Category Archives: Lipnica Valley

A New Old Walk in the Lipnica Valley

Posted in Adele in Slovenia, Beekeeping in Slovenia, hiking trails, ifeelsLOVEnia, ironworking, kamna gorica, Kropa, Lipnica Valley, Museum of Apiculture Radovljica, Radol'ca, Radovljica, Slovenia, Slovenia blog, Tourism Radol'ca, Visit Radol'ca by

Until recently, Peter’s Trail in Kamna Gorica was only known to locals and had been somewhat retaken by nature. However, this short trail in the Lipnica valley has been reestablished, together with added footbridges, wooden railings and information boards (in English only).

The trail is a tribute to Peter Novak (1846-1910), a former Latin language lecturer at the University of Vienna, who was born in Kamna Gorica. Following his retirement, Peter returned to his native village, where he built and repaired many old paths in the vicinity of his birth village.

The trail begins at the Gostilna Mlin restaurant in Kamna Gorica, which at the time of writing is closed, where there is a small parking area in front of the sign for the restaurant, as seen below.

Gostilna Mlin, Julijske Alpe - Sloveniaholidays.com

The first sign marking the trail is a little further ahead, so initially walk for around 150 metres across the grass away from the restaurant, ensuring the small brook is on your right, until you reach the first sign.

From here the path is obvious as it winds its way through the forest alongside the Lipnica river.

After a short while you reach a wooden hut, as seen below…

…before reentering the forest to rejoin the trail. After a short distance you once again leave the forest and come to a bridge over the Lipnica river.

Don’t cross the bridge but instead go up to your left where you will see a beautiful, typical Slovenian apiary.

At the time of my visit in early March, the bees were already really active for the time of year. Btw, if you’d like to find out more about Slovenian beekeeping and see an exhibit of some of the oldest known apiary painted frontal boards, be sure to visit the Museum of Apiculture in Radovljica.

Follow the path that leads up to the right behind the apiary, which then emerges onto a road. Here you could just follow the road down to the crossroads and return to Kamna Gorica on the pavement, or see below for a slightly longer walk.

Turn left and walk a few minutes uphill on the road until you reach a clearing where you can see a small cluster of houses that make up the hamlet of Zgornja Dobrava.

Facing the above sign you will see a path behind you to the right. Follow this path, cross the road and then rejoin the trail leading downhill, adjacent to the road.

The path emerges from the forest into the playground of the Lipnica primary school, where you should immediately turn right and follow the trail, this time with the forest on your right.

You pass a house, and, if you’re lucky as we were, a very contented cat!

You will now reach the bridge you saw, but didn’t cross, earlier and can choose to either return on Peter’s Trail or turn left to reach the pavement, which you follow back to the village past a large pond.

Take time to explore the village of Kamna Gorica itself, where you can walk up to St. Trinity’s church for a lovely view over the village, visit the Sextons’ Museum House and admire the waterways that have earnt the village the name ‘Mini Venice’.

If you’d like a longer walk, it’s easy to extend the route by visiting one, or more, of the surrounding villages, notably Kropa, with its wealth of iron forging heritage.

Now is the perfect time for such a walk, as nature is emerging from its winter slumber and colour is returning to the valley.

Finally, the Radovljica Chocolate Festival is fast approaching, so make a note of the date for what will be the 10th anniversary of the ever-popular festival of chocolate and fun.

© Adele in Slovenia

Super Saturday in Radovljica!

Posted in Adele in Slovenia, gluten free food in Slovenia, hiking in Slovenia, ifeelsLOVEnia, Jelovica, kamna gorica, Kamp Sobec, Lipnica Valley, Mosnje, Radol'ca, Radovljica, Slovenia blog, Tourism Radol'ca, Visit Radol'ca by

Last Saturday, 4th February 2023, was Super Saturday in Radovljica for numerous reasons – for me and for many others too!

Our day started with an early morning hike to the Suharna viewpoint on the Jelovica plateau. We set off on foot from Radovljica, and before reaching the start of the trail in Kolnica in the Lipnica valley, we were lucky enough to see a rare rainbow cloud formation. Having enlightened myself (well, Googled it), I discovered this occurs due to cloud iridescence. If you want to know more, Google is your friend, or you can just admire the photo!

No description available.

At this time of year a pair of lightweight crampons certainly comes in handy, as the trails are very icy in parts at lower altitudes, whilst up higher (higher than the Jelovica plateau) there is still A LOT of snow.

From Suharna, we first took the path towards the Vodiška planina mountain pasture, but soon turned off that path and took the one down to Kamna Gorica. On reaching the village we then headed up to the Zijavka viewpoint, from where there are lovely views over the village and church.

It was a really sunny day and not too cold, though abnormally windy; Radovljica is usually fairly well sheltered in terms of wind, but last Saturday was an exception, so we were glad of our flask of tea to warm us up. We then headed back to Radovljica via the Fux footbridge over the Sava river and back to Linhart Square, i.e. the heart of the action!

The Radol’ca market takes place on the first Saturday of each month in front of St. Peter’s church in Linhart Square. Since moving from its former location at Vila Podvin in Mošnje it has become increasingly popular. This month I persuaded the organisers (Tourism Radol’ca) to let me arrange a gluten-free corner at the market and, fortunately, they agreed! There were a total of 23 stalls, four of which featured gluten-free goodies – doughnuts, cake pops, bread, rolls, pastry, profiteroles, biscuits galore and more! I advertised the event via the Facebook group that I set up for coeliacs (Celiakaši v Sloveniji), as did each of the four stallholders, but, wow, I/we, weren’t expecting it to be such a hit! They pretty much sold out in less than an hour, and there was me asking the organisers for a one-hour extension to 1pm instead of the 12noon!

May be an image of drink, outdoors and text

In addition to the gluten-free corner, the market features local producers and suppliers of various fruit, vegetables, cheese and other dairy products, dried meat products, honey, herbs, teas and more – something for everyone!

Some of us – stallholders and fellow coeliacs – then went for to Kavarna Vidic in Linhart Square for a cuppa and a chinwag, during which we planned future such events, of which there will be many!

We then headed home for some lunch before heading out again, well it was such a lovely day (except the wind!) for a walk to the Šobec camp, which is lovely in winter too, before returning alongside the Sava river back to Radovljica.

May be an image of lake and nature

It’s amazing how much you can pack into a day in Radovljica; hiking, fab views, good (gluten-free) food, socialising, walking and more!

© Adele in Slovenia

Winter Hikes on the Jelovica Plateau

Posted in Adele in Slovenia, COVID-19 Slovenia, hiking in Slovenia, hiking trails, ifeelsLOVEnia, Jelovica, kamna gorica, Karavanke, Kropa, Lipnica Valley, Radovljica, Slovenia, Slovenia blog, Slovenian mountain huts, Tourism Radol'ca, Visit Radol'ca, winter hiking in Radovljica, winter hiking in Slovenia, winter sports in Slovenia by

So, in addition to the ongoing (and boy is it going on…) coronavirus situation, in this part of Slovenia we have already had the highest snowfall in 43 years – and winter is far from over. I, for one, hope it’s also the last time for the next 43 years!

Regular readers of my blog will know I’m not a fan of snow, so this is by far, already, the hardest winter for me since moving here in 2007, and with the restrictions in place due to ‘the’ virus, there’s nowhere to escape, and no way of escaping, snow, so one just has to put on a brave face and plenty of winter clothing and get out there and ’embrace’ it.

Yesterday was the first day for around a month that it was due to be sunny, albeit it bitterly cold, so it was finally time to head out for a long hike to get some photos for my blog. Due to the restrictions in place, as well as the snow, there’s not a huge choice of places to go where a) we are allowed to go, b) the risks of avalanche are minimal, c) there are no problems with parking and no crowds – the latter turned out to be a particularly good move as the headlines on the news on Saturday were about the major traffic problems in the most popular winter sports areas. Thus, the obvious choice for us was the Jelovica plateau, which is right on our doorstep and which we can reach on foot from home. In fact, we’ve grown to love the wide choice of routes on the plateau so much, they are now likely to become a staple among our local hikes, even when we are allowed to go further from home!

We started from home in Radovljica at 8.30am, first down to Lancovo and then onwards towards the hamlet of Kolnica in Spodnja Lipnica.

From there we continued up to the Suharna viewpoint above the Lipnica valley. You can also read more here about my first hike to Suharna earlier in the year, which, believe me, was a lot easier than trudging through the snow now!

It usually takes around an hour to reach the viewpoint but you always need to allow about half as much time again when walking in snow, and even more if the snow is knee (or thigh!) deep.

After hiking up through the forest you reach a road (yes, that really is a road you can ‘see’ below!), where the ‘path’ to Suharna continues to the left. The path is well marked throughout, provided the signs are visible beneath the snow, that is!

From the viewpoint there are far-reaching views across the Radovljica plains, the Karavanke mountains, the Kamnik-Savinja Alps and towards the Ljubljana basin.

Just don’t get too close to the edge as there is a sheer drop beneath that snow behind me!

We decided not to take a seat on the bench – can’t think why! – and instead returned to the intersection of paths and began our way, slowly, towards the Vodiška planina mountain pasture.

There are numerous paths that lead to the mountain pasture. This one proved to be a good option as we met few people along the way and it allowed us to do an entirely circular hike. Fortunately someone – though it looked like only one person – had already hiked that way that morning, so the trudge through the snow was at least somewhat easier.

From Suharna it would usually take around 1.15 hours to reach the Partizanski dom mountain hut on Vodiška planina but, again, it took us quite a bit longer due to the snow and we finally reached the mountain hut at just after 12.30pm, thus four hours after leaving home.

A flask of tea is an essential in winter, and even more so now when the huts are closed.

From the hut there are numerous paths the lead down towards Kropa. We took the one that leads towards the Stočje – the lower part of Kropa – which brings you out near the swimming pool.

The mountain pasture is only 1,108m and there’s over a metre of snow, whereas in the higher mountains there is over 3 metres of snow this year already. So, if you do plan any winter hiking, please do ensure you only choose familiar and/or well-trodden paths that are low risk in terms of avalanches and, of course, you need the full gamut of winter gear including gaiters, crampons, an ice axe (if going higher) and not forgetting a flask of tea!

From there we returned along the pavement to Kamna Gorica and from there we took the path that leads over the Fuxova brv footbridge back to Radovljica. The total hiking time from door-to-door was around 7 hours, and two pleasantly tired hikers certainly enjoyed their (gluten free!) pizzas once home!

You can read more ideas for winter hiking in my previous blog ‘5 Great Winter Hikes in Radovljica’

© Adele in Slovenia

Radovljica to Jamnik…the long way round!

Posted in Adele in Slovenia, COVID-19 Slovenia, hiking in Slovenia, hiking trails, ifeelsLOVEnia, Jelovica, kamna gorica, Kropa, Lipnica Valley, Radol'ca, Radovljica, Slovenia blog, Slovenian mountain huts, Tourism Radol'ca, Visit Radol'ca by

So, having done so well in the first round of COVID-19, unfortunately Slovenia is faring much less well second time around.

We are now back to a partial lockdown, and as of 19th October the Slovenian government officially (re)declared an epidemic and also introduced a curfew from 9pm to 6am. We are not allowed out of our region, bars and restaurants are closed, as are all non-essential shops (as of tomorrow), home schooling is in place for year 6 upwards, and masks must be worn outdoors too at all times, other than when doing individual sports such as cycling.

Hence, the best place to be by far – other than alone on your bike(!) – is in the forest and far from the madding crowd. So, that’s exactly where we headed last weekend; from Radovljica to Jamnik via Kamna Gorica, on foot all the way there and back!

There are several paths that lead up to Jamnik and its landmark church from Kropa, or you can drive (or cycle) up the windy road. If, however, you want to make a full day of it and you haven’t got transport, you could follow my lead and go the whole way on foot!

First head from the old town of Radovljica past the cemetery and down to the Sava river where you cross the Fux footbridge (Fuxova brv) and follow part of the Lipnica Castle Trail.

Instead of turning off the path towards Lipnica Castle, at the junction of paths with a shrine and an information board, as seen below, continue straight on towards Kamna Gorica.

You soon get your first glimpse of the Church of the Holy Trinity, which stands above the village.

Walk through the village then rejoin the road and walk on the pavement, with the stream to your left, until you reach a sign on the right, almost opposite the bus stop, for Vodiška planina (the Vodiška mountain pasture).

Walk up the tarmac road which soon becomes a forest trail. From here on the path is well marked with the usual red/white circles on trees.

Most of the trail runs through dense forest, so there isn’t much in the way of views, but when there is a gap between the trees it makes the effort worthwhile!

After around 1.5 hours of walking you reach the Vodiška planina mountain pasture and the Partisanski dom mountain hut (currently also shut due to the virus).

If you’d like a shorter version of this hike then you could now take one of the paths that lead directly down to Kropa. Should you wish to continue, then just keep following the signs to Jamnik.

And lookout for the viewpoint with a bench along the way!

…from there on its downhill all the way to Jamnik! We experienced almost four seasons in one day – sunny when we left Radovljica, a hailstorm on the way down towards Jamnik, then shrouded in fog when we got there. Oh well, you can’t have everything!

On a fine(r) day, it usually looks more like this and there are great panoramic views too!

Photo: http://www.radolca.si

So, despite everything, it’s still possible to enjoy the beauty of nature but, of course, do heed all the precautions and, above all, stay well and safe.

© Adele in Slovenia

 

 

A (New) Hike and an (Old) Walk in the Lipnica Valley!

Posted in Adele in Slovenia, hiking in Slovenia, hiking trails, ifeelsLOVEnia, Jelovica, Lipnica Valley, Radol'ca, Radovljica, Slovenia, Slovenia blog, Tourism Radol'ca, Visit Radol'ca by

Despite the title, the hike to Suharna isn’t actually ‘new’ per se, it is, however, newly marked and thus easier to find and follow – so that makes it new(ish) in my book!

The path begins in the Kolnica area of Spodnja Lipnica in the Lipnica valley. If coming by car from Radovljica then you should turn right opposite the Krona bar on the road marked towards Talež and other points of the Jelovica plateau.

You could, of course – like me – get to the start by bike (the car in the photo isn’t mine!), I got there purely by pedal power!

The first few hundred metres can be a bit muddy following rain, but the path then leads up into the forest on a good track.

The rewards come early on this hike, as after just a short while you glimpse the first view back across the Lipnica valley and across the Radovljica plains.

After around 20 minutes you reach počivav – a shrine with a bench where you can take a breather.

The path is well marked throughout.

A further cca. 10 minutes brings you to an intersection of two paths – continue left for Suharna or upwards towards Razpok. For the best views choose Suharna; the path to Razpok, which I also decided to check out, leads to a small pasture with a few weekend homes, but the views are somewhat restricted.

After a mere hour you reach the Suharna viewpoint at 952 metres above sea-level, where you can linger and marvel at the stunning views earnt for such little effort!

So, now to the ‘old’ walk mentioned in the title! I have blogged about the Grabnarca Waterside Nature Trail in the past, but since it begins from the same start point as the hike to Suharna, I thought it deserves another mention.

The trail follows the Grabnarca and Lipnica streams, which in the past powered mills and sawmills in the valley, and also leads to the spring of the Lipnica stream. You can read more in my previous blog post here.

You could even make a day of it, pack a picnic, and do both walks in one!

© Adele in Slovenia