havebootswilltrek.com

The first days out of Muggia have been very pleasant. Temperatures in the high eighties, with clear blue skies and with nothing more than rolling hills to contend with. Perfect. Whereas the GR20 in Corsica beats you down with Thors hammer as soon as you step out of Calenzana, the Via Alpina is much more gentile and gives you a chance to build up your fitness and develop your blisters at a much slower pace. At the start, it’s more like the English Lake District with rolling hills on a hot summers day than mountain terrain. I am now somewhere around Predjama having just horsed one’s ample arse over the first real mountain along the route: Nanos (or Plesa) at 1200m.

Slovenia Telecom seem to provide *FREE* WiFI access everywhere! Well, in the Hotels at least, where you feel obliged to buy a drink to use their connection. If I had any desire to browse for niche material, this is where I would do it…!

The cost of the Via Alpina has caught me a bit by surprise. So far, there have been no campsites at all along the route which means having to stay in hotels, inns and other hideously expensive establishments. This is particularly galling because I am carrying a tent with me.

And sleeping mat. And stove. And stove fuel. And food. And sleeping bag. Ok, you get the point! My backpack weights in at over 21 kilos, or about three Kate Moss’s.

The way marking for the Via Alpina is confusing or non-existant and it is quite obvious the trail maintainers have a macabre sense of humor. It is not uncommon to arrive at a four way junction with way markings going off in different colors and different shapes in all different directions with no signs telling you where to go or how long it will take to get there. Clearly, having a route across the Alps is not hard enough! I think it’s quite fitting that at the moment I am reading In Search of Schrodingers Cat by John Gribbon, a fascinating book about quantum mechanics. I have just got to the point where they are discussing alternate realities and different worlds.

This is appropriate, given that what the Via Alpina website says, and what the maps say, have no basis in our reality!

Slovenia has crazy place names. HTF do you pronounce CRNI VRH?! When you ask, the locals just look at you as if their livestock have uttered their first words. Then you show them on the map and they pronounce the name… convinced, CONVINCED, that that is how I pronounced it!

Fortunately, like all civilized people everywhere, many of the locals speak English, especially those under 30 so asking for help isn’t that difficult. For those that don’t speak English, lots of arm waving and testiculating (talking bollocks) usually works too.

My next stop and update will be in Lake Bohinj and Lake Bled (with pictures!), two places I’ve wanted to see in Slovenia for years. Infact, they are one of the reasons for doing the Via Alpina, so if they’re rubbish I’ll be gutted and will declare eternal war on this tiny, Slavic nation. The Via Alpina doesn’t go there directly, but it’s only a few hours walk from one of the stages next week. I want to spend about a week there camping, and to hike in the area and to help balance out the budget a bit. A Triglav ascent might be on the cards, too.

You’ll notice there aren’t any photographs of the terrain or the hike thus far. That’s because I can’t be bothered to get my camera out and take photos when I’m hiking up a steep mountainside, my heart beating so hard that my eyes are being forced out of my head and the lining of my lungs being ejected into my mouth. So you’ll have to excuse me on that one!

Slovenia has to be Europe’s most underrated hiking destination. It’s AWESOME!

Tchau!

The trip commences tomorrow!

Despite applying Germanic levels of efficiency to my packing list, my backpack is still too bloody heavy. Having to carry a stove, fuel, tent, sleeping mat, bag, food and (my goodness!) a second pair of clothes for three months is going to make this trek hard work. And a lack of clothes means I am going to smell like a donkeys arse on a hot day. But it seems people do traipse across the Via Alpina with this kind of weight: National Geographic contains a blog of some thru-hikers carrying this kind of weight so I am not totally disheartened, especially as I am only planning on doing about half of it.

My aim is to arrive in Central Switzerland some time in September to meet up with a friend, which means I should have done about half of the Via Alpina Red. I expect to spend about three weeks in Slovenia, five in Austria and three in Switzerland.

(This is a belated post, I had it saved as a Draft but forgot to post it )