Cycled Krk to Valbiska
Ferry Valbiska to Cres
Cycled Cres to Osor
28th May 2008
This day was quite a killer. By the time we made it off the ferry it was getting towards the middle of the day. The first 8km or so off the ferry was a long climb and the heat was really getting to us. We were a little disheartened by the time we got to Cres town. The Melbourne couple we met on the ferry Matt and Vanessa seemed to fare a lot better on their 8 speed commuters!
We spent the whole afternoon drinking beer, eating icecream, and trying to hide in the shade. We couldn't catch a ferry out of there though, so our only option was to continue riding down the island. The first 12km was uphill, but then it was flat along the top of the island. There was a fantastic bit of new smooth road which we caned.
Osor was another well positioned campground near a town. Although the town of Osor wasn't as nice as Krk, it had it's charms. It's a small town of about 80 people, with a centre square with stairs leading into it and a couple of small cobbled streets. The town guards a small bridge over the channel between the islands of Cres and Losinj. We enjoyed a dinner of beer and spaghetti as we watched the sun sink below the waves.
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Distance: 55km
Cycled Rijeka to Krk
27th May 2008
We left Rijeka and started out down the coast road of Croatia towards the island of Krk. There's quite a lot of traffic and it was quite a change from our relaxed Slovenian experience. The cars didn't give very much space, particularly the buses. I was driven off the road by a truck who was a bit impatient to overtake on Krk.
Against the warnings of some locals we rode through the middle of the day, and the heat was quite oppressive. Particularly as we were told of a "shortcut" that took us up and down some steep hills before taking us back to the main road we had started on. The bridge to Krk was also kind of funny as we were directed by a toll operator to take the footpath, but that led us into a large set of stairs, so we reversed up and took the main road instead. We're learning quite quickly that the advice of locals here is not of a high quality, although it seems they mean well.
We made it to the town of Krk and settled into the campground there. It's quite fantastic as it's only a short walk from the town centre. Krk is a very beautiful walled town and we spent the evening enjoying beers and the company of a friendly german shephard, who was very well mannered and seemed to want to act as our tour guide. This was one of our best stops of the trip because of the facilities of the campground and it's proximity to a very lovely town.
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Pros:
- Good roads, with not much traffic.
- Friendly, well mannered car drivers.
- Beautiful mountains and rivers.
- Helpful friendly people.
- Lots of bike shops and bike paths.
- Campsites are generally reasonably priced and good quality.
- There's a supermarket in most towns (which provide fresh bread.)
- The train system is good for bikes (at least in May.)
Cons:
- Some big climbs.
- A lot of rain.
- Campsites aren't everywhere.
Slovenia is an excellent country for cycling. A lot of locals cycle, even in the mountainous areas, so the infrastructure is there and the car drivers have a "share the road" attitude. It is a mountainous country, but when we weren't going over the top of a mountain range it was usually a nice steady incline or decline along a river. I would highly recommend everywhere we went. You may wish to skip the two big climbs (Vršič and the Kamnic Alps), but then you would miss out on the best views.
Food was easy to come by except occasionally on Sundays, when the Mercator supermarkets were closed.
The biggest negative was the unpleasant weather. It was raining most days and if not the threat was always there. I only ran into one other cycle tourist, and they were about to cut their trip short because of the rain. There were a few times we caught trains because cycling just wasn't very pleasant. However locals told us that it was unusually wet for May and when it wasn't raining it was a great temperature for cycling.
Later in summer it would almost certainly be better weather, but there will also be more tourists. Except in Bled there weren't all that many tourists at the time we were there.
The highlights were probably from Logarska Dolina down the upper Savinja Valley, and over the Vršič pass in the Julian Alps and down the Soča Valley. However everywhere was good and there were areas that come highly recommended that we didn't go near (particularly the Krka river.)
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Distance: 20km
Cycled Fernetti to Divača
Train Divača to Rijeka (Croatia)
26th May 2008
We rode to Škocjan Caves in time for the first tour of the morning. The caves are nothing less than terrific. You walk through a series of large caverns to a section with a river running through it. It reminded me a little of the mines of Moria. The walkway goes along the sides of the cave with the river raging 100m below. There's a bridge about 70m above the river, which ends as a waterfall disappearing into the depths. It's completely awesome. Sadly we weren't allowed to take photos inside the caves.
Audio update for the morning
Afterwards we caught the train to Rijeka in Croatia, ending our Slovenian experience. Rijeka was a very busy city, but there's not much else to say about it. We stayed at a hostel and looked forward to getting out of it.
Audio update for the afternoon
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Camping in Slovenia isn't as easy as we had hoped because there are so few campgrounds. Camping is only legal in the official campgrounds, which are all commercial. There are about 45 of them, and they are more concentrated in the tourist areas. So although in some areas they are easy to find, sometimes they are few and far between. This had quite an influence on the distances we did during a day, and of course sometimes meant we had to stay in more expensive accommodation.
On the plus side, every campground we stayed in was of a pretty good standard. For the two of us we were usually paying around €15, and the pitches were all grassed.
At Maribor tourist info we picked up a brochure Camping in Slovenia, which listed all the campsites and which we referred to quite often.
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