Dan 19: Slow in Slovenia

August 10, 2017

People really do listen to polka music here. I heard it several times, once when it was blaring out of a delivery drivers truck in a little town. I thought polka was more of a tourist thing these days. Guess not.

The Slovenias sure are good at English though. They all speak it. I suppose they have to? After all, how many middle or high schools offer Slovenian?

Today's ride was part bike and part train. The reasons for the train are half time constraint and half curiosity. I like trains and am interested in different trains of the world. Todays train was decidedly local. It had all of two cars and one was filled with school kids about 8 or 9 years old. My card had a rack for at least 10 bikes and I got the feeling that the passengers and conductor all knew each other, mostly because the conductor sat down between stops and chatted with people who he seemed to know.

Part way through the journey we went through a long tunnel, but before that we sat for a very long time at a station waiting for the southbound train to exit the tunnel while a train employee hand cranked a contraption that I think change the tracks over. Hey, who needs high tech if it works?

I got off the train in Bled which is beautiful but way too touristy for me. The last 20 miles of the day was on the bike and was beautiful, partly through farm country and partly through a national park. It also had several memorials to Slovenians from WWII. This was partisan country and I can see why. The remote forest would be a perfect hide out.

After two days I did a complete loop and ended up at the same campsite I was at 2 nights ago. Tomorrow I set tire in Austria!