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Our non-stop flight down to Cancun was utterly uneventful and stress-free. That should have been a clue that our return trip was to be an adventure. The day started out well. Our shuttle to airport picked us up on time and delivered us to the airport with plenty of time to check in and navigate our way through security. All of that went smoothly. It was only after we had checked our luggage and cleared security that we noticed that our flight had been significantly delayed.

The delays were the result of thunderstorms in Newark, NJ, where our aircraft was coming in from, and it left us with less than 30 minutes to connect to our final flight home in Houston. But because we would need to clear immigration and customs formalities in Houston before we could catch that flight, there was zero chance we would make it.

Instead, we decided to check our alternative flight options, since the airline was offering to let us change flights at no cost because of the delay. We found that there was a non-stop return to Washington, but we would be sitting in Cancun for an extra three hours (actually, not much longer than waiting for our delayed flight anyway). The good news is that it would actually get us home earlier because it was non-stop. However, because we had checked luggage, we couldn't just change the flight on the app and expect our luggage to get properly re-routed. It took us a few minutes to find some gate agents for the airline who weren't busy, but they were super helpful and rebooked us onto the non-stop flight and made sure our luggage was properly re-tagged for that flight.

That meant we ended up sitting at the Cancun airport for almost four hours. Which wouldn't have been too bad except that we didn't have any water to drink. Obviously, we had to empty our water bottles before security, but afterwards, we discovered that there was no place to refill them at this airport. The tap water was not safe to drink, and they did not have any bottle filling stations with filtered water available. The only way to get something to drink was to buy it at airport inflated prices. Not a fan!

Eventually, we were able to board our aircraft and our flight back to Washington was uneventful. The last challenge was after we landed, when we had to hold on the tarmac for about 20 minutes because all of the ground crews were sheltering indoors from an ongoing thunderstorm. But after the storm passed, we were able to pull up to our gate and unload. We sped through immigration and customs in record time and were soon on the Metro headed home, another getaway in the books.

On Monday evening, the resort hosted an event called "La Kermés", with traditional Mexican games and street food, accompanied by mariachi music and folk dances. We showed up at the scheduled start time, and found the games and street food available, but the music and dancing didn't start until later, so we didn't stay of all of it. However, we did get to enjoy a few mariachi songs and watched a couple of the folk dances. It was a relaxing way to spend an evening.

But on Tuesday night we splurged for an evening of culinary and musical delight. The experience, called "Between Bolero and Flavors" was a five course dinner, with wine pairings, accompanied by live bolero music, sung by Karenka, a Cuban born singer and dancer. The evening started with a welcome cantarito, tequila or mezcal based drink served in a traditional terra cotta pot, customized to each persons preferences. We then had three four dinner courses, each paired with a wine, before enjoying dessert, accompanied by a mezcal creme drink. The food was delicious and the wine and drinks were superb. All of that accompanied by wonderful bolero songs, which Karenka sang both from stage and while dancing between the tables. It was a little pricey, but we have no regrets because it was a truly remarkable evening.

Before we left on this trip, we were talking to a friend about it and she mentioned staying at this resort and said that she had enjoyed an excursion to the "Secret River", an underground river that you walked and swam through as you visited the cave. This was not something we had done before, so we looked it up. The cavern is called "Río Secreto", and was only discovered in 2006 and opened to visitors in 2008. Located inside a private nature preserve, the owners of the cavern and the sanctuary appear to be deeply committed to preserving both and seem proud of their ability to preserve the water quality of the river that runs through the caves.

We booked the excursion at the resort, and our tour included round-trip transportation to/from the resort and lunch after our cave tour. We were picked up at the resort about 9:30 and rode south on the main highway for 30-40 minutes to reach the sanctuary, where we checked in and had a little time to relax before our tour. Soon enough, the others in our tour group arrived and we were introduced to our tour guide, Hugo, who escorted us to a van that carried us back into the sanctuary to the cave entrance. Here, we were equipped with helmets, water shoes, and life vests. We were required to shower before entering the cave, and for those who felt the water would be too cold (about 77F) they offered wetsuits. All of our personal belongings were left behind in lockers. We also each received a walking stick, to help us keep our balance, minimizing the chances we might touch the walls or formations to avoid falling.

As we entered the cave, we were accompanied by a professional photographer who took a lot of photos as we worked our way through the cave. The cave itself is almost entirely unimproved, with no cleared or paved walkways and no permanent lighting. The only light we had was the light on our helmets and our tour guide's flashlight. For most of the tour, we either walked in the water, or swam when it became deeper. It was unlike any other cave experience I've ever been a part of, and it was a great deal of fun.

After the tour, we enjoyed a buffet of Mexican food before boarding a van for the ride back to the resort.

When we were at this resort back in 2019, we decided not to visit their resident Cirque du Soleil show. I don't remember the reasons for that decision, but we missed that opportunity to see the show. This time, we pretty much had decided that we would be seeing the show before we even arrived at the resort, although we waited until we were at the resort to purchase our tickets, which proved to be fortuitous, as we ended up getting a discount on them as a result.

The show does not run on Sunday or Monday, so we chose to go on Saturday night. The venue is a purpose-built theater across the busy highway from the main part of the resort, so we needed to catch a shuttle tram to get there, and we ended up giving ourselves far more time than we needed to get there. When we arrived, those who had purchased the show package that included dinner were just starting to be seated for dinner, but for whatever reason, the staff decided to allow us to enter far earlier than we normally would have, so we got to enjoy the musical prelude that accompanied the dinner before the show started.

The show itself is called "Joyà", and it tells the tale of an aging alchemist who wishes to share his knowledge with his granddaughter, Joyà, and her adventures as she begins to explore the worlds her grandfather is teaching her about. The show has all the characteristics of a Cirque du Soleil show, with acrobats, aerialists, jugglers, comedy, and fantasy, all wrapped together in the story. The set was absolutely gorgeous, and its transformation to an underwater domain was nothing short of magical. The dialog was bi-lingual, which was awkward at first, but I quickly adapted to it, and was soon immersed in the visual storytelling. With a running time of just 80 minutes, it was a good length as well, enough to satisfy without dragging on too long. Attending was definitely a great decision.

Maybe it was because we were staying in a different part of the resort last time and were more dependent upon the shuttles to get around, but I don't remember seeing so much wildlife on the grounds of the resort the last time we were here. But this time we mostly walked everywhere on the resort, and we were almost constantly encountering animals on or near the walkways along the way.

The first first animal we encountered was a large rodent. When I first saw it, I mistakenly identified it as a capybara, which is apparently a common mistake because I heard others calling them by that name. However, after doing some research and determining that the capybara doesn't live this far north, I realized that these were Yucatan Agoutis, which are a bit smaller than the capybara. They were a little skittish, and tended to stay in the underbrush off the sides of the walkways, making it harder to get good, clear photos of them.

That first evening, we also saw the first of the many coatis we would see during our stay. These are bigger than the agouti and are less intimidated by the people. They would boldly walk along the walkways, sometimes surprisingly close to us. There is a sizeable population of these on the resort, and they had a lot of cute little youngsters with them. We would often see them digging in the grass for bugs, or hear them rustling through the leaves in the underbrush.

Not surprisingly, there were a LOT of reptiles on the resort. The largest and most obvious were the iguanas. We saw dozens of them at different places. The younger ones were bright green, but the colors changed as they got older and bigger, with the oldest being almost a golden color. We often found them sunning themselves on the walkways, and some were bold enough the just stay there as we walked by them.

The resort had several enclosures with animals in them for the guests to see. The first one we visited was the flamingo lagoon, where they had a sizeable flock of flamingos. They keep these inside an enclosed pen at night, but they are out feeding in their small lagoon during the day, where the guests can enjoy seeing these beautiful birds.

The other two enclosures held pools with crocodiles. The crocodiles were harder to see, as they were often camouflaged, either on the shore or even in the water. But we did manage to see a crocodile in each of the two enclosures.

There were lots of other reptiles. We saw at least one snake, as well as lots of smaller lizards, including this one that was on the deck around the main pool.

There was also a wide variety of other birds around the property, but most of them were far to mobile to photograph easily. It was fascinating to see all of this wildlife in the midst of this large resort. I wonder if they are feeling more comfortable being out and about since this was the lowest of the low season, and the number of guests on the property was about as low as it gets. Perhaps we didn't see so many last time because the resort was more crowded.

The primary objective of this trip was to relax and unwind. And at this kind of resort, the best places to do this are on the beach or poolside. There were plenty of lounge chairs and cabanas on the beaches here, even though the sea water wasn't particularly appealing with all the seaweed that was washing ashore (something we remembered from our previous visit). In any case, the life guards had red flags up of dangerous conditions, so we never entered the water. But we did sit on the beach for some of our time here.

But the majority of our down time was spent poolside, either at the enormous main pool (I believe the resort claims that it is the largest in Latin America), or at the quieter, more secluded sanctuary pool. Both were lovely, with poolside bars, more than adequate lounge chairs and cabanas, and waiters ready to bring drinks and food. The pool water was almost uncomfortably warm, so I didn't stay in the pool for long, but I dropped into the water periodically to cool off from the heat and humidity, which were (unsurprisingly) high, even in the shade.

We slept in too late so see any sunrises on the beach, which faced the east, but we went for a walk on the beach the very first evening, right after we arrived at the resort, and saw a spectacular sunset behind the resort.

Here's a video summary of our week on the Riviera Maya in Mexico:

Watch on YouTube

After receiving word that our river cruise in Europe was canceled, we realized how much we were looking forward to getting away after being home for nearly two months. While we do have other trips booked for later in the year, but we decided that we didn't want to wait any longer to travel. So, after looking at a number of last minute travel options, we decided to do a time share exchange to book a room at a resort on the Riviera Maya coast in Mexico. We stayed at this resort back in 2019 with our daughter and her best friend, and enjoyed ourselves during that stay. The exchange wouldn't use very many of our RCI points, and the resort fees were actually pretty reasonable, especially if we stayed in a hotel room rather than a 1 or 2 bedroom suite. With just the two of us, a hotel room would be entirely adequate, even without a kitchen, since there are numerous restaurants on the property. And so we found ourselves booked for a week at a tropical resort, for the week after after we would have been doing the river cruise.

Based on our previous experience at this resort, we expected to have a relaxing time sitting on the beach or poolside, with plenty of food and drinks to enjoy. The resort is not "all-inclusive", so we would have to pay for our food and drinks as we went, but we found last time that we can eat and drink all we want and still spend less than the all-inclusive fees at another resort. We really don't eat or drink enough to do justice to the all-inclusive fees, so we expected that we wouldn't have a problem having all the food and drink we wanted.

Normally, I would be a bit hesitant to travel to the Caribbean in August, as this is the middle of the hurricane season, and the point at which the tropical weather activity usually begins to get busy. However, the tropical activity in the Caribbean this summer is unusually quiet, and because we booked only a week out from departure, it was clear that there was almost no chance that our trip would be interrupted by a tropical weather system.

Not exactly the cruise we had planned, but still a welcome opportunity to get away from the daily chores at home, and unwind and relax for a bit.

Our next planned itinerary was a river cruise on the Rhine and Mosel Rivers. We would have flown to Luxembourg two days ago, and would now be aboard our ship sailing from Trier, Germany to Antwerp, Belgium, passing through southern Netherlands along the way. We booked this cruise because of a promotional discounted price, but the itinerary looked interesting, and included several UNESCO World Heritage Sites. We were looking forward to a relaxing week of cruising and sightseeing.

Unfortunately, the weather in Europe has not been kind to the river cruise industry this summer. I was already aware that the Danube is approaching (or possibly even beyond) the lowest levels ever recorded. I had also heard that the levels on the Rhine were getting low as well, so it wasn't a complete shock when we received an e-mail a week ago (just five days before our scheduled departure) informing us that our cruise was canceled.

That e-mail offered us some options. We could just cancel the trip and receive a full refund, which is what we ultimately did. But they also offered an option to rebook on another trip and receive credit towards future travel. Unfortunately, as we explored those options, it became clear that we couldn't rebook any trip using a promotional price. This meant that rebooking would cost us more than the credits they were offering, so we just took our refund.

The next problem was our airfare. We had booked our own flights, and cancelling involved a cancelation fee, with the remainder of the ticket price returned to us as an online credit towards future flights. Luckily, our annual travel insurance policy is covering the cancelation fee, and we've already used more than half of the credit for our skiing trip this coming winter.

So, it was disappointing that our cruise was canceled, but in the end, it seems that everything will work out fine.

When I tried to check us in for our flights home the day before we were scheduled to fly, I discovered that our flight from Trieste to Rome on ITA Airways had been canceled (without us having received any notification, which was annoying). As a result, we ended up cutting our afternoon explorations short so we could return to our accommodations to call United Airlines (which is where I had booked our flights) to see what our rebooking options were. United was able to rebook us on a (much) earlier flight to Rome, which would then allow us to connect to an earlier flight back to Dulles International Airport and home. So, while we would need to be up and ready for a shuttle pickup to go to the Trieste Airport at 4am, we would be getting home about five hours earlier than originally planned.

After confirming the changes to our itinerary, we called it an early night. We made a trip to a grocery store to buy food for a light supper and returned to our apartment, where we finished packing, ate our supper, and headed to bed early. Our shuttle to the airport went smoothly, and we were among the first to check in for our flight to Rome, which arrived early, giving us plenty of time to navigate the Rome airport, clear departure passport formalities, and find our departure gate with plenty of time to spare.

Arrival back at Dulles was routine, with no difficulties with immigration and customs officials, or with finding our luggage, and we were soon on the Metro headed home, another adventure completed.

The nearest airport to Piran (where the Slovenian bike tour was scheduled to end when we planned this trip) was Trieste, so it made sense to visit Trieste, at least briefly, before flying home. When the bike tour itinerary was changed, the operator indicated that we would be provided a transfer back to Piran after our second night in Gorizia. However, since almost everyone in the group had made plans to move on to Trieste the day after the final bike ride, we asked if we could be transferred to Trieste instead. Since Trieste is actually closer to Gorizia than Piran is, this proved not to be a problem, and we were all dropped off at our various accommodations in Trieste.

We spent much of the afternoon walking around the city center, trying to get a little bit of a feel for the city. We found ourselves next to the hilltop castle, where we visited the Cattedrale di San Giusto Martire. This church is atypically asymmetric, having once been two separate churches that were later combined into a single worship space.

Later, we enjoyed a delicious food tour. I had booked the food tour for the group of eight of us who knew each other before the bike tour as a final group activity before we parted ways. The tour took us around the city center, and we sampled some of the local flavors, accompanied with good wine (or beer, for our non-wine-drinker), while our local tour guide talked to us about the history of the city. After being threatened and attacked by Venice, the city of Trieste appealed to the Hapsburgs for protection, becoming part of the Holy Roman Empire and eventually the Austro-Hungarian Empire. With its deep water port, the only such seaport in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, it became an important city, and enjoyed a high degree of autonomy, which is why this city feels more Austrian than Italian. Following World War I, Trieste became part of the Kingdom of Italy until World War II. The region was partitioned by the Allies and Yugoslavia after World War II, and Trieste, administered by the British and Americans, became the Trieste Free State until it was annexed by Italy in 1954.

The next day, we started with a walking tour of the city that was intensely focused on the long and complex history of the city. Our tour guide provided us with a wealth of information, far more than I was ever going to be able to remember. But he did point out that after the surrender of Italy to the Allies in 1943, the city was occupied by the Nazis, who then began to deport the city's Jewish population, as evidenced by the brass "stumbling stones" we could find on the sidewalks around the city. He also discussed the post-war partition and the Trieste Free State period in far more detail than our guide during the food tour.

Following this tour, we continued to explore the city on our own until it was time to return to our accommodations to pack in preparation for our return home the next day.

The final bike ride of our Slovenian bike tour was a loop ride through the rolling hills of the Goriška Brda wine region. From our winery resort accommodations it was about 3km to the Slovenian border, where we began our long, steady climb up into the hills. Our first stop was at the walled town of Šmartno, where we parked our bikes and took a short walk around the town. We then continued on our bikes to an observation tower on a nearby hilltop, which provided us with a panoramic view of the entire region.

Our ride then continued to loop through the countryside, passing countless vineyards, until we arrived at the town of Dobrovo, where we stopped for lunch. We also visited a grocery store here, to purchase food for supper, so that we wouldn't need to take a taxi into town to eat in the evening. We then completed our loop, crossing the border back into Italy and returning to our accommodations. It was, I thought, the prettiest ride of the tour. We were supposed to stop for a wine tasting at a winery outside of Dobrovo, but they had changed their hours and weren't open when we arrived. Instead, we celebrated the end of our tour by enjoying more of the wonderful wine available at our accommodations before returning to our rooms to pack for transfer to our final stop on the trip.

Although our tour was about cycling in Slovenia, our final accommodations were actually across the border in Italy. We found ourselves staying at the very nice Borgo Gradis'ciutta, a winery resort in the countryside just outside of the border town of Gorizia, just a 3km bike ride from the Slovenian border. After arriving from Piran, we had some time to settle into our rooms before we reconvened downstairs in the tasting room to try some of the local wine and learn more about the wines and history of this border region. This wine region was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until World War I, after which it became part of the Kingdom of Italy. However, after World War II, the region was partitioned between Italy and Yugoslavia, and a border established through the middle of the region, and even through the middle of Gorizia. Since Slovenia's independence and its entrance into the European Union, that border has become transparent, with no border controls and freedom of movement and commerce restored.

The wines of this region are predominantly white, and the ones we tasted were all quite nice. The resort has an honor bar policy, where the tasting room is left open, and we can help ourselves to the wine, paying for what we drink upon check-out. We would take advantage of that the next evening after finishing our last ride of the tour, celebrating the week and new friendships with good wine.

After our tasting, we ended up shuttling down into town by taxi to have dinner. We didn't see a great deal of Gorizia, since we taxied in, ate, and taxied back to the resort. But the area around the restaurant was lovely, especially at night. While our accommodations were quite nice, it was too bad they were so far out of town, as it did limit our ability to explore somewhat.

Our first ride from Piran was to the east, towards the Italian border. We started along the Piran waterfront, eventually turning inland to follow an abandoned railroad right-of-way that has been converted a bicycle trail. The trail passed through a couple of long tunnels, and eventually we found ourselves at the seaside town of Izola, about halfway to the Italian border. We stopped here to have a brief walk around town before continuing on.

From Izola, we followed a bike trail along the shore, on what used to be the main road connecting Izola and Koper before the new highway tunnel was completed. It was a fabulous trail, with separate lanes for opposing bike traffic and a separate lane for pedestrians. When we reached Koper, we had time to get lunch and explore this town, which is Slovenia's only major port. After spending some time in Koper, we turned around and retraced our route back to Piran for the night.

The next day, after bringing our luggage down to the lobby to be loaded for our transfer, we did a short ride to the south from Piran, toward the Croatian border. We stayed close to the water for much of this ride, and our destination was the Sicciole Saltpans Nature Park, located right before the Croatian border. Located at the mouth of the Dragonja River, these saltpans have been producing salt from sea water since the 9th century, and continues to produce salt using traditional techniques to this day. We rode out into the salt pans to visit the park's museum and to learn more about history of the salt works and how they harvest salt from seawater. Then we retraced our path back to Piran for our transfer to the final accommodation of our tour.

Slovenia has only about 43km of coastline on the Adriatic Sea, with only a handful of seaside towns. Piran is one of them and is a popular resort town, with a long pier and a small harbor. The town is a medieval town that was under the control of the Venetians for centuries and therefore has a strong Italian vibe to it.

We spent two nights in Piran, staying at a guesthouse just off of the main square, the Tartini Plaza. After arriving, we went for a stroll to explore a little of the old town, and to walk along the waterfront. We also found a seafood restaurant where we had a delicious calamari dinner. The next day, after our ride, we took the opportunity to cool off after the ride with a dip into the sea at a swimming area on the north side of the point at the end of the town. We then had dinner and one last walk around the town before returning to our room to pack for our transfer following our morning ride the next day.

Because of the changes in the itinerary and our transfer to Piran, we would not have time to do a ride on our third day, so the moved the visit to the Vintgar Gorge (originally scheduled for our arrival day in Bled) to the morning of our third day, prior to our departure to Piran. The gorge was carved by glacial runoff after the last ice age, and carries the Radovna River northeast towards its confluence with the Sava River. Inside the gorge, which is just inside the Triglav National Park, the river plunges through a series of cascades and chutes, before pouring over a hydroelectric dam near the bottom and a lovely waterfall right at the mouth of the gorge.

When we reached the gorge, we were required to wear safety helmets because the walkway passes under rocky outcroppings and overhangs. Much of the walkway through the gorge are wooden platforms mounted to the steep sides of the gorge and bridges that cross back and forth across the river as it winds its way through. The gorge is quite lovely, and the walk through it was a pleasant stroll. The trees and gorge walls provided enough shade to keep the temperatures quite comfortable.

The first ride of our Slovenian bike tour was an out-and-back ride from Bled into the Triglav National Park (Slovenia's only National Park). We headed north out of Bled and looped around the north side of Lake Bled, through several small towns before we entered the national park and rode through the Radovna River valley. The clouds from the previous night's storms lingered, giving us overcast skies, but it didn't rain, and it was a pleasant ride. Along the way, we stopped at the ruins of a stone building, preserved as a memorial to the town of Radovna and the massacre of civilians here by the Nazis as a reprisal for Partisan activities in the area during WWII. The turn around point for our ride was a homestead museum, where we stopped for drinks and a bite to eat before we began our ride back to Bled.

The next day, we did another out-and-back ride from Bled to Lake Bohinj, also inside the Triglav National Park. This time, we rode through town and around the south shore of the lake before setting off up the Sava Bohinjka River valley. This ride was originally planned to be our first ride, but our guide delayed it a day to ensure that none of our route was under water after the thunderstorms the evening of our arrival. The majority of this ride was on dedicated bicycle trails (though a stretch of it was under construction, and we had to walk our bikes around the work for a piece of it), and the weather was glorious. Someone compared the views to those in Yosemite Valley, but without the traffic. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant by a campground shortly before we got to Lake Bohinj, and when we reached the lake we had a little time to take in the scenery (or go for a swim, for those willing to brave the chilly water). We then retraced our path back to Bled.

I have wanted to visit Lake Bled ever since I first saw photos of the picturesque lake with its pretty church on the island in the middle of it, the alps rising up behind them. Those images are a big part of the reason I jumped at the opportunity to go on this bicycle tour, and I must say that I was not disappointed.

We transferred from Ljubljana to Bled by bus, about an hour ride, and arrived in Bled in the early afternoon, with rain threatening. By the time we walked from the bus stop to our hotel, the immediate threat of rain seemed to have passed, so after dropping our luggage, we headed out to see a little of the town of Bled and the Lake before we had to return to the hotel for our bicycle fitting. Our walk wasn't long, and we mostly just explored the area at the end of the lake closest to the town. The low clouds on the alps beyond the lake made the views more dramatic. While I was prepared for the church on the island, I somehow I hadn't realized that there was also a castle on the hill above the lake, which was equally impressive. We also walked over to the Church of St. Martin, which sits in the town, near the base of the castle hill.

The next day, after our ride, a group of us hiked up the hill to visit the castle. Bled Castle is believed to be the oldest castle in Slovenia and dates to at least the 12th century, although portions of it were added much later. Today it is a museum, with exhibits on the history of Lake Bled and the surrounding area. While there is a road the climbs up the back side of the hill, we chose to walk up the steep trail that climbs up from the lake shore. The views of the lake and the surrounding countryside from the castle are breathtaking. The castle also has a small chapel with beautiful frescos.

On our final evening in Bled, we opted to ride one of the traditional Pletna boat out to the island to visit the Pilgrimage Church of the Assumption of Mary. These wooden boats are rowed with long oars by a boatman who stands at the stern of the boat, facing forward. The ride out to the island took about twenty minutes, and we were given about 45 minutes to explore. We visited the church, climbed the bell tower and made a very brief visit to the museum before returning to the boat for our ride back to shore. Later, after eating some supper, we went for a walk around the lake, taking in the changing vistas across the lake, and watching the sunset color the evening sky.

On our final day in Bled, after our hike through the Vintgar Gorge, we had some down time while they loaded the bicycles for our transfer to Piran, so we returned to the lakeshore to watch a little bit of the rowing competition that was being held there over the weekend. There were rowing teams from all over Europe in attendance, competing in various events from single rower sculls to 6 and 8 person crews.

This entire trip was built around this bike tour. Operated by Stephanie Ventures, we were invited to join the tour by a friend who had gone on another trip with this organizer, and we readily agreed because Slovenia was on my list of places I wanted to visit. Stephanie, the organizer, hired a local guide to lead us, and rode with her twelve paying guests throughout the tour.

While the tour began in Bled, as originally planned, the itinerary ultimately varied significantly from what was originally presented. Before the trip even started, a decision had been made to swap the Goriška Brda portion of the tour with the legs along the coast from Piran. This allowed us to ride the roads in Goriška Brda on a weekday, rather than a weekend when there would be a *lot* more traffic. Since the rides along the coast were largely on dedicated bike paths, riding there on the weekend wouldn't be as big an issue.

The logistics of this change meant that we had a longer transfer from Bled to Piran, and we lost one of our rides. However, we still did get to hike through the spectacular Vintgar Gorge before we left Bled. On the other hand, because most of us had planned to travel to Trieste after the tour, we were able to arrange a transfer into Trieste from Goriska, rather than returning to Piran, where the tour was originally scheduled to end, which was very convenient.

Altogether, we had five rides, two from Bled and two from Piran, all of which were out-and-back rides, and one in the Goriška Brda wine region, which was a beautiful loop ride. The weather was spectacular, warm and sunny for each of our rides, as well as for our hike in the Vintgar Gorge. The only rain was during the evening and night we first arrived in Bled, which was a spectacular thunderstorm that echoed through the mountains for hours. It was a wonderful trip and we got to see a bit of the diversity of landscapes that make up Slovenia.

We had given ourselves an entire day to experience Ljubljana. With a population of just 300,000, Ljubljana is one of the smaller capital cities in Europe, and it has a reputation as being one of the greenest. The entire historical center of the city along the banks of the Ljubljanica River is a pedestrian only zone, which makes it an incredibly pleasant place to visit. They have electric shuttles that transport people to/from the parking areas on the periphery of the pedestrian zone for free. Those and bicycles are the only vehicles in the city center, except in the early morning, when delivery vehicles are permitted.

Much of the architecture in the city center is the work of Jože Plečnik, including the University Library, the central market buildings, and the iconic triple bridge. The impact of his work is such that they have been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site (the seventh and final of this trip).

We started our day with a walking tour of the city. Our tour guide was Italian, originally from Florence, but a resident of Ljubljana for nearly twenty years. As he showed us around the city, he talked to us about the history, language, economy, architecture, and politics of the city and Slovenia more generally. He also talked about Slovenian independence (in 1991) and about the association of dragons with the city. It isn't entirely clear how dragons become associated with Ljubljana. Some argue that it is related to the Greek myth of the Argonauts, others point to the legend of St. George. However it arose, the city has embraced the dragon, using it on the city coat of arms and flag, and decorating the city with dragon sculptures.

After our walking tour, we walked up to the castle on the hill above town. The first elements of this fortress were built in the 12th century, with numerous modifications, including a modern viewing tower added in the 19th century. We enjoyed the views of the city from the castle walls, but didn't pay the admission fee to go up the tower.

Back in the city, we explored both banks of the river, walking through narrow alleys and just soaking in the feel of the town. We visited the central market, where vendors had a wide selection of fresh fruit and vegetables available, and visited the Cathedral of St. Nicholas. Eventually, it was time to return to our accommodations to pack for our transfer the next morning to Bled and the next bicycle tour.