Ljubljana, Slovenia: lair of the Dragon 🐉

We didn’t know what to expect of Ljubljana nor how to pronounce it. It was just a convenient stop on the way from Venice to Zagreb, Croatia. It was a very nice find.

One disappointment occurred on the bus ride to Ljubljana, while almost into Slovenia, we drove through Trieste, Italy. Trieste and it’s Adriatic coastline look beautiful, we will have to return here someday.

Feeling a bit sad that we missed our chance at Trieste, we were heartened by the pleasant surprise of the medieval looking town, Ljubljana, dominated by a large castle on a nearby hill. The locals have seized on a folk story of a fire breathing dragon that still lurks in the depths of water caverns beneath the city. All around the city there are dragon statues, tributes and adornments.

We toured the castle and watched a video that describes the mythical dragon, its slaying and resurrection and the protection it now provides to the local inhabitants and their precious water sources. For it is this water that enables the production of the majority of beer made in Slovenia – I like dragons more already🐲🍺

Since beer is a major product and favorite consumable of the locals, (and me), we toured the largest brewery in Slovenia, Union Brewery, founded in 1864, where it still stands today. The tour lasted 1.5 hours and we got a free beer every 20 minutes or so – great tour. As it turns out, Terri doesn’t care for beer all that much, so in the interest of national security and not wanting to offend our brewery guide, I was forced to finish what she could not 😂🍻🤣. We learned a lot about beer making and how it has changed over the years, although, I can’t seem to recall many specifics….

We had purchased a 24 hour tour card that allowed us “free” access to the castle, the museums, the brewery, shared bikes, boat rides on the river, the Illusionarium (pretty cool on a rainy night), and a few things that we didn’t get around to doing. It was a good buy but kept us hustling for our short stay in Ljubljana. If you get the chance, Ljubljana is well worth a couple of day’s time.

We had researched places to eat and settled on one that offered good local cuisine. Unfortunately, they were completely booked so we took the advice from someone at the hotel and went to the oldest restaurant in town (200+ years!). The place was not particularly busy and we were seated very quickly. The problem came when the one waiter tried to service everyone on the patio by himself. It took him an hour to take our order and then 45 minutes to get our “pretty good” food. 200+ years and they still haven’t got it right, how they have stayed in business is a mystery to me.

Next Stop: Zagreb, Croatia 🇭🇷 by bus.