To leave Italy and get across the border to Slovenia is not as easy as it used to be. Increased border control has stopped all the direct trains but with a bit of research we managed to find a coach company running between Venice Mestre and Ljubljana for a bit of a bargain price. Standing at the train station we're looking around for the big green coach on their website but it's nowhere to be seen. Are we at the right place? We realise that we are when eagle eyed Christine spots an 8 seater minibus parked across the road with the coach company logo on it...turns out we've basically booked a taxi to Slovenia and shared it with a few other people! So our motley crew consisted of: us two, a nun and her friend, a smelly man (who we both had the pleasure of sitting next to!) and a woman with her three kids sat in the back constantly eating...munch, munch, munch all the way to Slovenia!
Since we're in a minibus rather than a coach its a very quick journey, the driver seems keen to get there asap so James tries to keep his eyes off the speedo and breathe normally. It's nice to get to Ljubljana before dark though. We buy tickets to get to our home for the week and wait by the stop. Tick tock, tick tock, we wait for almost an hour after the bus is due before James goes to find out what's going on...the woman who sold us the tickets told us to wait at the wrong place. AARGH! No wonder she ran away from her desk when James walked in the office. Christine is annoyed too but gets a bit of a laugh from watching James stamp his feet and throw a strop. At least its not long until the next bus and our host even picks us up from the local stop and give us a tour of the tiny 'town'. We have the entire ground floor of a house to ourselves and after renting just a room for a while, it makes a nice change to have our own flat again. Jana, our host, is nice enough to make us some food but it's not quite Christine's thing (pork, mushroom sauce and potato dumplings) so James, the human dustbin, gets two portions!
The next day is a Sunday. Slovenia on Sunday is like England used to be...shut! We do manage to pass a bit of time browsing a little flea/antique market on the riverside followed by a bit of wandering round the city and starting to get a feel of it but its raining :-( We grab some food supplies from the one shop that seems to be open and head back to plan for the week.
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