said that in August they’re all on the beach staking their claims. But Croatia has 3501 miles of the sunniest coastline in Europe.

Opatija

While Tito ruled Yugoslavia there was peace but we all know what happened after his death. We can tell from comments we’ve heard between our driver, Drago, & Viki that feelings are still tense between Serbs & Croats. I can understand the prolonged hostility since the end of the war is so recent. I don’t think they’ve really made peace with the Germans & it’s been sixty years since that war ended. At breakfast in Bled it wasn’t unusual for a German group to run some of us off what they claimed was their “turf.” They didn’t understand or chose not to understand that the signs on the tables referred to dinner seating only. Today as we were entering the cave we outwitted them. While they tried to push us out of the way we took a short cut & ended up first in line. Ha!

Drago skillfully took us to The Grand Hotel in Opatija (population 11,000). The town has churches dating from the 15th century but became a popular vacation destination only 160 years ago. The exchange rate in Croatia is 5.7 kuna to the U.S. dollar. The economy isn’t as healthy as Slovenia but there’s a lot of re-building. Our hotel was rebuilt two years ago & is clean, modern, on the Adriatic & overlooks the isle of Krk (these spellings drive spell-check crazy). It’s one of 1185 islands off the Dalmatian Coast. Our rooms are on the waterside. There’s a heavy Italian influence in food & bright Mediterranean oranges, blues, greens, & yellows punctuate Italianate facades.

Viki took us on an orientation walk around town so we’d be able to find the ATMs & restaurants. We strolled through a jewel-like park where Japanese camellias, the city’s flower, bloomed. The seaside promenade was a hub of activity at the flea market, cafés, restaurants, & gelaterias. The gelato here is creamy but doesn’t have strong flavors. There’s an Israeli tour group at our hotel & we noticed Jewish jewelry in store windows. It’s close to Israel & I imagine it’s a popular vacation spot.

David is sitting on the balcony studying up for tomorrow. We have an area tour of a nearby city, the hometown of our guide, Rijeka

Toby.