Food Orgasms and Reality TV

Day 6 - There is something magical about Ljubljana. It's not really anything you can put your finger on exactly, but something in the air. I know what you're gonna say, "that's very very lame", but it's also true. Waking up in a supper shitty yet at the same time super awesome hostel room and going to have breakfast in a cafe on the river is ridiculous. I love it. We immediately realized that we needed more time here, so I pushed out our Budapest apt. reservation one more day.

After walking around the city for a bit we went on a boat tour where the driver went on a beer run prior to departure. The ride was very fun and very relaxing, but then again it might be the beer talking. we passed by an otter swimming in the river and the boat driver told us that there used to be an otter farm by Ljubljana and a couple of the otters escaped and now there are thousands of them around the city. I thought that was really cute :)

As we walked around the city for a bit after the boat ride we saw a guy selling one of those wooden puzzles that you need to figure out how to take apart and then put back together again. Girls 3, Boys 0. MVP for the girls team = Olichka for doing both of those things first. I am putting this to paper so I have documented proof. Feel free to argue later about who is smarter Mike Livschiz and I will whip this baby out in three seconds or less. Just saying.

One of the things that we had booked for Ljubljana was dinner at an underground restaurant. The basic concept is that someone cooks for you in their house and you give them "donations" in return, but there is no zoning, no liquor license, no rules, just food. The meal was ridiculous - 5 courses of pure awesome. The dessert was so decadent that if I write about it I would have to make this blog rated XXX. AAAAHHHHHHHH

We capped our night by going to Metelkova, which is the area in Ljubljana where the cool crowd hangs out at night. You will have to check out some of Yan's pictures of this, but here is a sampler from google. For some reason a lot of the bars were closed but we did meet a Russian chick who had lived there for 18 years, but who was really excited about meeting us. We broke it down for us in terms of what to expect here. It's a really cool place with guitar playing and people singing in the courtyard and bars that all play different music to suit any taste around. The buildings and walls are decorated in weird graffiti and sculptures and the whole place has a really nice vibe to it.

Day 7 - We decided that this will be a day when we separate and just meet up for dinner and night activities. Because we originally didn't book our hostel for this day we had to check out and find other accommodations. Mike and I ended up staying at Hotel Center, which was very reasonable, clean, comfortable and very reasonably priced. We started off our trip by checking out the hotel and then walking up to the Castle. The walk exposes amazing views of Ljubljana, and you can really see all of it once you get to the castle. I found the castle itself to be underwhelming, as there is a lot of new pieces to it done in a modern style. It houses art galleries of a grotesque and creepy nature, an old chapel, and not much else of historical value.

While we were there, we saw people with microphones and cameras and Mike asked what was going on. Apparently there was an episode of Coach Trip being filmed in the castle that day. Coach trip is a UK reality TV show where contestants get voted on and off and have challenges that they do in teams of two. The challenge for today was having the contestants practice with professional clowns and putting on a clown show. The clown theme was due to a Clown festival that just ended in Ljubljana. Mike and I decided to grab a bite and watch them for a bit. When we sat down we asked about portion sizes since the restaurant served large and small portions. The waiters reply: "The small portions are tiny, and the large are still not big enough". Love it.

After coming down from the castle, we decided to grab our bags, walk them over to our hotel, and maybe take a nap, but we got a little lost and the nap was no longer an option. We met everyone at Foculus for some pizza and were shocked when we learned that they saw EXACTLY THE SAME THINGS AS WE DID. This group is so in tune that even on our day apart we did exactly the same sight seeing. I can't believe we didn't run into each other.

The pizza was alright and I did go back to the hotel for an hour long nap while the rest of the group had coffee in a nearby cafe so that I could enjoy the rest of the night. The one thing that has been missing from this trip for sure is sleep, and all fun and no sleep makes Kathy a mean girl. There was an art festival going on in Ljubljana that night so we went and saw a fire show that was put on in a park area. We were a little worried since it was raining, and even bought umbrellas, but the show just started at 10:30 rather then 10pm and was fine. It was industrially themed and amazingly cool. Firemen were standing by in case they were needed, but all went off without a hitch. Once we were put in the right frame of mind we went back to Metelkova and this time the bars were open and hopping. We went in to one of the bars and partied for a while, but it was really smokey so we eventually escaped into some fresh air.

To cap off the night Mike, Olichka, and I found a 24 hour food place that served AMAZING kebabs at 3am as well as highly decent pizza and gorged ourselves prior to calling it a night. I was apparently enjoying our Kebab so much that I was stopped on the street and asked where I got such deliciousness. Foodie or no foodie, sometimes a 3am kebab is all a girl needs.