Lake Bled III

Pletna boats on the shore at Lake Bled.
Bled Castle and St. Martin's church visible in the background.

This is my third time to Lake Bled, an alpine lake found in the Julian Alps of northwestern Slovenia. We are now into the Slovenian part of this trip.

This is Lake Bled. Lake Bled is probably the most beautiful place in what may be the most beautiful country on earth. Croatia is awesome. Especially the Dalmatian Coast. The historic stone architecture alongside the amazing azure blue waters of the Adriatic is something to behold. Slovenia packs a huge amount of variety into a land area the size of Massachusetts. With only about 7,800 square miles of land, Slovenia has mountains, lakes, rivers, a tiny Venetian seacoast, farmland, and the hometown of Melania Trump.

Today we concentrate on the mountains and lakes portion of beautiful Slovenia.

Here is a pletna boat coming into dock.

So our first Lake Bled adventure is to take a pletna boat out to Bled Island, the island in the middle of the town's namesake alpine lake, where the famous Church of the Assumption of Mary may be found (if you lost it).

And this is the island and this is the church:

Again, only with the sun making the crystal clear waters of Lake Bled a slightly different shade:

 Cerkev Marijinega Vnebovzetja, or Church of the Assumption of Mary, is famous all over Slovenia as THE place to get married.

The views from the island are nice:

As is the church interior:

I really liked its stations of the cross paintings:

Next to the church is a clock tower. The bell tower, where you ring the church bell three times for good luck, is inside the church.

The climb to the clock works of the clock tower (about three-quarters of the way up) are nice:

Then it was time for the trip back to shore:

The trip to the island is free. Intelligently, they charge only for the trip back. It's only 15 euros, which is fair considering that the pletna boats are rowed by a single oarsman.

No fossil-fueled boat motors on Lake Bled (although there was one electrical powered boat that could be seen).

Again, Bled Castle towering over the lake:

The castle was more of a fortress. I don't think any royals lived here, although they may have summered here.

Ducks on the pond!

Next stop was Župnijska cerkev sv. Martina, the Church of sv. Martin.

There are a number of Saint Martins in the Catholic Church. I'm not sure which one got the naming rights to this church. Saint Martin the Caribbean island is named for St. Martin of Tours, a French bishop from the fourth century. It could be the same St. Martin. I do not know.

What I love about this church is its Last Supper:

Judas sneaking off, the only apostle without a halo (which should have been the tip off that he was going to be the one who would betray Christ).

Giant rosary in front of the altar:

I'm guessing this archway was installed after this painting was painted, but maybe they just painted around it.

The next stop was the Park Restaurant and Cafe, which claims to be the originator of the Cream Cake. I do not know how many proprietorships in Bled claim to be the originator of the cream cake, but this place has staked a claim.

Lake Bled is known for its Cream Cakes. The Cream Cakes here are amazing. Just a little tiny bit of crust that is there as an excuse to eat a ton of delicious pastry cream.

The other desserts behind the dessert look just as amazing:

The weather forecast said that the sun would come out at 4:00 p.m. and it broke through the clouds exactly on schedule.

Next was the time and the place to buy my favorite souvenir in all of Slovenia. Borovnika. Blueberry liqueur. It is more blueberry tasting than actual blueberries.

In front of the store was this refugee from Country Bears Jamboree.

The song he was singing and playing (on the squeeze box) was clearly "Take Me Home Country Roads." Yes, the John Denver song. But the lyrics were not English. They had to have been Slovenian, but my Slovenian is way too weak to be able to discern the correct language when a Country Bear (with an accordion in both arms) is singing a John Denver tune.

And that was the day in Bled.

Lahko noč, Lake Bled, with your slightly different spelling from how those words are spelled in Croatian. Lahko noč.