5 Autobahn to Slovenia

The next morning we bid farewell to Zagreb and pointed Opel north toward Slovenia, a three-hour drive on the most modern, smoothest, cleanest, fastest highway system I’ve ever driven. Croatians love the tunnels. During our travels we must have passed through a dozen of them. One was over 5 miles one. In 6th gear Opel cruised at 150 KPH without breaking a sweat. I got the hang of autobahn driving after a few days. The key is to stay in the "slow" lane and reserve the "fast" lane for passing. Opel has a turn-signal feature that blinks the signal three times then automatically shuts off.

Dave and Donna kept us in stitches with family stories about raising two sons. Petey and I could relate. Dave has a library of travel logs he shared. He is also a walking encyclopedia of movies. The guy is the pop culture king. He knows actors and key lines from many movies. Several times in our journey he spit out a movie line that fit our situation perfectly. Donna kept our passage true with clear Croatian pronunciation and spellings of each upcoming exit. She has the Baltic accent down pat. Petey kept us informed with dramatic readings from the Rick Steves’ book about our upcoming sights. The trip (about the same distance as Visalia to Sacramento) went by quickly. Up next Ljubljana (lyoob-lyee-AH-nah), the capital of Slovenia.

Ljubljana is a charming town built around a meandering river (Ljubljanic River) once the trade route between the Mediterranean (60 miles west) and the Black Sea. Toss a “bottle message” in the river and it can float to the Danube and eventually be read in Russia. The ancient town was batted around by Greeks then Romans then overrun by Huns then Habsburg emperors and resettled by Slavs. During Napoleon’s reign Ljubljana was made capital of his Illyrian Provinces where culture flourished. The charming town reminded me of Salzburg, Petey’s favorite foreign town. As host to a major university, the town is filled with youth. We spent our afternoon in the downtown area which is compact with Old World cobblestone narrow lanes and beautiful pastel flavored buildings that pack shops on the ground floor and office space, pensions and apartments on the upper floors.