We hadn't realised when we decided to stop in Salzburg for a couple of days that although it is on the main bus route from Munich, the city itself is a few kilometres off the highway and long haul buses here generally don't seem to make any stops along their routes. This is great if you are in a city where many buses depart from as all the journeys are quick and don't have repeated painstaking stopping. Unfortunately for us it meant that the only bus available was one leaving at midnight, unless we were prepared to fork out 80euros a ticket, which we weren't. Instead we found a ride on a ride-sharing website and managed to ???? organise a meeting point and time with a Croatian who didn't speak a word of English. It's amazing what you can do with an online translator and the worlds most universal word; McDonald's.

We decided to walk the 6km to the meeting point even though the hostel staff thought we were mad, but were slightly perplexed when our mapping app led us straight towards the Salzburg airport. Thinking maybe this was why they suggested it was too far, we started to wonder if we would make our meeting time. It was a long way around. We might have got away with dashing across the runway in India, but we doubted it would fly in this part of the world. Fortunately the app, which has virtually never let us down, once again got it right and we crossed through an underground tunnel under the runway and emerged to our meeting point with plenty of time before we were due to be there. Perhaps predictably, our Croatian chauffeur was running an hour late so we had plenty of time to sit and wonder if he would turn up at all. Once on the road the journey was smooth, though we both came out of it with a mild nicotine addiction after 5 hours of 2 people chain smoking with the windows shut. Arriving in Ljubljana late at night we were both exhausted but had a sleepless night in a room with a snorer. We picked up our car in the morning and on a urge to get out of the city, headed north to a little town called Kamnic, at the bottom of the Kamniska Bistricia Valley. We found a pub with an attached BnB and headed up the valley for a pretty walk in the forest to a pristine waterfall. We had a good nights rest and a charming breakfast made almost entirely from local ingredients, enjoyed next to a large closed in fireplace, which I can't describe very well. I'll let a photo do the talking on this one because I think it does it more justice. With our appetites more than satisfied, we continued north, crossing into the Jezersko Valley. It was a rainy, cold day and though the river is nestled right amongst the alps, the mountains were swathed in cloud making it feel very closed in. Every now and then we would catch a glimpse of the snow covered slopes through a gap in the clouds. The road wound its way higher and higher up the narrow valley until the roadsides were covered in snow and we started hoping the road wasn't going to be closed further along. Eventually the valley opened out into a wide plateau and we reached Jezersko, the small town we were staying in. The very friendly owner of the hostel made us very welcome and insisted we stay inside the warm house instead of in the dog box we had booked. She was a domestic goddess, making about 20 different type of liquor from flowers, herbs and fruit all grown in Jezersko. Her most famous brew was made from 124 different flowers which take 8 months of the year to collect! I made sure we left after 2 nights in case Liam fell in love with her. Though the weather was miserable, we went out walking along the snowy paths through scattered uninhabited farmsteads, unsuccessfully looking for deer and bears. The weather was unseasonably cold and a lot of leaf-laden trees had been damaged by the heavy snowfall. When you've been waiting all winter to use the energy stored from last Autumn to make new leaves and a storm knocks them all off, it would be quite disheartening. Liam couldn't quite get over it.

After another cozy evening playing cards next to the fire, we reluctantly left the peacefulness of the valley and headed for the city, picking up Cormac and Kristi from the airport and heading into Ljubljana. We had a nice evening in the city and then headed back into town the following morning to do some more exploring. The thing that struck us the most is that all that the city is completely surrounded by forest. We climbed up to the Ljubljana castle while we were there and I couldn’t get over the sea of forest stretching out from where the city buildings finish as far as the eye can see, until snowy hills and mountains got in the way. Tough view.