Lake Bled

 We were in Slovenia.  And like I mentioned in my last post, we started our day in Lake Bled by taking a SUP tour to the island in the lake (read it here).  Since our tour did not start until almost 11 am we decided to walk around the island and explore for a bit beforehand.  With a coastline of 5km (3 miles), there was plenty to see...

    The boats were still locked up for the morning.

 The water was green, blue, turquoise...it all just depended on what angle you were looking at it from..And I loved how it constantly changed in pictures.  We also loved the fact that it was so clear (and deep -30 meters at its deepest) so that you could see the bottom all around the shore.

 Fuzzy Baby Duckies!!!

I shot this island/church from so many angles and loved every one of them.

 The island train.  We didn't take it because we were having such a good time exploring...

MadHatter asked me to stop and take pictures of the wildflowers (and post them).  These were her favorites...

We made it to our meeting point with a few minutes to spare so we checked out the docks.

We went on our 2-hour tour and once back on shore continued on our adventures around the island.  This time looking to walk up to the castle.  We found this sign and headed in...and UP, UP, UP...

After about 20 minutes we were at the castle but the wrong side of the castle.  

The pathway there was blocked off and so we had to continue on and back down another path only to head back up again this time taking over 200 stairs.

By this time, we were starving.  Thankfully there is a very good restaurant at the top with some of the best views of all. 

 Our table was on the left...

And this was our view straight down...

  Family pic!

We toured the castle but there really wasn't much to it so we went back down the 200 steps and into this church (which I have forgotten the name of and can't seem to find online...)

After a day of hiking and paddleboarding we were ready for a treat.  And when in Lake Bled you must have the Bled Cream Cake (Kremsnita).  And you must try it at the source of its origin - The Hotel Park.  Created by  Ištvan Lukačevič, the recipe is no secret but experience does matter because if there is too much flour it will take awful; too little and they collapse.  Obviously these guys have it down to a science because they have sold over 12 million in the past 60 years.

Thumbs up all around.

The sun was starting to go down on our fabulous day exploring Lake Bled.  We took a short stroll to dinner and found a table lakeside with this view...(I don't think there is a bad view from anywhere on the lake)

One last picture and we were off to the hotel.  We would be leaving Bled in the morning but we were not sad, just determined that we would have to come back again someday and do it all again.