Slovenia – Before the Trip

17. August 2025

 

In 2021 I hiked the Panorama Trail of the Southern Alps. Along the way, I spent one night in Slovenia—here in this hut. Other than that, I’d say I don’t really know much about Slovenia. But back then I really liked the more relaxed way the hut and the guests were handled, and of course the mountain scenery, and I thought I should come back sometime for a longer stay.

 

Then came the planning for summer 2025, and I considered what I could do with which friends. I really hoped that Ute would have time for me—with her I traveled to Kyrgyzstan in 2023 and Ladakh in 2010, and we’ve also shared apartments in Hamburg several times. I like her a lot. She doesn’t really like being photographed all that much though—so we’ll see how many pictures of her will make it in here. Here she is in Kyrgyzstan:

 

 

We found a two-week window—a bit tight after my last tour, but still! Our plan looks like this:

• Drive by car to Bled, with two nights booked in advance

• A 5-day hut-to-hut hiking tour in the Julian Alps

• The remaining days: no fixed plans, just deciding spontaneously

 

For the hut tour, Ute had set one condition: no more than 600 meters of elevation gain per day. Since I’ve been eagerly studying how useful ChatGPT can be for trip planning, I was excited when it suggested a fitting route! I started booking the huts. But then I thought: better double-check with Mapy! What luck that I did—ChatGPT had made a mistake and suggested nonsense. That was a very valuable lesson for me!

 

Here’s a screenshot from my conversation with ChatGPT after I noticed the error (unfortunately just in german):

 

 

Now I’m thinking: maybe ChatGPT and Mapy together make for the best tours? Because what ChatGPT suggested wasn’t entirely wrong—the area seemed good, the starting point as well—and then, with Mapy, I managed to create a route myself that feels just right:

 

 

 

We’re going to test now whether it really works out as well as it looks on paper! The huts are all pre-booked again—something you pretty much have to do, since it was sometimes actually difficult to get spots.

 

It seems to me that Slovenia is booming quite a bit, and what only a few years ago struck me as very affordable has now seen prices rise quite a lot. We’ll see how it really feels once we’re there!

 

So—Slovenia, a country I actually know very little about… I first had a quick look at Wikipedia:

• 2 million inhabitants (so roughly the same as Hamburg in total)

• After the dissolution of Austria-Hungary, it became part of the new Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1918

• After World War II it became a republic within socialist Yugoslavia

• In 1991 it became an independent state, and joined the UN in 1992

• In 2004 it joined the EU and NATO

 

And here’s a quote from german Wikipedia into english: “Slovenia is the most prosperous country of the former Yugoslavia. According to a 2020 assessment by the Bertelsmann Foundation, it has been above average in its economic transformation and political development. The United Nations Development Programme ranks Slovenia among the countries with very high human development.”
 

 

 

What I also didn’t know: it’s actually very close to me! Only 265 km to our first overnight stop – we’ll get there faster than I did when going to the Rätikon! Tomorrow we set off!