Slovenia

Although Slovenia is a country with definitely small place (20.000 km2), it is extremely rich in natural merits: mountains, forests (more than 10.000 km2 of surface), beautiful and transparent mountain lakes, and a coast at the Adriatic Sea.
The climate is continental in the central parts, alpine in the North-West and Sub-Mediterranean along the coast.



Some facts and numbers about the country:

Full name: Republika Slovenija

State system: Democratic parliamentary republic since 1991; member of the EU since 1 May 2004

Capital: Ljubljana, with 258,873 inhabitants

Official Language: Slovene, in some areas also Italian and Hungarian

Anthem: the 7th stanza of France Prešeren’s poem, the Zdravljica (Toast); set to music by Stanko Premrl

Currency: Euro

Country code: +386

Internet TLD: .si

Population: around 2.000.000

Nationalities: Slovenian 1.631.363; Hungarian 6.243; Italian 2.258; other 324.172 (2002 data)

Main cities: Ljubljana, Maribor, Celje, Kranj, Velenje, Koper

If you visit Slovenia by plane, you will arrive at the International Airport (LJU), which is about 16 miles from the city centre, but there are many car renting companies, and you can also take a shuttle bus to downtown. To begin the journey in Ljubljana is a good choice, since it’s located in the heart of the country, and you can easily get everywhere, let it be the Julian Alps in the west or Maribor in the northeast. I found a quite good webpage to compare the prices of different cheap flight companies to Ljubljana.

When I visited Slovenia a couple of years ago, had a rail pass which was valid for a month, and could use it on all the intercity trains.Now Interrail is one of the options that offer you this kind of ticket, for the following prices:

The prices of single country passes, which can be used on 3, 4, 6 or 8 different days within a month.

Single country passes, valid for 1 month	2nd class Under the age of 26	2nd class Adult	1st class Adult
3 days	32 €	49 €	66 €
4 days	45 €	69 €	93 €
6 days	64 €	99 €	134 €
8 days	77 €	119 €	161 €

(The same prices apply for Bulgaria, The Czech Republic, Macedonia, Slovakia, Serbia and Turkey anyway.)

There is also a Eurail Hungary - Slovenia / Croatia Pass that allows you to travel in Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia. This Pass is available for 5, 6, 8 or 10 travel days within a 2-month period. The travel days do not have to be used consecutively, just like in case of the Interrail passes, but the difference is that this one is for non-European citizens only.