I haven’t been posting lately because we have been busy traveling! We are currently hanging out in Slovenia and absolutely loving it (I am skipping ahead a bit and will go back to our time in France and Italy soon!). Our first stop in Slovenia was the very popular Lake Bled. I started planning this trip in the early spring, and I still couldn’t manage to find reasonable accommodation for us right at Lake Bled, so we ended up staying about a 15 minute drive away in a small town called Zirovnica. It ended up being fine, but when we visited Lake Bled, we made sure to drive there early in the day, to beat both the crowds and the heat. The early trips to Bled paid off. We easily found parking in a lot that was jam packed when we left later in the day, and we also watched a huge backup of cars driving into Bled as we left.
The first thing we did when we got to Bled and parked was to start walking around the lake. And walk. and walk. It is beautiful, and as we walked we got different views of the castle perched on a hilltop above the lake, and the church perched on an island in the lake.
Bled Castle is behind the boys overlooking the lake
We saw people swimming, canoeing, paddle boarding and kayaking in the lake as we walked around, but by the time we had walked most of the 6km around the lake, we were getting hot. We saw a public swimming area (apparently the people we spotted swimming along the way were not supposed to be doing that – only in designated swimming areas!), and decided to check it out. We paid our entrance fee and spent a few really fun hours in the waters of Lake Bled!
They have a few more shallow swimming areas for young kids (or whoever wants shallow water)
I am not a fan of cold water, but C insisted the view from the middle of the lake was phenomenal, so he convinced me to hop in and check it out (luckily, Bled is somewhat warmer than expected due to a thermal spring, but it was still pretty darn cold!!). We had to do some fast talking to convince the younger boys to join us in the middle of the lake (“the fish are more scared of you than you are of them!”), but we finally bribed/cajoled/threatened them sufficiently to get them to join us for a few minutes. Of course, they insisted on basically riding on top of us to the middle of the lake, so it was less than enjoyable (apparently L’s swimming ability only works in pools!). It was a fun and unforgettable few minutes with the whole family in the middle of Lake Bled.
C & A in the middle of the lake with a view of the island
After that, we had some fun on the water slides (big and small), and diving boards.
N preferred the slide in the shallow pool to the big slide
After a few hours in the lake, we were all hungry, so we decided to go to the restaurant located just above the swimming area (I always check reviews on TripAdvisor and this one was rated highly), Grajska Plaza, and it ended up being our best meal of our time in Slovenia. All of our meals were great, and we finished it off with a few slices of the famous Lake Bled cream cake.
Yum! It was as good as it looks!
The famous Lake Bled Cream Cake. We polished off two of these bad boys between the five of us.
We took the next day off to see Vintgar Gorge and visit the nearby town of Radovljica (I will write a separate blog post on those), but the following morning, we were once again at Lake Bled first thing (9am or so) in the morning. This time, our goal was to hike to Mala Osojnica, said to be a great viewpoint over the lake. It wasn’t recommended for people with young kids, but I figured that didn’t apply to us, since N is a good little hiker. And it really was no problem at all. It was really steep, but short.
L leads the way
The payoff for the hike was well worth it offering an amazing view of the lake.
After a few minutes enjoying the view, we headed back down to the lake and spent a little time at the other (but free) swimming area on the lake. 
Then we said goodbye to Lake Bled and headed off to our next Slovenia destination. Stay tuned for more of this gorgeous country!
