Day 14: Ljubljana to Trieste

The main aim of today was to travel to Trieste, but as our bus wasn't scheduled until 14.10 we had a final morning to enjoy in Ljubljana first. The weather didn't look too great when we opened the blinds, but we decided to hope for the best and go for a walk in Ljubljana's enormous park, Tivoli.

The park is just on the edge of Ljubljana city centre, and as well as a formal landscaped part, there are miles and miles of forest to explore.

It's quite a hilly park, and as we climbed higher we had some beautiful views back towards Ljubljana.

At the top of the hill we climbed we found a beautiful pink church, the same colour as the large Franciscan church in the city centre.

Around the corner from the church is a house where the Slovenian poet and writer Cankar used to live.

There are some wonderful views from here as well.

We walked around the park for several hours, enjoying the scenery.

We eventually emerged back into the main town just outside the orthodox church and found a restaurant to get some lunch.

We were back at the bus station in plenty of time for our bus at 14.10. There aren't many daily connections between Ljubljana and Trieste and we were booked to travel on a Hungarian Eurolines bus which was coming via Budapest and Zagreb. We waited and we waited and we waited.

Once it was about 15 minutes late we started to get worried that we hadn't been standing in the correct place. We were waiting outside stand number 9, which had a sign saying "Trst" above it so it seemed like a good bet, but Tim went into the bus station to check. The lady on the desk told him that we should have been standing outside stand 20 (labelled "Udine"!) but reassured him that the bus hadn't come yet anyway as there were some "delays".

We went and waited outside stand 20. Again, we waited and waited and waited. There were two American couples who also appeared to be waiting for the same bus. Once it was an hour overdue, they began to get really worried and two of them went into the bus station to seek advice. They returned a few minutes later and suggested to the other American couple that they should all get a taxi together. Wow! The bus journey was scheduled to take the best part of two hours, so I can't imagine it would be a cheap journey!

We were started to get worried by this point too, but we reasoned that the bus had to come to Ljubljana eventually; there were bound to be people wanting to get off here even if we were the only people who were now waiting to be picked up.

Eventually, 90 minutes late, the bus rolled into the station. Phew! It turned out that it had been delayed by additional border checks entering Slovenia as a result of the migrant crisis. We had been worried about whether we were going to be able to get a seat, but nearly all the passengers disembarked from the bus in Ljubljana, leaving us with an almost empty bus to travel on to Trieste. It was a very pleasant journey and we finally arrived in Trieste around 17.30.

We made our way to the apartment where we are staying for just one night. It definitely isn't the nicest apartment we've had this holiday, but it's okay for just a few hours. As soon as we'd unpacked a few things we went out again so that we could have a walk around Trieste before darkness fell.

Trieste was just as beautiful as normal

We enjoyed walking through the main square on our way to our favourite restaurant, where we were looking forward to some goulash.

As we turned the corner to walk along the seafront, however, we caught sight of this monstrosity.

Wow. It was so big it looked like it had crashed into the harbour rather than having been docked there, completely dominating the building next to it and with its nose extending almost into the road.

Luckily all the passengers seemed to be back on board already and by the time we had finished our meal the ship had departed.

Before long we had made it to the restaurant at the opposide end of Trieste and we were enjoying the gnocchi goulash.

As it was our final evening we stretched to some pudding as well

It was a great meal but the most surreal thing was that Trieste seemed to be celebrating some sort of Oktoberfest weekend, with the result that the pub was playing a DJ Ötzi album at full blast throughout the evening, presumably to try and give a German feel!

By the time we had finished eating it was dark, so we were able to enjoy the main square all lit up.

Some of the buildings look even more beautiful at night.

We've had a wonderful holiday in Croatia and Slovenia, and it's been lovely to return to Trieste again today