Another great tour is about to start. It has been forecast wet road but our riders don't get scared at all for just few drops and after the first hour we reach the Loiblpass, the first border of the day. The transition from Austria into Slovenia goes smooth: the custom control is as desert as Sahara in low season! We will have some more border crossing later on... and believe us, it won't be THAT smooth and quick...

Our first coffee stop (without coffee, everything still shut down... low season means less traffic, and less cafes...) is in Kropa, a picturesque little village at the southern feet of the Julian Alps. The signposts clearly tell us that we are far from German speaking regions...

Our planned route is blocked: few kilometers after Kropa a landslide washed out the narrow road and we are forced to ride back and invent a detour that gives us the chance to have a bite in another scenic location: the old town of Škofja Loka, while the sky is giving its best in washing the small pavilion that is protecting us.

One of the highlights of the day is the Postojna Caves, where we decide to go for the short tour in order to save some precious time for the afternoon ride.

Passing the Slovenian-Croatian border is not so easy anymore. Since we are travelling with a multi-cultural group of 11 US-Americans we thought the border cross might be done quite quickly - we were wrong! Two of these Americans are actually from Pakistan, one only having a Pakistan passport. So either the lady at the border did like our guest Ali that much and wanted to have him around a bit more, or, more likely, she just needed to check on his papers more carefully... At the end all what they wanted was his home address! And on the Croatian side, same same! This is probably a new policy: to send postcards as a welcome gift for visiting tourists!

After few back and forth the officer gives us the go and we cover in few minutes the last part of the route: the landscape in front of us changes immediately. After a long day of pine forests and mountain roads, green hills and farming villages the Adriatic reveals itself in beautiful light.

One more task is awaiting us: the yearned swim of the day, just before the dusk starts to lit the lights of the houses on the shoreside facing Rjeka and the islands we are going to visit the next days: Krk and Rab.

Karin&Manuel