This cathedral, built in 1860, is a very handy landmark, due to its central location and distinctive colour. Next door is a Franciscan monastery that’s still operating.

It’s austere inside, because of the next door neighbours. Apparently, Franciscans aren’t very flashy people.

1895- earthquake. It pretty much levelled the town. This is where the more Art Nouveau buildings were put in.

Adam and Eve after the expulsion from paradise.

Prometheus. I bet he regrets giving fire to humanity. This looks painful.

This has been banned on the bridges in Paris, but it still goes on here.

Dragon bridge 

Built for Sisi’s husband, for the 40th year of his rule. He ended up ruling for 68 years.

The little figures under the lamps are gryphons.

There are markets all over the place here!

800 years ago the first church was built here. This current cathedral is only 300 years old. Unlike the pink church, this one is very baroque, so we were told.

In 1990 the first Slavic pope John Paul visited, and they installed these fancy doors for him.

Roman tombstones 1800 years old are included around the walls.

100 years ago, the river was regulated. It used to be shallower and wider.  It used to flood. No one swims here, because the temperature of the water is the same as in the caves. 10C.

New Square… only a few hundred years old.

This wall used to shield a German monastery, built in the 13 th century.

After WW2, they had to leave. Nowadays, it’s a secondary school for design students.

After the walking tour, we had a couple of hours to spend before we headed off to the countryside to the caves.

We had to look at the baroque church.

Yes, it was very… decorative. There was barely a square inch that didn’t have something painted, gilded or sculpted on it.

He looks bored.

On the way to lunch we spotted these two guys from the seminary.

This toddler was DONE.

So was this bear. Too many pancakes, I suppose.

Before we knew it, we were sitting in a railway car, about to head into the Postojna Caves. ( My face is red because I had 4 layers of wool. The caves are only 10C.)

There was a bit of excitement before the tour, because Mary ( in the photo with us) caught a team of pickpockets in action. She was walking behind a woman wearing a backpack, and noticed that the zips on the backpack were gently being unzipped by a young “couple” walking close behind her. The minute she called out, the couple peeled off and disappeared into the crowd.

Wow. We all hear about it, but of course, we all get complacent when nothing happens. We all took notice when we heard about it, that’s for sure!

43 million people have come through here since the caves were opened for tourism back in the late 1800’s.

These caves are worth visiting. There’s a 10 minute train ride to get down to where all the fun is, then there’s a 2km walk through the caves.

This one looks like a lion.

People for scale.

Russian war bridge. It was built by Russian POWs in WW1.

What a dark, cold and miserable job it must have been.

Stalagmites and stalactites grow at the rate of 1 cm every 100 years. The one on the right is 50,000 years old.

They don’t know how old the one on the left is. They’re not sure how deep it goes, and they’d have to cut a hole in the centre to measure it. No one is prepared to do that. Safe to say, it’s VERY old.

Someone asked what happens to the caves when there are earthquakes. The short answer is: nothing.

The shape of the caves means that nothing disturbs them. People were in the cave the last time there was a huge earthquake here, and they felt nothing.

On the train on the way back out, I saw this. A nice touch of whimsy!

Blogless Sandy caught this view of the Slovenian alps on the bus ride back.

Jake said that there hasn’t been snowfalls on the alps in May for years.

Just fortunate, I guess…

Dad joke of the day: