a view of trieste from the van... it was a super steep windy road! trieste seemed to be a very cute town that would have been fun to explore, but there was no time.
on our way to the caves, we tried to find a restaurant from the guidebook, but no one seemed to know where it was. so we found this one called the erasmus. dad and i decided to have an adventure and order the erasmus plate which had zero description of what it was other than it was a platter for 2 with their specialties. in addition to this, we saw there was polenta bread as a side and we ordered that too. only we each got the polenta dish with mushrooms and it was big by itself. THEN we got the platter. this is a picture of the platter. we all about died laughing when we saw it b/c it was HUGE!!! it has 2 of everything and probably could have fed a table of 12!!! it was all very good and of course it also had polenta as part of it. whoops! well, we certainly were well fed that day!!!
then it was time to go to the caves which was the main objective of our jaunt to slovenia. my grandpa had been to the cave when we was much younger - i believe he visited in 1929. mom had heard some of the stories and had wanted to see them for herself and do something her dad had done. this is the outside of the cave area.
b/c the caves are so far down, it gets awfully cold down there. they even rent capes for 3 euros each. we all got our capes and were ready to go!
i liked all these signs. they cracked me up.
no pictures in the caves...
no smoking!
no peeing on the caves!!!
of course no jumping on, touching or breaking the stalagtites and stalamites!
dad and andrew consult a map or ponder something...
there's a big long train that takes you 2km deep in to the cave. once you get down there, you are met by a guide you takes you on a tour.
this bear cracked me up. he would randomly talk, in english, and say something along the lines of "hey boys and girls! put some money in my tummy for a niiiiice froooozen treat!" he said a few other things too, but i don't remember what. he's a self serve ice cream bear and mom and i tried in vain to get ice cream from the bear. finally we noticed that he said out of order!!! but, not before while trying very hard to make the bear take my euro, he all of a sudden started his hey boys and girls routine and scared me to death! a guy on a bench nearby cracked up and so did we.
from the caves, we headed to the beach area of piran which is about an hour's drive away. there wasn't really a beach there so much as mostly rocks and jetties that you could jump off of, but it was a pretty little town.
we walked around and explored...
a view of the town from a pathway along the water. along this path are a lot of tasty looking restaurants with great views. we picked one and i had fantastic seafood risotto!
the view from our hotel. lovely! the hotel itself was not fabulous, but it worked. the view was definitely the best part.
the next day, we spent traveling. all day long. by van back to trieste. from trieste a train back to venice. from venice, a train to florence and then finally a train to pisa!! whew! it was a long day, but it was fairly easy... the best part of that travel day was by far the big italian fight that erupted on the commuter train from florence to pisa!! when we first got on, we picked one of the first cars and noticed we were the only ones beside a guy who seemed to be talking to himself. mom thought he was on the phone... um, no. definitely talking, loudly, to himself. so we switched cars as to avoid hearing him for the next hour go on and on and on about whatever interesting convo he was having with himself!
in our new car, there were a lot more people. we settled in. then the train conductor came thru collecting our tickets. he stopped at a very tall black guy and they started conversing in italian. then it got more heated. then louder. and more heated. then the guy got up and they argued some more. then some other people totally unrelated got involved! and then more people. then everyone was staring and mom and i were trying to figure out what the heck the problem was! we figured it had to do with something about not getting his ticket stamped before getting on the train and we were right. this whole commotion went on for at least 45 mins - the guy would get off, then back on, then argue, then some other people would come in and on and on.... finally a couple of guys clearly on their way home from work asked in english if we were able to follow what was going on. so they explained to us (this is the short version) that if you don't time stamp your ticket before getting on the train it is a 50 euro fine and this guy didn't have that money. oh my. well, it certainly was entertaining!!
once we arrived in pisa, carl and tonee met us and picked us up in our rented van. and then we drove to barga we were would be for the next 4 days. the drive took us probably close to 2 hours and it was raining and not fabulous weather, but we got there! we checked in to our adorable hotel - the hotel alpino. and then we ate dinner at their restaurant. the food was delicious. and then we were exhausted - said goodnight and rested up for the next day!
4 comments:
i love that you took this trip! it's on our to-do list; i did caves in Slovakia, Poland and Switzerland as a kid, but not cape rentals back then; you looked very Harry Potter, in an adorable way. How was the seafood? fresh and amazing? how long was the trip from Venice to Slovenia? Not too long? looks beautiful.
i didn't know you were side tripping to slovenia! love your hotel view too! and as for the guys arguing on the train - at least the entertainment was provided!
did you pee in the caves?
the seafood was uh-may-zing. yum! the trip from venice to slovenia was not long at all - i think maybe a total of 2 hours by train and another hour by van? i can't really remember.
the train was total entertainment. mom and i enjoyed every minute of their very enthusiastic italian!!
and sarah, yes... i totally dropped trow in the caves and peed! hahaha... uhhhh, no. :)
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