Koper and Piran, Slovenia Saturday 24th June

Its hard to beat a port stop like Venice but Slovenia has its own charm, full of green hills terraced for grapes and olive trees and although a small coast line it has several beach holiday towns.

We took a ship tour to Piran a medieval town which was as charming as its sea side setting. 

This location gave it a universal appeal for most tourists as it had history a lovely marina and quaint laneways with shops, ice creameries, bars and restaurants and local homes. 

We had a walking tour through the square and up to the church and monastery and then free time which gave us the opportunity to swim in the sea, eat ice cream and for James to buy New sunglasses. 

The tour also drove through several of the other sea side towns and a look at the salt fields where in days gone by families of up to ten shared homes with perhaps five other families also with up to ten members all summer to skim the salt off the fields as the water subsided. The salt was scooped up and without filtering or washing bagged and off to market it went.

The town of Koper where the ship was docked, also had an old town and a small area flagged off for swimming. It was a Saturday and as the temperatures were high it was as busy as you would expect. Sand isn’t really a thing so people were camped out on the grass with little shade. 

Slovenia is extremely close to the Italian border and people here speak both languages plus learn English. 

It is also easily within sight of Croatia and at least people could say that although they didn’t get there they did see a small stretch of its boundary.