Lake Bled (Slovenia) - Graz (Austria)

Lake Bled is gorgeous....I cannot say anything else that can describe it.....it is a little gem of a place that feels very special.

We woke to a crisp but sunny morning, looking forward to exploring more of this place that looked so promising even in the dark last night. 

Fuelled by a hotel breakfast (a hotel breakfast buffet is such a treat for the kids - even though they hardly eat anything...they seem to love it - when we got to the hotel last night Eloise spotted the breakfast room as instantly grabbed me and said "Look at that Mummy.....guess what that is?........Breakfast!!!") we set off to the lake to take a look.

And what a look it is. The tiny island in the lake, with one of those picture perfect churches perched on the middle of it, bells ringing across the water.....the castle high up on a hill above the town....the other picture perfect church positioned on the waters' edge.....all against a backdrop of mountains with just a hint of snow.....

We walked down and found some boats that took people over to the tiny island on the lake - so we jumped on board and were rowed by a man across to the island.

On the boat....

The island houses a church, a small shop and a cafe....we were given half an hour to explore the island before the boat took us back to the lake edge. This was just long enough to see the church and do a quick lap around the island to make sure we took in every angle on the view surrounding us..

 

Coming up towards the island

The church on the island

The Dempseys....

My Mum and Neve looking out over the lake to the castle

My 2 global travellers.....

The castle and the other gorgeous church....plus a few hints of snow on the mountains behind. This was the girls first real sighting of snow so they were very excited and are now keen to make snowmen.....all of this about 24 hours after leaving the beach in Sardinia!!!!!

After our boat trip we wandered along the lake's edge...stopping off for the obligatory 'local' cream cake (it is important to respect local culture after all!).

This was probably a blessing because we then had to walk up the mountain to reach the castle above....I didn't count the number of steps but it would have been up in the hundreds! Neve walked the whole lot (and back down)....she said her legs were very wobbly once we got back!!

The castle was lovely and gave a super view across the lake....

The view from the top of the castle

Shane's new Facebook profile....

The girls thought they might see Rapunzel in the castle tower and it took some convincing of Eloise that she wasn't at home today!!

Back down from the castle and another slow walk around the lake until we stopped for lunch. After lunch we were back in the car for the drive "through" the Slovenian alps - I say "through" because we literally drove through an 8km tunnel that went straight through the mountains....so I can't say the view was anything amazing....

The scenic drive through the alps....

I have to say we were all more than a little sad to leave Bled so soon. It was a peaceful, beautiful and the kind of place you could easily stay a week doing activities.....

But onwards we went and we passed the border into Austria. Our accommodation tonight is in a village FAR less scenic than Bled (more of a stop on the highway really) - but we did find a Bunnings-type store that also strangely sold liederhosen and Austrian national dress....

Shane testing out the Austrian clothing.......the pants themselves were 99.99 euro so no impulse buying from us!

We also found they had the best supermarket trolleys in the world.......Eloise was devastated that we couldn't actually buy one to do our grocery shopping when we get home!!!

So here ends another day. Tomorrow we make our way into Vienna (about 2 hours drive away) and also say goodbye to my Mum who has travelled along with us now for just over 2 weeks.....she has been very tolerant of my crazy kids and I hope she has had a good time. I know my girls will miss her terribly (as will Shane and I as there will be no one else to take over the kid-minding reigns!!!).