The Great Grimm Tour

Next on the agenda wa the salt mine at Wieliczka,just before we set off the lady who ran the hotel we were staying at gave us a tip about the parking there, and told us we need to take no notice of parking attendants waving you into the car parks, and drive past them to the last car park as that one is free, saved us about 8 euro.
The mine buildings above ground are very well kept and spotless, and there is an area thats laid out as a park that people were using as a picnic area, all very clean.
You have to have a guide to go down into the mine, you just pay for your ticket and queue up at the station for the language you need, they run at 30 minute intervals so not a great wait. To get down into the mine you have to walk down 380 steep steps, once at the bottom the tour begins where you will be walking a total of 3km, its been a working mine for almost 900 years so it has plenty of history, not to mention all the fantastic sculptures you see and the massive chambers and structures that hold the place together, it is a worthy world heritage site, and if you visit Krakow put half a day aside to visit the mine i dont think it will dissapoint.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8295.jpg
    IMG_8295.jpg
    49.2 KB · Views: 777
  • IMG_8298.jpg
    IMG_8298.jpg
    51 KB · Views: 779
  • IMG_8331.jpg
    IMG_8331.jpg
    51.9 KB · Views: 732
  • IMG_8344.jpg
    IMG_8344.jpg
    60.9 KB · Views: 727
  • IMG_8355.jpg
    IMG_8355.jpg
    65.5 KB · Views: 734
Onto the High Tatras into Slovakia via Zakopane, what a bad day to travel, it was some sort of special religious holiday, and the traffic from Krakow to Zakopane was bad, i dont know how the people in cars coped it was really hot in the high 30s and the traffic was not going anywhere. it took us about 2.5 hours to do 50km with constant filtering.

This parade the cause of one of the many holdups
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8401.jpg
    IMG_8401.jpg
    83.7 KB · Views: 712
  • IMG_8403.jpg
    IMG_8403.jpg
    85.5 KB · Views: 708
looks good, heading that way in a couple of weeks.
justin
 
We only had a one night stopover in the Tatras, so not a lot of time to see the place, but what we did see there and the subsequent ride through Slovakia was very nice, and also very hot it reached 41 degree on the way down heading to Slovenia. I would not mind going back to explore the place to the full.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8419.jpg
    IMG_8419.jpg
    59.5 KB · Views: 672
  • IMG_8423.jpg
    IMG_8423.jpg
    73 KB · Views: 686
  • IMG_8424.jpg
    IMG_8424.jpg
    67 KB · Views: 668
  • IMG_8430.jpg
    IMG_8430.jpg
    42.4 KB · Views: 663
  • IMG_8435.jpg
    IMG_8435.jpg
    87 KB · Views: 665
Onto Slovenia. What a stunning part of the world it is, we had based our 4 day stay in the ski village of Kranjska Gora in the north of the country on the edge of the Triglavski Narodni National Park, this gave us a good base for getting around the place.
We arrived late afternoon found the hotel got all our gear off got the bike unloaded then went for a walk around, our luck was in, there was some form of pushbike race on not the tour de france type race but more of a fun event where most of the riders were in fancy dress, and all were riding small wheel bikes, there were people everywhere a real party type atmosphere,there was a red bull stage set up for a band to appear on later, also a compare who was handing out prizes to the entrants of the race.
We decided to get some food sorted for tea and wait for the band and see what they were like. The Band came on stage around 7 and they were really good, they played a few of there own songs in Slovenian and then went into a load of rock songs in english, ACDC Queen Zepp to name but a few, we stayed until the end and had a really good night.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8443.jpg
    IMG_8443.jpg
    50.6 KB · Views: 656
  • IMG_8473.jpg
    IMG_8473.jpg
    79.1 KB · Views: 667
  • IMG_8475.jpg
    IMG_8475.jpg
    75 KB · Views: 666
  • IMG_8482.jpg
    IMG_8482.jpg
    66.1 KB · Views: 663
Our first full day in Slovenia we opted to go upto log pod mangartom a high pass just to the west of where we were staying,but to get there, first we had to go over the Vrsiska cesta a steep pass with a total of 50 hairpins, how do i know?, they are all numbered. then it was onto log pod, on the way we passed a couple of forts. got to the bottom of the log pod and there was a sign saying it was closed but not to be put off we ventured on, we got about 1km from the top and sure enough the road was blocked by a snow fall so i took a couple of pics and headed back down and stopped at one of the forts for a look around.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8513.jpg
    IMG_8513.jpg
    49.1 KB · Views: 651
  • IMG_8515.jpg
    IMG_8515.jpg
    55.2 KB · Views: 658
  • IMG_8550.jpg
    IMG_8550.jpg
    44.6 KB · Views: 683
  • IMG_8551.jpg
    IMG_8551.jpg
    72.6 KB · Views: 659
  • IMG_8543.jpg
    IMG_8543.jpg
    80.7 KB · Views: 683
Slovenia is really a stunning place, we visited lake Bled and lake Bohinjsko Jezero, the water was crystal clear and the weather was great, so warm my lady took a paddle to cool her feet down. We spent the best part of the day walking around the lakes had some tea in Bled and then made our way back to the hotel.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8569.jpg
    IMG_8569.jpg
    54.7 KB · Views: 627
  • IMG_8581.jpg
    IMG_8581.jpg
    44.2 KB · Views: 628
  • IMG_8595.jpg
    IMG_8595.jpg
    57.7 KB · Views: 656
  • IMG_8591.jpg
    IMG_8591.jpg
    85 KB · Views: 629
  • IMG_8601.jpg
    IMG_8601.jpg
    61 KB · Views: 630
Nice write up :thumb
It's given me a few more ideas...


we got about 1km from the top and sure enough the road was blocked by a snow fall
Had the same problem 2 years ago but much lower down. Hopefully it'll be clear this year, should be there in the next week or two...
 
Nice write up :thumb
It's given me a few more ideas...



Had the same problem 2 years ago but much lower down. Hopefully it'll be clear this year, should be there in the next week or two...

Thanks for the kind comment, i would have thought with the weather they have been having there would be no problems with road closures
 
Great report dude, looks like an excellent trip! :thumby:
 
After a truly great time in Slovenia we moved on to our next port of call Lappago di sopra near Taufers in the Dollomites, We had a route set that would take us over a few passes from Italy to Austria and then back into Italy, this included the Nassfeld, The Plockenpass, Sella valcalda, the Cima di sappada, Passo del zovo and Monte Croce before getting back on to the main route to the Hotel. We arrived at the hotel around 4pm and what a great spot, its situated on a dead end road at the end of a steep sided valley about 8 miles from the ss621 main road.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8686.jpg
    IMG_8686.jpg
    84.8 KB · Views: 480
  • IMG_8707.jpg
    IMG_8707.jpg
    40 KB · Views: 497
  • IMG_8726.jpg
    IMG_8726.jpg
    45.1 KB · Views: 479
  • IMG_8757.jpg
    IMG_8757.jpg
    37.9 KB · Views: 515
  • IMG_8764.jpg
    IMG_8764.jpg
    62.1 KB · Views: 487
The next few days were spent exploring the dolomites, we visited Cortina d'ampezzo, Bolzano and as many places and passes we could do in the time we had. I must say the Dolomites dont dissapoint, and when you are blessed with good weather it is great place to be, I will most certainly be going back.
We had a run into Taufers to visit the castle an impressive place and worth a visit if you are in the area from there we headed to Schaubergwerk Prettau an old mining museum at the end of the valley just outside Taufers, again worth a look if only for the ride up the valley.
The following day we spent visiting a couple of the national parks and on the way back we went over the Passo Valparola and the Passo Falzarego with the little fotification at the top.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8766.jpg
    IMG_8766.jpg
    42.8 KB · Views: 472
  • IMG_8771.jpg
    IMG_8771.jpg
    50.7 KB · Views: 479
  • IMG_8845.jpg
    IMG_8845.jpg
    56.6 KB · Views: 471
  • IMG_8847.jpg
    IMG_8847.jpg
    64.3 KB · Views: 472
  • IMG_8795.jpg
    IMG_8795.jpg
    55.5 KB · Views: 486
Time to move on to Austria, we would be going via the Timmeljoch pass, heading for a little village just outside Imst called Nassereith, and by the looks of the weather forcast we may be having a little bit of rain, google was telling me it should be about a 4.5 hr run so hopefully we would be there for dinner.
Well the run upto San Leonardo In Passiria where you start to climb out of Italy towards the Timmeljoch was great, brilliant sunshine and warm, but after about 5km it started to rain and as we got higher visibility started to drop as we entered fog/cloud until i could only see about 5-10 meters ahead and the temp was dropping aswell, and with that so was my speed, i was down to about a crawl.
Eventually we reached the summit and according to my camera whilst taking the following pics it was 0 degrees, pictures taken and off we go down the other side,unbelievably by the time we reached the Toll booth the weather was back to warm dry and clear as a bell and it remained like that all the way to the hotel.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_8880.jpg
    IMG_8880.jpg
    18 KB · Views: 470
  • IMG_8877.jpg
    IMG_8877.jpg
    13 KB · Views: 486
  • IMG_8883.jpg
    IMG_8883.jpg
    48.9 KB · Views: 476
  • IMG_8884.jpg
    IMG_8884.jpg
    41.3 KB · Views: 472
Enjoyed that, especially Slovenia. Was there last summer and this makes me want to go back. :beerjug:
 


Back
Top Bottom