LJUBLJANA: THE CITY OF DRAGON

Between a pizza, a pasta, a gelato, another pizza, a cake, another gelato and another pizza, we quickly (although not slightly) spent the week at Lety's house and without realizing it we were on a train to Gorizia. Here we would expect our super driver from blablacar who in a couple of hours would leave us in the capital of Slovenia: Ljubljana. The adventure begins!

The first thing we notice is that the city is plagued by laughter of about 14 years traveling the streets, with hair full of crap and skin covered with letters "F" painted with markers. They are called "Pheasants“, The rookies who start the course in first of what would be Bachelor (with so much change with the super majo Wert I no longer know what system there will be in schools). Come on, we expected dragons and ran into pheasants!

¿Dragons? You are right: The dragon is the symbol of Ljubljana. The reason is simple: it represents strength and courage. We must go to the legend of Jason and the Argonauts To finish understanding it. According to this, Jason and his group of heroes called Argonauts (now you will be imagining a kind of Conan the Barbarian at the head of a group of aliens carrying many axes and chains) on their journey to the Coliquida to recover the Golden Fleece, which was nothing more than a fleece of a ram's son son of Poseidon and Theophane. Apparently recovering the vellocino would also recover the throne of his king and achieve great fame. On their way aboard the Argos ship, they spent a thousand adventures among which is the one that occupies us: upon arrival at the grounds of the current city of Ljubljana a huge dragon cut its way. Jason had to kill him to continue his journey, but the spirit of the dragon remained in this territory being his protector. Today it is the symbol of the city and is represented in many enclaves, cone in the Bridge of the Dragons (Zmajski Most).

There are some voices that ensure that the 4 dragons of the bridge raised their tails every time a virgin woman crossed the street ... although as you can imagine it seems that there are not many virgins left by Ljubljana and a few years ago that the dragon's tail remains well anchored to the stone!

After having traveled the city for 3 days we can say that we found it a friendly place with good food (our first bites are the traditional Cevapcici and Burek), well-groomed people, with very clean streets, facades and corners, not in vain Ljubljana will be the green capital in 2016. Everything seems perfect, almost too much we would say, like the typical ideal family: the father with a wonderful job as an executive in a large company, the mother with a paid work for hours as a piano teacher of the neighbor rarito opposite, the daughter just enrolled in the university with the best grade in its class ... Although in many of these families there is also the rebel of the hipster son with high crest and wrist bracelets ... In Ljubljiana the alternative son would be Metelkova, how could it be otherwise, is what we liked most about this perfect city!

Metelkova It is the underground soul of Ljubljana, one of the most amazing places we have ever seen ... all full of graffiti and strange works of art that day for the cameras of the travelers pose and at night they watch the tourist and local spree. The most curious of all is that Metelkova occupies the place of what used to be a military headquarters of the former Yugoslavia. The discipline, rigidity and coldness of those times have been engulfed by the color, creativity and fantasy of their present. Metelkova is one of those places that you will always remember, one of the best surprises of this trip to Ljubljana.

Strolling aimlessly we run into a peculiar museum: that of Hitchhiking. Its creator is Miren, a nice man who has been hitchhiking from his native Slovenia to Italy at the age of 25 to see the concert of his beloved Queen has not stopped raising his finger to be lifted. Your last record: 31 countries in 10 days! His small museum has a lot of personality and just to chat with him for a while and participate in his geographical games is worth it! By the way, would you say what chrome is repeated in the photo below?

Another thing to do in Ljubljana is to see the sunset from the castle, although with nuances. More than from inside the castle (where the only beautiful views are those that, with payment of € 8, you can see from its highest tower), we advise you to enjoy it on its hill. The sunset from here, although it was not that explosion of intense reds that we expected, was spectacular. Besides that the legs appreciate a piece of grass where you can relax accompanied by other spectators (and their many furry and very funny pets). There on the top of the hill the skin cools with the breeze of the valley and the eyes engulf the last rays of sun of the day. Definitely a must!

Be careful with the super tip that we are going to give you now: if you want to enjoy other sublime views over the city and do not want to pay the € 8 of the castle tower we propose a cheaper and much tastier plan: go for a drinkPrekmurska gibanica in theNeboticnik, the tallest building in the city. Here, in its bar, you can enjoy this delicious cake (and with 709.832 million calories) for € 3.5. It is really delicious! There is also a menu of the day for € 8.

Although if there is a place that deserves to be strolled to wear the sole of your shoes, this is the environment of the river that runs through the city, the Ljubjanica. Its shores are full of terraces, you know with its perfect people having perfect conversations and taking out their perfect dogs to make perfect poops (we assume they will be perfect, because we did not see one!).

Don't forget to take one pivo (beer) and to know each and every one of the attractions of the city: from the Triple bridge to the Dragon bridge, from the central Market to Cathedral, from the Preseren Square until castle. This romantic and vibrant city will make you fall in love, for us it was a real surprise!

And of course ... street and street ...

• Where to sleep. We did it at the Vrba Hostel.
• How to getFrom Udine we did it first with a train to Gorizia from there with blablacar. By public transport to get from Italy it is best to do it through Trieste, from where there are many buses with direction Ljubljana, although there is a direct option from Mestre (Venice).
• How to get around the city. The best are your feet. The downtown area is very easy to travel, it's flat and it won't take you long. Metelkova is somewhat further away, but come on it's like 15 minutes from downtown The bus and train station is about 20 minutes from downtown. Mind you, over the years many downtown streets are closing to traffic, if you come by car, plan ahead where you are going to park it.
• How to move to places of interest in Slovenia. To say 4 points, which are what we did, would be these: Vintgar gorge, Lake Bled, Postojna cave and Predjama castle. We did it all on a day tour of Slovenia. Although it can also be done for free (we will explain it in the post of each place). There is an intermediate option that is the Loopy Slovenia,a hop-on, hop-off system that stops at the most important sites in the country with a single ticket. It has two loops, the east and the oste. You can buy the ticket for a single loop or for both, depending on what you want to visit.
• Where to eat cheap: in the Central Market square there are several foodtrucks with cheap food: hamburgers and ćevapčić for € 3.50, burek for € 2.20, fried sardines and other fish dishes from € 3.80 ... Also around the city you can find Bakeries where they also sell ready-made food such as pizzas for € 1.20 and other cheap sweet and savory buns. There is a store in the center called "Klobasarna" where they sell some death sausages from € 3.50.
• From where to get the best views: from the castle hill you get very cool views of the sunset. In the castle there is the possibility of climbing the tower with a viewpoint over the entire city, but the price of € 8 makes it not recommended (obviously if you are on the castle you lose sight of it, so in your photos something essential will be missing from the city). There is a cheaper and much tastier alternative: go up to the "Neboticnik", the tallest building in the city. On its terrace there is a bar-restaurant not too expensive (coffee € 1.50, cakes from € 3.50, menu of the day € 8).