There is a country in the heart of Europe with two million inhabitants, bordering Italy, Austria, Croatia, and Hungary, whose natural environment is so well preserved that the international organization Green Destinations declared it, in 2016, the first country in the world to receive the title of “green destination” in its entirety—not a region, not a city, but the entire country.
Slovenia met 96% of the assessed sustainability criteria, a score no other territory has ever matched. National Geographic awarded it the World Legacy Destination Leadership Award. Condé Nast Traveller has consistently ranked it among the world’s most sustainable destinations. And most people flying to Venice or Vienna pass within less than two hundred kilometers of it without even knowing it exists.
According to the Sapo website, 61% of Slovenia’s territory is covered by forest, making it the third most forested country in Europe. More than a third of the territory is part of protected areas within the Natura 2000 network. There is only one national park, Triglav, in the Julian Alps, but 40% of the total territory is classified as a nature conservation area. These figures are the result of a culture of connection with nature that predates any international certification and is evident in the way Slovenians use the land, in the trails they hike on weekends, and in the bees they keep on the rooftops of buildings in Ljubljana.
Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia
The capital deserves a chapter of its own. Ljubljana’s historic center is closed to car traffic, which, in practice, means the city functions on foot and by bicycle with a natural ease that cities attempting to replicate this model from scratch rarely achieve. The Ljubljanica River, which cuts through the center, has cafés along its banks and lighting at the end of the day that makes tourists stop and check if they aren’t in a movie set. Ljubljana has already been named European Green Capital by the European Union and is the first European capital to commit to a zero-waste policy.
Lake Bled is a photographic scene that no filter can ever do justice to. An island with a small church in the center of a mountain lake surrounded by the Julian Alps, with a medieval castle perched on the rock above the northern shore, the water shifting from emerald green to deep blue depending on the light. It’s the kind of landscape that, the first time you see it in person, seems too perfect to be real—which is the best thing you can say about a landscape. The water temperature, warmed by natural hot springs, allows for swimming well into the fall, which is a rarity at this altitude.
Lake Bohinj, less than half an hour from Bled within Triglav National Park, is where Slovenians go when tourists are in Bled. It is larger, calmer, less photographed, and just as hard to believe. The Soča River valley, in the west, has turquoise-colored water that geologists attribute to suspended calcite, and that photographers try to capture without ever quite succeeding. Kayaking, rafting, and fishing are the local industries, and the local guides possess the quiet pride of those who know they have one of the most spectacular landscapes in Europe without needing to advertise it.
Slovenian cuisine is the least well-known aspect of the country and one of the most surprising. The country has its own edition of the Michelin Guide, six establishments that have received the publication’s sustainability award, and a culinary culture that blends Mediterranean, Alpine, Bavarian, and Balkan influences in a unique fusion found nowhere else in Europe. They say there is one vineyard for every 70 inhabitants, which gives a sense of the depth of the winemaking tradition in a country of this size.
Source: Sapo
