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 The
northernmost republic of what was once Yugoslavia, Slovenia currently
appears the most stable, prosperous and welcoming of all Europe's
erstwhile communist countries. It was always the richest and most
westernized of the Yugoslav federation, and apart from the Ten-Day War
which brought it independence in 1991, it has avoided the strife which
has plagued the republics to the south. For centuries, Slovenia was
administered by German-speaking overlords and was, until 1918, part of
the Austro-Hungarian empire. The Slovenes absorbed the culture of their
captors during this period while managing to retain a strong sense of
ethnic identity through the Slav-rooted Slovene language, a close
relation of Czech, Serbo-Croat and Slovak.
Slovenia's landscape is as varied as it is beautiful: along the Austrian
border the Julian Alps provide stunning mountain scenery, most
accessibly at Lake Bled and Lake Bohinj ; further south, the brittle
karst scenery is riddled with spectacular caves like those at Postojna .
Slovenia's capital, Ljubljana , is easily the best of the cities, a
vital, youthful place, manageably small and cluttered with Baroque and
Habsburg buildings, while the short stretch of Slovenian coast, along
the northern edge of the Istrian peninsula, is punctuated by a couple of
towns that were among the most attractive resorts of the former
Yugoslavia - Piran and Portoroz - not to mention the port of Koper ,
with its appealingly ancient centre. Despite its relative isolation in
the eastern part of the country, the attractively preserved town of Ptuj
is also well worth a visit.
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