ellbie

I am currently living in San Diego, CA but I will be living in Ljubljana, Slovenia for 3 months starting this May 1 for work. I will have weekends off and would love suggestions on places to visit inside the country or out. I will probably do a couple weekends in the country but since I'll be there all through the week I will reserve most weekends for visiting other countries within a fairly easy traveling distance.

Aside from these recommendations I need to decide where I want to fly into after the 3 months for another 7-10 day stay. This will be purely vacation. I have a friend offering me her couch in Helsinki and the weather will probably be nice there the first week of March. But, on the other hand people keeping telling me to go to Barcelona and I've always wanted to see Greece.

I have read that August is vacation month for Europe so I'd like to stay away from hot spots that will be overcrowded. I also don't care about shopping and while I want to see a city I also really like exploring things that are off the beaten path. I love the outdoors and beautiful scenery. I don't care a whole lot about night life (ie: getting wasted)

I speak English and will be traveling by myself or possibly with people I meet from hostels or from my time in Slovenia.

Thanks for any suggestions!

ellbie

not sure how to edit this. Might help with suggestions to tell you that I'm a 29 y/o female.

Andrew

Wow - need someone to go with you? 3 months in Ljubljana for work in spring/summer sounds delightful!!! I love Ljubljana. If you asked me to pick a city to work in for three months in Europe, that would be on my top ten list.

Will you have a car? If not, you can always rent one for a few days at a time or take public transit. Slovenia has a limited train system that gets you many places but not everywhere (like Italy). Still, there are buses, and there are plenty of weekend trip options. easyJet flies from Ljubljana to both Paris and London, so you could certainly visit France and the UK very easily/fairly cheaply. Adria, Slovenia's national airline, flies directly to many European cities but is much more expensive (usually) than easyJet.

Venice is only a 3.5 hour bus ride from Ljubljana; trains can get you to Munich or into Austria or elsewhere in the Balkans (Croatia is really nice too). Triglav National Park, a huge park in western Slovenia is really close to Ljubljana - lots of natural beauty there. Plitvice Lakes National Park (much smaller) in Croatia is a bit further away but very worth seeing - think waterfalls and big turquoise lakes full of trout.

By the way, there some local experts on the Trip Advisor Slovenia board so be sure to post specific questions there about Slovenia and Ljubljana, if you need to know stuff only a local would know!

adrienne

I would see Lake Bled, Split, Dubrovnik, Trieste, and Venice for a start. These can be seen from Ljubljana on a weekend. There's also Istria (very popular in the summer).

For other weekend jaunts you'll have to check flight times from Ljubljana. You won't want to spend money getting to someplace if you don't have the time to see much.

I don't understand your comment about Helsinki and the weather in March.

As to where you'll go after your 3 months of working, you'll get lots of recommendations. Decide on the type of week you want and go to a place that supports your interests.

Don't forget to get a visa if you're not a citizen of one of the Schengen countries. I would start that process immediately.

bobthenavigator

Good for you---I am jealous---you will like Slovenia.
Piran
Lake Bled
Venice
Trieste
Rovinj

That is a good start for close encounters.

kja

Another jealous person!

To add to the options already mentioned: Zagreb, Varazdin/Cakovec, Mostar, Sarajevo....

ellbie

Thank you all for the comments! A lot to take in here but its getting me excited!

@Andrew, Your enthusiasm is making me even more excited. I will not have a car but like you said I can rent one. Or, maybe I will make friends with cars that want to join me. The names of the airlines and other transportation options are great info! thank you! and i'll definitely check out trip advisor next.

@Adrienne, That was a typo.. I meant to say the first week of August. I was reading that more Southern countries (Italy, France, Greece) are unbearably hot that time of year. Not sure what that means as its pretty subjective. But I figured Helsinki will have some nice weather. The problem is that I have to decide now as my company is buying my plane ticket and it has to show proof that I will fly out of Slovenia after 89 days. I would love if I could decide when i'm there but unfortunately I can't. The visa stuff is all being taken care of by my job so no worries there. Thank you!

I have a lot of research to do already but keep the recommendations coming! Anyone been to Helsinki?

kja

I'm glad to say that I've been to Helsinki, and I enjoyed it very much, but am not sure I would spend a full week (or longer!) there. As I recall, I spent about 2.5 days, during which I lost a chunk of time to jet lag. I wasn't able to visit the main art museum because it was closed for a long holiday weekend, but I saw everything else I wanted to see and at a pace that was reasonably relaxed. So it might make sense for one of your long weekends, if not your final vacation time.

adrienne

If you're getting a visa why do you have to fly out of Slovenia by the 89th day? What is your nationality?

If you're American and your company is sending you for 90 days I would guess that they're not getting you a visa. Otherwise why should your company need to show proof that you're leaving after 89 days?

I'm wondering if your company is paying for a visa and doing the paperwork just so you can stay in Europe for another week to 10 days on a vacation. Pretty nice company to work for!

Heimdall

It's not a good idea to get visa advice from a travel forum. That said, if you are limited to 90 days in 180 for a stay in Schengen, then after 89 days in Slovenia won't you have to leave the Schengen Zone? All the countries you have tagged (Finland, Greece, Slovenia, and Spain) are Schengen, so would count toward the 90 day maximum stay. Maybe you can get around this by visiting non-Schengen countries on the weekends, and getting your passport stamped, but I don't know. You need to get expert advice on this.

ellbie

@Heimdall,
Thanks for that info as I had no idea. I trust my work knows the visa regulations and they have told me it's fine for me to spend a week somewhere else after. I'll double check with them just in case. A co-worker of mine did the same program in Sweden last year and did an extra week in Spain at the end without a problem. That's definitely not something I was aware of though so thank you for pointing it out.

Andrew

Please return to this thread after you're all done to let us know how it turned out for you! We often read trip reports here from tourists, but actually living in a place is different. Plus, if you can befriend locals who can accompany you now and then on your Slovenian excursions, you see more interesting things a typical tourist wouldn't know about.

I'd love to have time to go visit nearby little Slovenian towns on weekends. Skofja Loka is one town not far from Ljubljana I enjoyed. I wanted to visit Kamnik (easy by train) but didn't have the time. There are numerous possibilities.

If you will be working close to the center of town and want some good, cheap pizza for a quick lunch, check out a place callled Pizzeria Sestinka on Miklošičeva. It's kind of too cheap/casual to make lists of recommended eateries for Ljubljana, but the pizza slices are terrific. I saw mostly locals there. There's a park across the street - you can grab a slice and enjoy it in the park on a nice afternoon.

Heimdall

By all means double-check with your employers, but the Slovenian Embassy would be the best source of information. In the meantime you may want to do some Googling on the 'Schengen 90 day rule'. Lots of Internet discussion on this topic, not all of it accurate. My understanding is that you can stay in Schengen a maximum of 90 days in a 180 day period. There are no border controls within Schengen, so the 90 days applies even if you leave one Schengen country and enter another.

One advantage of Slovenia is that it borders Croatia, which like most other former Yugoslav countries is not a member of Schengen. Therefore you could probably gain that extra week by spending a few weekends in Croatia, which you will probably want to do anyway.

hetismij2

Unless you are an EU or New Zealand citizen you really need a visa. If you are working in Slovenia for 89 days you cannot legally visit any of the Schengen countries after that. You risk being deported, or banned from returning to any Schengen country if you over stay your 90 day period.

Yes you can stretch it by a few days by going to Croatia - but only if your passport in scanned on exit and re-entry.
It will not reset the counter just mean you have a couple more days available.

Alternatively head to the UK or Ireland for your final break - lots of stunning countryside to enjoy, people speak English and both are non Schengen.

JoyC

We entered and exited Slovenia twice in a 9-day period, and our passports were stamped (and I presumed scanned) 4 times. Same thing in Croatia, whenever we exited and re-entered, we had a stamped on our passports.

rtt0921

I just want to add that that 90 days in 180 rule is only valid for tourist visits for tourists that don't need a visa to enter the Schengen Zone (the US & Canada are included).

Since she will be working she will need a work visa, so she should definitely not take any advice from us and contact the Slovenian embassy.

ellbie

Thanks rtt0921, I'm hoping you're correct. I'm wondering though because my pay is still coming from my home office in the US so I'm wondering if it really is just a tourist visa and more like an exchange program. Obviously I have some questions to ask Monday morning.

I wouldn't be opposed to Ireland though if I can't pick a Schengen country at the end.