Slovenia to the coast

We didn't have any internet on the second and third day of our trip, so we are posting them all at once.  This entry occurred on the second day.

After leaving Maribor, we set off for a small town on the Slovenian coast called Izola.  Izola was deemed to be a beach holiday location so we were excited to see the ocean again. We had a nice relaxing day planned so we slept in a bit and ended up leaving at 10am instead of 9am.  Slovenia isn't a very big country and the GPS told us that we could reach Izola within 3 hours so we decided to make a few stops on the way.

The first stop was an old castle in Celje which was called Stari Grad Celje which is Sloven for "old castle in Celje".  Early references to this castle places its construction in the early 14th century.  Over the centuries, the castle was destroyed and renovated over and over again in the tradition of European castles.  The most recent renovation occurred just after World War 2.  

This castle was awesome.  It was just the right combination of restored and authentic.  There is nothing like climbing over castle rock in order to get onto the wall of a castle and look over the countryside.  It was also completely open to exploration so you could go anywhere that you like, which is unlike some castles which demand that you go to Point A, see the thing that they want you to see, then head off to Point B. In this castle, you go where you want, see what you want and spend as much time there as you want.  

The castle has a number of baileys with many structures that are still standing.  The second most impressive feature of the castle was Fredrick's Tower. Iago didn't particular like the tower as there were many stairs, but he took them like a champ.  Amanda complained a bit however.  

The most impressive feature of the castle was the scion of the oldest vine in the world.  That's right, Maribor's oldest vine in the world had kids and they took up residence in a 14th century castle.  This vine is bad-arse and I love it.  Anyway, we had a great time and it certainly hits my "top 3" castles in Europe (that we've seen so far).

From Celje, we got back in the car and made our way to the Slovenian capital of Ljubjana.  Ljubjana was a very pretty city with the Ljubljanica river running through the center.  We didn't really know what we were looking for, but we were still on a high from seeing the scion of the oldest vine in the world so we took a risk and just parked somewhere pretty.  It turned out well however, as we ended up having lunch in this really nice restaurant by the river then continued on our walk to see the famous triple bridge.  

Good times were had so we were in an excellent mood when we arrived in the small beach town of Izola, and were ready for our next day of adventures.

- Daniel