Slovenia Travel Guide: Dragon Eggs, Castles and the Best Sausage Ever

We’ve been to Slovenia twice and each visit just gets better. In this episode we share our favorite finds from the best sausage we’ve ever eaten to the story behind Ljubljana’s dragons and the mysterious dragon eggs. Join us as we talk lakes, castles, caves and why Slovenia deserves a spot on every European road trip.

Music from #Uppbeat (free for Creators!):
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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome back. I'm Lisa. And I'm Aaron. And this is the Getaways Podcast. Before we jump into our topic today, I'm gonna I'm gonna throw out a request for help. A call to action, one might say. There you go. We cannot figure out where to go for Christmas. And we keep investigating all these different places, but we're nothing's sparking. Hit us up if you guys have an idea or somewhere that you've always wanted to go or whatever. It's just it seems like everything's kind of either like super expensive or too far to drive. So we're just kind of struggling. But hit us up if you have any ideas. I like city and Lisa likes super festive holiday stuff. So keep that in mind. That might shock you. I realize. Okay. So today we're talking about somewhere that we have spent a little bit of time over Christmas and then Easter time.

SPEAKER_02 0:51

Yes. Was it Easter?

SPEAKER_00 0:52

Yeah, it was our well spring break.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Oh, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

And that is Slovenia.

SPEAKER_02 0:58

Slovenia.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

And I think that it's one of the most underrated places in Europe.

SPEAKER_02 1:03

Well, we just kind of initially went and did a stop through on our way to Vienna, right? Really not expecting, not knowing what to expect. Underrated. Like you don't see a lot. I think now you're seeing more, but when we went, when did we go? In 2020, 2017? No.

SPEAKER_00 1:22

No, 18.

SPEAKER_02 1:24

2018. I we didn't know much about it.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

No, not at all. And in fact, we didn't even stay in Ljubljana.

SPEAKER_02 1:31

No, we didn't. Which should we just start there? Because that was a beautiful just come across. I don't know what I'm trying to say. It was like uh just luck of the draw that we found that place.

SPEAKER_00 1:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:43

It was a splurge.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

I'm gonna let you uh say it, say the name.

SPEAKER_02 1:47

Okay. So it the hotel was called Kendav Dvorek. Kendra rolls right off the top. It's on it's on the website. I can promise you that. It's in a little village called Indria. And it was about what 45 minutes outside of Lubiana?

SPEAKER_00 2:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:07

And did I say that one right?

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Ljubljana.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

Ljubljana.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

And the drive was beautiful. I mean, it's one of the greenest country. Well, it is one of the greenest countries, like rated in Europe. But it is just beautiful countryside.

SPEAKER_02 2:21

It's gorgeous. I mean, gorgeous. Even from the hotel, which we're gonna get into, the little village below the hotel, because we were kind of on a hill, was I mean, it was a little village, like we didn't see very many shops or anything, but it had this giant river rushing through it, and it had a park on one side with like the best play area, soccer fields, basketball. I mean, it was it was a dream.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

Yeah, it was a little too small. I don't think I could have lived in that village. No, but I could have never left that hotel in my whole life and lived perfectly happy.

SPEAKER_02 2:54

Yeah, yes. So, so Kendall Dro Dvorak is a manor, it dates back to 1377, and it was turned into this hotel, and it's it's part of the Relays and Chateau hotel chain, which they're a splurge. But if you ever get the opportunity, they're fantastic. And if you ever get the opportunity to stay here, even though it's not in Lebanon, it it was it was like a dream. Yeah. I'll let Lisa do some describing because we also had our dog Cash, who is a pit bull. So we always have to look for hotels that are pet friendly, but let me tell you.

SPEAKER_00 3:34

Well, and it was a spurge, but it wasn't like stupid expensive. I mean, it was like what you would expect for a an affordable at that level hotel.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

It was about 250 a night, I think.

SPEAKER_00 3:46

237. Well, but it was also a huge room. I mean, because Dylan was little, so you guys had like the big bed. Yeah. And then sort of around the corner, I had a little, I mean, it was still like a I think it was a twin, but like still a little full bed.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

Not like a pullout couch or anything. Very traditional decorations and furnishings, but like all antique, all very special, all very cool. And then downstairs was the restaurant, which was was it our food included there? Because we ate there a lot, but just because there was nowhere else to eat.

SPEAKER_02 4:24

I don't think it was included, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

But we were like also the only ones at the hotel practically.

SPEAKER_02 4:30

Yeah, there was one other room that we saw once, but we were never joined with anybody in the dining room. Yeah, it was always just us.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Yeah, and well, yeah, because Cash isn't always or he didn't always love strangers. So, you know, he was perfectly happy to go get exercise and then just be in the room. And they were like, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, bring him down. He can come in the the dining room. And and there was like couches and stuff, and they're like, Oh, well, just let him off leash, like let him roam around. And I was like, he's gonna be in the kitchen eating all of the food.

SPEAKER_02 5:00

We said thanks, but no thanks. He'll stay on the leash. But we did, did we have dinner down there one night and we left him in the room? Yeah, because this is a story that Lisa will tell. Because the work staff said they would go take care of Oh no, that was when we were went to Ljubljana.

SPEAKER_00 5:13

Oh, it is during the day. Yeah, and they were like, Well, can we go in and check on Cash while you're gone so that you're, you know, we can take him out for a walk or whatever. No charge, just wanted to go in and check on him.

SPEAKER_02 5:24

Well, he got a little snippy.

SPEAKER_00 5:26

Cash had other plans. He was like, Oh no, you didn't open the door without my permission. Had a mean bark, but no bite. Yeah, but but yeah, he he said, No, no, no, no, thank you. I will I will cross my legs. I do not need to go out, I will wait here for my people to come back.

SPEAKER_02 5:42

And it was cold because it was right after Christmas, but the gardens were beautiful, yeah, the big swing overlooking a huge view. And they had a yeah, beautiful outdoor eating area, but nobody was using.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

Yeah. So we were only there, I think, for two nights, right? And then so we drove into Ljubljana, and that was like our exposure to Ljubljana at Christmas, which was really, really, really decorative. I mean, it was decked out. It was, and this was the 26th, 27th, 27th of December, yeah. And just really, it was a very lively, very not I wouldn't say crowded, but there were definitely people. It was very active. There was, I mean, lights on every corner. The Christmas market wasn't happening when we were there. No, but in the first area where we came, there was like a it's kind of a square, and there was the Museum of Illusions. And then right next door to the Museum of Illusions, there was a big tent, like temporary tent built. And there was, it was full of ice sculptures and freezing cold inside, but really cool to see all of that. And then we wandered around quite a bit. There's one area that had like, is it her curling? Curling. Yeah, curling.

SPEAKER_02 6:57

Oh, in the city. Once we got it because that square is a little bit out of the center.

SPEAKER_00 7:02

So then there was like curling, there was, you know, and like I said, lights everywhere, people like street food, all that good stuff. Then there's like the three bridges, which joins the old side with the new side of Ljubljana. And then once you get to the old side, then at night we went up to the castle. We took the funnacular. Oh. Up the yeah, up to the castle, which had like that's where the Christmas market was, I believe.

SPEAKER_02 7:27

Not when we were there, not when we were there, though. Yeah, it was still very Christmassy.

SPEAKER_00 7:31

They were playing Christmas music, and had a big projection on the side of the castle that was in the season. Did we eat in? We did. We ate in there that night, didn't we? In the castle. No, no, down below. We ate at a tiny cute little white and blue place. It almost had like a Greek vibe. Yeah. But really cute, really good food.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

There's so many little restaurants along the river that still have outdoor seating with heaters, and they all have like fur on them and like blankets that come with it. I it's just so charming. We wanted to go back.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

Yeah. So and the thing about Ljubljana or Slovenia in general is dragons, right? It's sort of their symbol. So you'll see like there's a dragon bridge. They have these candies that are called like dragon eggs. Dragon eggs, yeah, which are delicious and beautiful. Yeah. But there's definitely like a dragon vibe throughout. And then so that was that trip. So then we went back in springtime for a spring break. And that we had another Airbnb kind of semi-debacco.

SPEAKER_02 8:28

Fail.

SPEAKER_00 8:28

Yeah. It was a cool Airbnb. It was, it was just not suited for three people.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

So what we've come to find out about some Airbnbs, and you've got to really dig and sometimes ask questions, is they'll say two bedroom or three bedroom, and it's really not. It's one bedroom and then a pullout couch in the living room. But this one didn't say that. And when we went back after COVID, Dylan was, you know, mid-teens, and so we all need room. So we pulled up, it was a cute neighborhood, not too far outside of the center, and we went in, and it was a it was beautiful, wasn't it? It was cute, yeah. But it only had one bed. And then the sofa bed wasn't even like a full bed, it was like a day bed.

SPEAKER_00 9:13

Yeah. So we went in, saw it. That was definitely not gonna work. So then we found kind of the perfect hotel after that.

SPEAKER_02 9:20

We did. It is X Lev.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

X Lev. Yeah. And it was affordable, it was in a really good location. We were very, very close to a big park that I could walk Rex at to Volley Park.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

Yeah, I could see it from my room.

SPEAKER_00 9:33

Yeah, I mean, huge and beautiful and walkable to everything, to old town and new town. Yeah, so no, that was a great hotel. And then we did, we did a lot of fun things on that one.

SPEAKER_02 9:44

We sure did. That was so 1950s.

SPEAKER_00 9:49

The first night, which I think was a was that a Christmas present? I think it may have been a Christmas present, but whatever. We did a traditional dinner and dancing and Slovenian dancing.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

Yeah, it was fun. It was fun.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

And it was like a coursed dinner, and then there was people dancing for us while we were eating, like entertainment, and then they asked people to dance with them, Dylan included, after we were finished eating.

SPEAKER_02 10:15

And we played games like that hat game where we had to change the hats.

SPEAKER_00 10:18

Yeah, but it was really cute and really and like that was 60 euro. So it wasn't cheap, cheap, but for a whole dinner and entertainment, it's pretty good. And there was that giant table of Germans.

SPEAKER_02 10:28

Where they Germans were drunk and having them, it was so much fun. Yeah, no, that was so much fun.

SPEAKER_00 10:35

And it was nice because it was also something that, you know, seeing a little part of the history of their culture too, the culture there.

SPEAKER_02 10:43

Yeah, and you and Rex spent a lot of time in Tivoli Park. Yeah. And we we really got to explore the old town this time. Like we got to go, we went in a lot more little shops and we did a scavenger hunt, which was fun to just kind of like assimilate to like to see different parts of the city that we wouldn't have seen.

SPEAKER_00 11:03

Right.

SPEAKER_02 11:04

We did an escape room. I'll put it on the website for all you escape room people. It's good family fun. It was fun.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:11

And I took Dylan to a trampoline park, which is I used to take him to trampoline parks everywhere we would go just so he felt like he was doing something just for himself. And this trampoline park was really, really cute. And they had an adult viewing area, and I had a like a spiked coffee drink while Dylan jumped and climbed tires, and it was it was good times for all.

SPEAKER_00 11:33

Nice. We ate at another place, that white and blue place where we had dinner, but then we had lunch when we'd actually heard about it on another podcast. We had lunch at this sausage place for lack of a better name. You want to throw down how to say that one?

SPEAKER_02 11:47

It's called Clebassarna.

SPEAKER_00 11:50

Like it's a little Italian. It's a little um it's tiny. It's a tiny little like walk-up takeaway place.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

That's foodie kind of, right?

SPEAKER_00 11:58

Yeah, except that it's soup. Well, I got soup. I got Dylan and I got this just the sausages with mustard. Yeah. So it so my soup was broth that was delicious, the sausage and sauerkraut, and then you guys got the sandwiches.

SPEAKER_02 12:11

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

And it was pouring rain when we were waiting for our food. So there was like probably what, like 20 strangers, like all smashed together. But the food was delicious and exactly what you would want to eat on that kind of day of weather, but it was right behind the cathedral or the church there. So it's just, it's not a big town. It's very, very easy to navigate your way around. And it's also one of the few places in Europe that's a big, huge city that doesn't feel like you have to have like your agenda to the minute to be able to see everything. Like, yeah, you could you can relax when you go there because it is it is not like you know, 50 million things you have to see, and and the pace is different too. It's not like a frenetic pace of like a Rome or a Paris, right? It's more kind of walk around, live, and explore. Right.

SPEAKER_02 13:05

Which I being that kind of city, it's also not a city you have to plan a whole week in. You can do a couple days and you're close, close to Zagreb, you're close to Vienna, you're very close to a lot of cities around you in other countries. So it's it's a nice add-on. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:21

Yeah. I mean, not that it's not worth going to in and of itself, but you know, probably people aren't going to travel, especially from the US, just to go to Ljubljana, but but it is very easy and very, very worth it to go, you know, add it as a a couple days from one of the one of those other cities.

SPEAKER_02 13:38

Do you know what else we got in Slovenia or something we got in Slovenia? We got that wine decanter. Oh yeah. Like they have very fancy crystal there.

SPEAKER_00 13:48

Yeah. They have, I mean, they have a little bit of there's lots of woodworking stuff there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:53

It it just feels very it still just feels very provincial. Is that that's more of a French word, but it feels still very grounded in what they do well. And like they're not trying to be so modern and tech, you know, it the old town stayed old town.

SPEAKER_00 14:12

Well, yeah, for sure. But it feels it's very, I mean, it's a simple sounds negative, and that it's not that's not the intention. It's just it's very, you know, simple. I mean, it's it's not it's not crazy. It's not like trying to, it just is kind of uh a salute to its past, I think, too, because it doesn't it doesn't worry about playing catch up.

SPEAKER_02 14:36

That's exactly what it is. That's what I meant to say.

SPEAKER_00 14:38

So one other place that we went that we drove to, I think the first time.

SPEAKER_02 14:42

We did go the first time, and we haven't got to explore it nearly as much as I'd like to because it was cold. Lake Blood? Yeah. I don't think there's much to explore, is there? Well, we could have taken a boat out to the castle. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:54

There's a church on it, right? Church.

SPEAKER_02 14:57

Yeah, that we could have taken a boat to that thing.

SPEAKER_00 14:59

Yeah. But Lake Blood, I'm sure you guys have all seen it, the pictures on Instagram of the little island with the medieval structure on it, and then surrounded by trees. I mean, it's it's breathtaking, it's stunning. But when we went, it was quite crowded and it took us a long time to get there. Yeah, and then you kind of just do like, and it's a lovely walk, but you kind of just do a walk around. There's not there's not much else to do. It's not like you would spend days there. You would spend an afternoon maybe and take a picnic or you know do something like that. But certainly worth seeing. It's like it's a fairy tale.

SPEAKER_02 15:33

Yeah, I think we just hit it on the way to Vienna. Yeah. Yeah. It's beautiful. It's it's beautiful, yeah. Well, we we fully intend on getting back to Slovenia in case we were actually looking for this year. I don't know if it's gonna work out, which is why we need your help. But help. But it's it's a definite, like put it on your list.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

Well, and it's funny because my sister and I were in Paris two years ago, and and we were doing this cheese and wine tasting, and we were grouped together with other travelers, and and we were sitting with this American parents and a teenager, and they were like, Oh, you know, we we're we've been gone for like two weeks, but we just spent the last four days in Slovenia and Ljubljana. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I love it. Like, you don't hear very many people going there. And they just spent the whole rest of the time tell talking about how much they loved it, how much it was so unexpected, and and they couldn't wait to get back to America and tell people about it. But I think that that's exactly how I felt after the first time and still do, that it's just like it's not, it doesn't necessarily fall on everybody's radar, and it's too bad because it really is special.

SPEAKER_02 16:43

It's it's yes. You at least look it up or read read our blog post about it. All right. Anything we missed? I don't think so. I don't think so. We are lining up some guests for some future podcasts, which will be fun for everybody.

SPEAKER_00 16:58

We are, we are, and we are gonna try and do some food and drinks, like incorporating that into our our programming too. So stay tuned and thanks for listening.

SPEAKER_02 17:12

Yeah, and check out the website www.thegetaways with a z dot com. And we'll see you next week. Thanks, guys. Bye.