Whistle While You Walk

Today we headed out before noon (this is quite an accomplishment for us) and went to the tramway to catch a ride up to the mountainside of the Medvednica mountain trying to make our way to Sljeme peak (about 1033M above sea level). This is the mountain that our expert skier friend Natasa used to hone her shredding skills on.

Despite a late tram, we make it up to the mountain, and in turn to the base of the Gondola that should take us up to the peak…oops, the gondola is not in operation. So, given that we’ve already spent an hour or more getting to this point, we roll up our sleeves and dig in for a hike.

Now Natasa is in good shape, and so I did take the 45 minutes she proposed for the hike with a grain of salt, however we took a not too leisurely hour and a half to get up to some shelter, at which time it just started pouring.

While the scenery of the mountainside was gorgeous - mist covered hills and orange tiled rooftops of scattered villages, and the walk through a dense deciduous forest that looked a lot like the Smokey mountains was beautiful, my favorite part of the hike was walking into the little restaurant located near the peak and ordering food next to the fire. After a strenuous walk in the rain we were starved and the home cooking hit the spot. Ulises had turkey with baked egg noodles, while the rest of us each had big bowls of savory bean soup with sausage. We topped it off with coffee and hot apple strudel. It was so good.

It was with full stomachs and reluctant hearts that we left the warmth and shelter of the restaurant to hike/run our way back down the mountain while whistling occasionally and ducking into dry spots as often as possible. We ultimately to the city center, just in time to have an afternoon coffee before we headed upstairs to pack, watch one more soccer game, and clean up the flat, as tomorrow we head out to Split on the coast, and say goodbye to our gracious hosts.