Day 5 -- Ljubljana

After breakfast, we packed the car again and set off to Ljubljana. Before we went, we looked for a place to stay since we didn’t have anything pre-booked. The B&B that was recommended in a guidebook I read in California was all booked, but Lucy found a nice looking hotel that was only 2.5 km from the center and reasonably priced so we made a reservation there. The drive to Ljubljana was easy -- only about 70 km so we got to the hotel around 1 pm. It turned out to be very nice, but maybe a bit further from the center than desired. They showed us how to walk to the center and so we did. They told us it was a nice stroll along the river, but it turned out to be 1/3 along the river and 2/3rds along pretty busy suburban streets. It took us more than an hour, but we got there and were not disappointed. Ljubljana turned out to be a great city -- vibrant, young, alive, with beautiful old architecture enhanced with modern touches. On the way to the center, on the river bank we encountered a little outdoor library stand, a project called “Library under the Trees” -- boxes of books, a few comfortable lawn chairs and a person who looks over it. They have 5 of them in the city. You can sit and read or borrow a book to take with you. I love this idea and want to start something like this in Huntington Beach.
Our first stop in the city was in an outdoor restaurant (one of hundreds) to have lunch/dinner. We had a one of the "menu of the day" combos -- lentil soup, pasta with veggies, salad and desert for 6.5 euro. Then we walked to the castle, the highest point in the city. The castle was fantastic -- the medieval structure again combined with very modern touches -- glass and metal -- light and airy. Instead of trying to renovate and recreate the original look, they enclosed the original structure in beautifully designed glass and metal enclosures.
After that we walked through the city, Vodnikov trg, Mestni trg, Stary trg -- we admired the market designed by Plecnik and a series of bridges -- Dragon bridge, Shoemaker’s bridge, triple bridge and others. There so many bridges here, and all along the river -- hundreds of cafes, restaurants, bars with lots of young people having a good time. We walked and walked until finally at 9 pm we sat down in one of the restaurants on the river bank and ordered a bottle of wine and became part of the local night life. Lucy was all stressed out because she thought that the waiter said that we couldn’t just have wine without food. It took a lot of persuading and quite a bit of wine to calm her down. At about 11 pm we started walking back to our hotel. We would have taken a cab, but there were no cabs in sight so we walked along a very crowded river bank and then along very empty and dark streets until we reached our hotel and collapsed in beds.