Phot-o' the Day: The Sava River, outside of Bled, Slovenia

I have posted many pictures of Lake Bled in Slovenia. I'm not yet willing to say that it's the most beautiful acreage on planet earth that I have seen thus far, but I do know it would be under very serious consideration. And the beauty of the area is not limited to the namesake lake. Case in point: the Sava River just outside of town, just over a mountain ridge from the lake.

This is from my "off road" segway tour of Lake Bled back in September 2014.

Phot-o' the Day: Pletna Boats in the Rain, with Castle; Lake Bled, Slovenia

Pass the word the pics are back.

After taking a few weeks off, I'm back to posting phot-o's the day. And I am getting back into the groove by posting a pic from what I consider the most photogenic place on earth, at least among places I've visited. Lake Bled, Slovenia. These are the rowing-powered pletna boats (used to transport us tourists to the island in the middle of the lake with the church on it), at the dock waiting out the rain, with the imposing Bled Castle looming large high atop a rock face, on the other side of the lake.

This was from my first visit to Lake Bled, back in May 2010.

Phot-o' the Day: Rower; Lake Bled, Slovenia

A rower on the lake. The lake is Lake Bled, Slovenia, as evidenced buy the island with the church on top in the background.

If it seems like Lake Bled is the subject of a lot of Phot-o's the Day, that's because it is. It might be the most photogenic place I've yet visited. This is from the September 2014 visit.

Phot-o' the Day: Pletna Boat; Lake Bled, Slovenia

Ten years ago today, I was at what may be the most beautiful place on earth I've visited so far: Lake Bled, Slovenia. What was the occasion? My 50th birthday. One half century on the planet.

I wanted to do something "big" for my 50th. You only get one of those (at most) per lifetime. I decided to take a trip to the land of my ethnic heritage, Croatia. I added Lake Bled, Slovenia, to the itinerary because (a) it looked beautiful in pictures and (b) I had a weird dream about it and thought I should check it out. The logistics of the trip put me in Bled on the occasion of the actual 50th.

And today is 10 years later to the very day.

I had taken only a couple of international trips before this, if you don't include Canada. (Calling Canada an "international" trip is like someone in Italy saying they've been to a foreign country because they went to the Vatican.) I used to think that I did not need to go out and see the rest of the world because there was plenty within the United States that I had not yet seen. But, by the time of my 50th, I had seen almost everything I wanted to see in the U.S., at least in the lower 48, and I thought I heard the rest of the world calling me. I've done at least one international trip a year in the past decade (and, in one, 2018, three!). You never know when the ability to travel is going to be taken away from you, whether because of finances, health, global economic collapse, or pandemics. I expect to be able to travel internationally (and within the good ol' U.S.A.) for many many more years. But there are no guarantees. So I plan accordingly.

Landscape (and Horse) Phot-o' the Day: Walking Around Lake Bled, Slovenia

Saturday is horsin' around day. But this is a landscape week. What to do for a photo du jour of the day? A horse against a beautiful landscape, of course!

This is from the walking trails around Lake Bled, Slovenia. The walking on these trails is not limited to the two-legged. Four legs good.

From the September 2014 visit.

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.

The Grand Finale: Lake Bled

Church on an island in the middle of Lake Bled

The grand finale of this trip is a visit to Lake Bled. This is the one place I visited on my first trip that I absolutely was certain that I needed to see again.

I promised the Sister and B-I-L that we would do a segway tour of Lake Bled. The segway tours are organized through an agency named 3glav Adventures (named after the tallest mountain in Slovenia, nearby Triglav). 3glav was supposed to be closed today. But we got there when someone was there. And it was supposed to be an off-day for the segway tour guide Jakob. But he was willing to lead a tour that would just be the three of us. We were to meet Jakob back at the 3glav offices at 3:00 p.m., which gave us some time to walk around the Lake, visit the Castle, and eat a cream cake.

Bled Lake is amazingly beautiful.

At the rowing area of Bled Lake

Another view of the church on the island in the middle of the Lake

The church on the island is the classic wedding spot in Slovenia. Grooms are supposed to carry their brides up the 99 steps from the shore to the church as part of the Lake Bled wedding tradition. This, I would guess, would put a premium on finding and marrying a small, Slovenian bride.

Admiring the church through the woods 

But look out for horse-drawn carriages on the trail

People do swim in Lake Bled, which I would not recommend due to the ice cold water. Boating would seem to be more fun.

Swimmer ready to dive into the icy cold Alpine water 

Boaters on the Lake

Pletna boats bound for the island and a lone rowboater in training

Lake Bled is an alpine lake at the foot of the Julian Alps. The water is crystal clear. Boats are either powered by electricity or rowing. It is guarded by a "castle," which again, is dramatically situated but is actually more of a fort than a castle per se,

Castle from across the Lake

Castle view 

Same rower, only with a church view

Lots of ducks at Lake Bled

And nasty mean swans

For reasons not entirely clear to me, we decided to make the 15-minute walk straight up hill to the castle at the top of a cliff.

The smooth paved part of the pathway to the Castle, before it's all stairs

 We got to the top.

Castle door

I opted not to pay the nine euros to enter. The fee is basically for the viewpoint, since there was never a royal family in residence at this castle. We were told of an alternative viewing point where we could get just as nice of a view. But when I saw that the trail from the castle gate was high up, and learned that is was without a guardrail, and given how hot and tired and sweaty I was from the 15-minute climb, the sitting bench beckoned.

So we walked down to tour lovely Church of Sv. Martin on the lake shore, right near the castle. I am abbreviating the word "Saint" the Croatian and Slovenian way, "Sv.," for the extra added pretentiousness.

Church of Sv. Martin on the shores of Lake Bled

This is NOT the church on the island that you saw in all of the previous photographs. So Bled has one Catholic church inside the Lake and one outside.

Let's have a look inside, shall we?

Door to Sv. Martin 

Chandelier over the sanctuary

Church art

Very interesting Last Supper painting. It's easy to tell which one is Judas.
(Clue: He's the one with devil horns and no halo.)

View of the church organ above the entryway

Let's have one more look at Saint Martin, this time with some Lake effect:

Sv. Martin on the shores of Lake Bled

After all that touring, we had time to snack on the food that Lake Bled is most famous for, all over Slovenia:

Kremsnita

The traditional Slovenian Cream Cake. It's like a Napoleon, but not as sweet. It is a layer of phyllo dough, with whipped cream underneath, then a vanilla custard cream base. Only a teeny tiny little bit of gluten in the ultra-thin layer of phyllo dough. So it's OK.

And I washed it down with a Union Radler:

Union Radler

"Radler" is the German word for bicyclist. It's like a shandy in the States. This particular radler is brewed at a small brewery in Ljubljana and is mixed with grapefruit. And it works. Who'd a thunk it? The beer and grapefruit combination goes together perfectly. It takes just like Squirt. Only kickier.

Whoops. Look at the time. It's almost 3:00 p.m.  Time to meet the Segway tour guy.