This year is not going quite as planned. But hopefully with the summer here and with another operation safely behind me, I am back on track and we are making alternative plans.
A few weeks ago we managed 4 days at Valata resort in Istria (diary entry) and as we have already written an extensive post on how great this place is there is no need to go into detail again. Except to say that the facilities are now even better as they have upgraded some sanitary blocks and re-developed one of the beaches which is very nice.
Unfortunately their prices are still continuing to rise and in moderate season you will be expected to pay upward of €70 for a pitch. Let me say that again. Thats over €70 per night to park on a parcel of dirt. And thats if you can actually find one thats worth parking on without having your neighbours sitting on your breakfast table or having to take your hiking boots with you to get to the beach.
Also the supermarket prices have risen and an hour of tennis is now a quite remarkable €17! So they have effectively priced us out of going there except at the end of April or the last week of September, and then only for a few days. For us thats quite sad as we would love to spend an extended trip there to truly enjoy the facilities and area.
Its quite unbelievable how prices are rising in Croatia, and Europe in general, all caused by covid and the new van life boom. The ACSI card is no longer worth having as the “off-season” times are being constantly made shorter, and the pitches that are being made available for card holders are getting worse and worse.
We also took a trip to naturist campsite Mali Raj in Slovenia. Again we have written about this lovely camp beforebut also in March I made an interview article for British Naturism magazine in the UK of which I am also a member as well as the INF in Austria. It is published in the June Summer issue if you are a member, and if not you can download our article below.
Our plans for this year may have been forced to change but we are still positive and hopeful that we will be back to the second part of our trip to France and Spain later in the year. So stay tuned and any comments on our posts are always welcome.
We were planning on going to Venice over a long holiday weekend to visit this year’s Biennale exhibitions but we also wanted a spa day first to relax a little. So we decided very strangely to go to Lake Bled in Slovenia on the Way.
It may not have been a first choice for a spa day but after surprisingly finding out that Leela had never been there, we came up with a few days travel plan. So late on a Wednesday afternoon we made our way to Bled which on any normal day should have taken just over an hour. But after an unplanned stop at the tollbooths of the Karawanken Tunnel, took us just over two.
There is only one camper park near Lake Bled and as is with everywhere now they have really tried to capitalise on the camper van boom. So an off season rainy 24 hours at the end of October costs €20. And a warning if you want to go there in high season they rip you off for 40€. And for this incredible sum you get an open and unsupervised parking lot with no camper service as it was all broken and an option of paying even more if your wagon requires electric. But fortunately the night was peaceful enough with only the heavy rain for company.
The following morning we started with a big cooked breakfast and headed out for a 6km walk around the lake. The weather was very Autumnal but with patches of sunlight and blue sky we enjoyed the views and the walk before returning to the van for some food and to pick up our towels.
We then headed off by foot to Hotel Rikli which offered a day spa to visitors from 12-9pm. The ticket was €30 each which is not too bad as there were 3 steam rooms and 3 Saunas available as well as an outdoor hot pool with stunning views. And also included in the price was a sauna towel and shower towel which is always a nice bonus as drying your own in the van in a wet Autumn week is somewhat difficult!
We spent a lovely few hours there and left around 5pm when it began to get too full and a little too dirty for us as in these 5 hours not one person had been in to clean anything. I guess the hotel couldn’t stretch to paying a cleaner.
Getting back to the van it was already dark and nearly 7pm so we filled up with gas and headed to our planned stop just across the border in Italy only to have a surprise full van and personal identity inspection by 6 police officers at the border crossing. We asked why all the fuss and stringent control but they just mumbled something about Palestine. You would think that a rainy border crossing in northern Italy would not really be on the list for any fleeing Palestinians.
Stopping in Fusine we had a quiet night apart from the heavy rain again and after waking early to a dreadful morning we decided to skip the planned visit to the lakes and just have a coffee and hit the road. Thats if we could actually find it as it was just heavy standing water and torrential rain virtually the whole way until we reached Venice. A really tough drive.
Getting to the Venice camper park we already knew what to expect but it’s still a shock when you get there. A car park like a swamp with a disgusting toilet and shower facilities, no hot water in the mens block, a camper service that you should not use for health reasons and litter everywhere.
If it was not the only available camper parking for the city you would never go there. But we managed to find a dry spot backing on to the wonderful municipal park and as we would not be using any facilities just locked the door for the weekend.
We finally had some breakfast and got ourselves together for the sensory onslaught that is this amazing city and made our way to the tram stop and over the bridge to begin our first day there. We both love Venice and Leela even more so. We have written lots before about this incredible city (diary entry) but it still never ceases to amaze us how it is able to function on a daily basis and now late in October it was still absolutely full with no space to move about freely.
We were really going to make the most of these two days as who knows how long we will be able to access the city with new rules and sanctions proposed and with the ever growing number of tourists causing so much damage it may not be the same for too much longer.
We firstly spent a couple of hours just wondering the streets and people watching before buying our tickets for the Biennale and heading to the Arsenal for the first part of the exhibition. This year was architecture so I was hoping for lots of buildings and bridges and amazing feats of engineering, but we we were both left a little baffled and confused with the general themes of the countries exhibitions.
The interpretation of architecture was stretched quite thin and even though you can obviously see the incredible amount of thought and work that had gone into the individual pieces, it left a lot to the imagination as to read up on everything that was going on would have taken you weeks.
But we are always impressed by such things and after another couple of hours we decided that our brains had had enough and it was time to buy a couple of beers and sit on the dock side and watch the ocean traffic and the sun go down. One of our favourite things to do whilst in Venice. As the sun set we made our way through the masses and back to central station for the short tram ride back to the mainland and the safety and comfort of the van for the rest of the evening.
Saturday morning we were up way before the dawn and ready to roll as a beautiful sunrise lit up the city from across the water. Getting into Venice very early should have given us a chance to explore in relative peace but to our surprise it was already packed. So we enjoyed a coffee and croissant and then headed for the market for an attack on the nasal senses. It is a feast of fresh caught fish that day and so fresh that some of it was still alive on the tables as well as there being so much local produce.
Then over the Rialto bridge to the incredible old post office which is now a very upmarket shopping mall to try and get on to the free viewing platform. But after asking several very unhappy security personnel we found that every single 15 minute entry spot was pre-booked online months in advance and we were told to come back in December. So back into the chaos and off to find the narrowest street in Venice which I could barely get my shoulders through and then to the most chaotic bookshop in the world where unless you were extremely lucky to find what you wanted by chance, you had no hope!
Getting hungry we made our way to the Gardens to have our packed lunch before touring the exhibitions. As the day before, this left us more confused than inspired with only the Romanian entry giving us cause for pause and be informed. After a couple of hours of shuffling around the exhibits we decided to go to the lovely little park at the end of the island and found a bench and just sat in the warm sun for a very long time before heading back to the dock for a supermarket beer and another lovely sunset on maybe the last trip to this incredible but bizarre city for a while.
Sunday morning we were up early once more and surprisingly full of energy considering we had covered over 50 km by foot the last two days. So I went for a 10 km run around the park at sunrise and Leela done some Yoga at the van before trying to make our way out of the cesspit of a parking lot. I say trying as the final issue was to actually open the barrier.
The owners had a new ticket system that couldn’t cope with the clock time change overnight and was trying to charge everyone an extra days payment so the queue was building with a long row of vans, but fortunately we were at the front. If only they would concentrate on cleaning the place then maybe people would not be so annoyed whilst paying for it!
Finally on the road a little later than planned we still made it to the huge shopping mall just outside the city for Leela to pick-up some new shoes and then the long drive home. A wonderful weekend, some new things for us, and a very lucky weather window for touring Venice and its magical and unique experience.
Slovenia is a lovely country to travel. It has wonderful mountains, lakes and countryside but unfortunately for us very little coastline. This is due to its transition from a region within Yugoslavia to an independent country. The details of which are confusing to me, as with all politics, but I believe that it actually could have been worse and at least they did manage to hold on to 45 km of coast that the region always had before the break-up.
That said we don’t go to the Slovenian coast as we just don’t like it so much. Too compact, too many people and quite frankly, too loud. Not to mention the lack of campsites there. But Slovenia has many wonderful locations to choose from inland. The countryside reminds me a lot of Wales and the campsites also. Lush green fields and rivers with traditional Welsh grassed campsites in the mountains or at riversides. Still giving the feeling of when tents ruled the camp grounds and not luxurious motorhomes.
There is also a distinct lack of FKK campsites in Slovenia which we find remarkable as the FKK Camps in Croatia are literally drowning in Slovenian people. But in their own country there are only two part FKK part textile camps which do not interest us as much as we don’t like in the segregation and only one dedicated FKK camp in the whole country. Which is where we would like to talk about.
Mali Raj is located in the Novo Mesto area of Slovenia deep in the countryside and not all that far from the border with Croatia. It is a very small and basic site run by a father and daughter and lies quite beautifully along the banks of the River Krka. It is wonderfully maintained and can accommodate around 50 guests at full capacity although the owner informed us that she never overloads the site so that it keeps its space and freedom.
We arrived on Friday evening a lot later than we had planned and we were very surprised entering the site. Firstly to see its incredible beauty and secondly to see that there was not another single person there. Driving down the entrance road you immediately are overtaken by the location and as we were surveying all of the parking options a very cheerful lady appeared at the side of the van.
Katja is the daughter of the partnership and her helpfulness and enthusiasm not only for the camp but also for the area really is apparent. She advised which plots are better for our type of camper but as there was nobody there we just took the first one but any of the riverside plots are amazing. She left us to sort ourselves out and after a walk around to get our bearings in the setting sun, we headed back to the van for a glass of wine whilst looking out on to the majestic flowing river sweeping by directly in front of our door.
The night was so peaceful and we woke to the morning sun lighting up patches of green all around. We were so overcome by our surroundings and complete peace and quiet, something that is not possible to experience at home, that we decided to skip our morning run and just enjoy this gift we had been given.
The day passed with short walks along the river, reading, painting, sunbathing, a cold beer and a very cold dip in the river. And best of all was that you could be naked the whole day as the warm sun shone down until late in the afternoon. It was really incredible that not one single other person, anywhere, thought that it would be a good idea to visit this particular camp on a weekend where it was only sunny and 25 degrees?! In fact the only person we saw that day was Katja who came to make sure that we were ok and to give us some maps and tour advice which we shall use on our next visit.
After such a wonderful day we once again had a peaceful night with only the river as company and woke to another beautiful day. This time we did venture out on our morning run through some idyllic forest before spending much of the day as the one before.
Talking to both Katja and her father during the day we were already making plans for a return visit but next time for longer and with the bikes. There is so much to explore in the surrounding countryside by foot or by bike as well as some local tennis courts to play. And if the weather turns bad then there is always the option of the nearby Terme which we visited last year (diary entry) and can also easily be reached by foot or bike directly from the campsite.
The camp has basic facilities but is immaculately clean and well kept. It can accommodate a moderately large camper with good driving as well as many tent pitches. There is electric if you need it, hot water, and a camper service at the entrance. And with its unique location there is nothing more you need if you are a true nature lover.
We were both really taken by this natural paradise, its peacefulness, its beauty, and the relaxed manner of its naturist owners. We were of course phenomenally fortunate to have this paradise completely to ourselves for a whole weekend and in perfect weather but there is no doubt that we will return as soon as we have an opportunity to this real Slovenian hidden gem.
