After all our visitors had headed off – Gill, Andre and the kids to Venice and Slovenia and Mike, Charmaine and James to Nice – it was time to get back to normal life in the cottage. For a week at least as we are driving to Nice to swap our lease cars over in early August and to catch up with Mike, Charmaine and young James.

It was a beautiful afternoon and we were sitting by the pool – as you do – when a text arrived from Gill. They had arrived in the capital of Slovenia – Ljubljana pronounced Lubiana – and were getting ready to celebrate young Jordan’s 6th birthday the following day. The text effectively said “am I being silly but what about you coming to Slovenia for Jordan’s birthday?”

Initially we dismissed the idea out of hand, let’s face it we didn’t know exactly where Slovenia was anyway – but then we got to thinking. How long would the drive be? Around a six hour drive – easily do-able. Can the dogs travel to Slovenia? It’s part of the EU so they can. Can the mighty Peugeot go to Slovenia? It’s on the list of eligible countries. Can we find our way around? TomTom maps for Eastern Europe are available and downloadable. Where could we stay for a couple of nights? Booking.com have a list of 23 hotels in Lubiana. Did we have anything else to do? Not really.

Within an hour we had all the answers – and we were off to Slovenia the next morning!

Driving from Italy into Slovenia you notice two things. Firstly the terrain goes from the dry, yellow/brown and hot Italian plains to the mountainous and green Slovakian hills and mountains. Secondly the architecture changes from Italian villas to Austrian style mountain houses. This isn’t surprising considering Sovenia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until 1918.

We had booked a boutique hotel in the centre of the old part of Lubiana. An area overshadowed by the historic castle on the hill which dominates the capital city. Sadly our recently purchased (24 hours earlier) Eastern Europe TomTom maps didn’t take account of the fact that the heart of the city was largely a pedestrian area and blocked off to traffic other than that of residents. This caused problems as we circled the city centre trying to find a way in to our hotel and getting more frustrated by the minute. Eventually the good old “get out and walk approach” did the trick and we located the hotel who kindly provided access for our car to off load us, the dogs and the bags.

Our hotel was in a restored historic residence. We had booked a suite and it turned out to be a complete apartment with kitchen, dining room, lounge, bedroom and terrace. At 100sq metres it was about 3 times the size of our tuscan cottage. The dogs loved the space and intially did laps exploring, sliding across the parquet floors, and generally enjoying the freedom to run around.

We met the Mays at a nearby restaurant and celebrated Jordan’s birthday in style. The food, wine and service were superb. Apparently horse meat is a local delicacy and Andre, sticking to his mantra of trying anything once, had “Black Beauty” as a main. The rest of us did not.

Lubiana is a pretty city which has put time and effort into making the “old city” a tourist friendly place to be. A river runs through the city and the banks are lined with restaurants, cafes and shops. The river has been named 7 times due it’s habit of diassapearing for a period of time and then reappearing. Over time it has been called the Trbuhovica, Obrh, Stržen, Rak, Pivka, Unica and Ljubljanica.

Although the official language is Slovene, English was spoken by pretty much everyone we encountered so communication is easy. Prices are also cheap compared to Western Europe so your Euro goes that bit further.

The temperature was around 25 – 28 degrees although we were greeted at the Slovenian/Italian border with thunder storms, torrential rain and a 12 degree drop in temperature. For the next two days, however, it was warm, sunny and settled as we explored the cities sights, cafe’s and bars.

We left Slovenia with fond memories. This is definitely somewhere to add to your next European holiday – ideally for a little longer than 36 hours.

*This great title is borrowed and adapted from P J O’Rourke and one of the stories in his book “Holidays from Hell”.