Livin the outdoors life

It's been a few days since I last posted anything, and for that, I'm sorry. I had access, but it was in a smoky, nasty pub with swarms of flies, and I just didn't think it was worth the hassle. I'm currently in the far northwest corner of Slovenia in a village just outside the town of Kranjska Gora, only a couple of km from both Italy and Austria (I was actually in all three countries at some point yesterday). Where I am, the forested mountains dominate the landscape, with the farmhouse I stayed in last night perched against one side of the valley and the other side of the valley sitting a mere couple hundred metres north of here....it's amazing. It's funny, but I've realised on this trip that I really do enjoy the 'hiking in the Alps' part as much as the 'wandering around grand and interesting cities' part (and I thought I was just coming for the cities!). So far, it's been a really nice balance of the two, and, although I'll soon be out of the mountains, I hope to be able to keep it going with the upcoming 'swimming in the Adriatic' part. I'll let you know how it all turns out... =)
I've posted some more pics on the flickr site, and maybe when I get to Croatia tonight, I'll try to put up a few more on here, now that I think I have this 'posting pictures' thing working (it's hard to figure it all out when everything on the screen is in Slovene!).
I had a great time in Ljubljana. The first night there, I stayed in an old villa and met some really great people. It was mostly Canadians and Americans staying there at the time, and weirdly enough, I was hanging out with the Americans to avoid the really annoying Canadians....what a bad state of affairs! Anyway, I was there on their Day of Independence, so we managed to check out part of a free outdoor concert with some decent Czech rock and some really awful rap. We were probably the oldest people in the crowd, and all the high school kids seemed to really dig it, but....
The last two nights there were spent staying at an old converted garrison barracks (military prison, essentially), which they've redone into a pretty awesome youth hostel, in an old squatter's section of town. The hostel itself was fun, but even better was the section in behind....go around the corner and you find these underground bars/clubs in these abandoned buildings where a bunch of interesting Ljubljana youth hang out. So, needless to say, we got some beer and homemade schnapps, and pulled up a log and/or Persian rug in the middle of the parking lot, and got the night started! After a while a couple of girls and I went in search of some music we heard, and stumbled upon a gay dance club, where we proceeded to dance the night away. I'll try to post a pic of us with our froofy girly drinks (the only thing they really served). All in all, good times in Ljubljana!
From there, it was off to the beautiful town of Bled, further north in Slovenia. Great town, terrible hostel. But I was hanging out with the same girls, so all was good. A couple of us went on a walk in Vintgar Gorge, and it was one of the most beautiful places I've seen, with this crystal clear water pouring through ancient rocks, cutting its way through the mountain. I'll get some pics up of this too, to get some idea of what it was like. Oh, and there's a diving world championship going on there now, so we got to watch people hurl themselves from a 23 metre board. You must be CRAZY to want to hit the water from that height. It was intense.