When I arrived in Bled, I set out to find a hostel. I ended up finding a really great one called Traveller’s Haven. They offered a kitchen, internet, comfortable mattresses, free laundry, and free bike rentals - all for only 20 euros!

I was pretty hungry so I walked down to the center of town and had a pizza. Then I went to Kavarna Park to have a coffee and a slice of the famous Bled Cream Cake, which was quite tasty. Then I went back to the hostel, threw my clothes in the wash, and took a bike ride around the lake.

The next day I planned to take a three hour walk to the gorge and back through Zasip. After a series of navigational errors, it turned into an 8 hour excursion!

The gorge was really cool - it reminded me of the glacial gorges in the Swiss Alps.

The walk afterwards was also great. First I walked for a while through Triglav National Park. Then I was able to orient myself by the sound of the nearby highway. I walked along a path next to the highway for a while and came to a large bridge.

I decided to take the path underneath the bridge but ended up coming to a dead end. Then I decided I would attempt to climb up the hill as I was relatively close to the other side. Unfortunately, after cutting through some trees and brush, I faced a dirt wall. If it had been rock, it may have been possible to climb it, but the dirt just crumbled right off. So, I ended up having to walk all the way back and around. Pedestrians aren’t allowed on the bridge itself, so I took another path that would take me around the bridge. I walked through a couple more quaint villages and finally found a sign that pointed me back to Bled.

The following day I went for a bike ride down to Bohinj. I think it was around 55 kilometers, round trip. Throughout the ride the sky threatened rain but luckily it didn’t start raining until I got back. The road was quite precarious at times, but consistently scenic. For some reason, the ride back seemed much easier than the ride there.

When I got back, I made some dinner and went out for a few beers with a couple of British geographers. We had an interesting discussion about the applications of GIS in viticulture. It turns out that the Californian wine makers embrace this technology whereas the French reject it. As a result, the Californian wines taste better on a consistent basis.

The next day, I was planning to take the train to Greece. For some reason, none of the Greek train stations showed up when I searched for them on the InterRail website. I reached Belgrade, Serbia before someone informed me that the trains weren’t going to Greece anymore. I decided to go to Budapest instead.