Smrkci

Yesterday, Marinka, who works at the little Mercator grocery store that we stop in nearly every day, gave Rosetta, Celia, and Sy a bunch of little toy Smurfs.  Apparently, Mercator is running a big promotion on the Smurfs, or Smrkci as they’re called here (don’t ask me how to pronounce that…it seems to be missing a few vowels).  No Hefty, Smurfette, Lazy, or Gargamel, but we did get Brainy, Jokey, Harmony, and Baker Smurf, all with the symbol of Slovenia on their shirts: Triglav, the highest Slovenian mountain with its three peaks.  Of course, they think their new toys are the greatest and they made Marinka a “Hvala!” card, which elicited an “Ohhhh, Super!” response from her.  The funniest part is that the kiddos have no concept of the smurfs so they say, “…sloths.  Daddy, what are those blue guys called again?”

Weekend in the Alps

This past weekend, we drove up into the Slovenian Alps with our friends, Rok and Petra, and a couple of their friends, Rok and Martina (yes, Rok is a quite popular name here).  We shared a house in Kobarid, the location of a brutal battle in World War I (see The Soča Front from last year) and home of everything mountain adventure these days.  Chantelle and I and the kiddos shared one room and the Roks, Petra, and Martina shared the other.  Not the ideal set-up for a great night’s sleep, but we managed.

Here’s more or less how our weekend went:

Saturday morning, we woke up (much earlier than the folks in the other room…) and found a little outdoor café where we could get some cheese toast.  As we looked around, we realized we were the only table not adhering to the "There isn't a meal that can't be paired with beer or wine" policy (see the fellas at the table next to us below).  Normally, we have an attitude of “When in Rome,” but…we stuck to our bella kava.

Later in the morning, we drove and then hiked up to the top of the mountain near Kobarid where all of the paragliders take off.  It was a half-hour drive up a single-lane gravel road on the edge of the mountain, which made for some tense passing of the logging trucks on their way down.  Rosetta sang her “Mountain” song the entire way:  “Driving up the mountain, driving up the mountain, driving up the mountain…”  You get the drift.  Once at the top, the view was just spectacular.  To be completely cliché, Chantelle posted pictures to Facebook titled “The Hills Are Alive!”   The kiddos hopped from stone to stone and were most enamored with the cows (and cow poop) at the top and the fifty or so paragliders flying around.  After coming back down, we ate a late lunch and then donned our swimsuits and went for a dip in the river to cool off.

Sunday, the Roks insisted on taking me rafting down the Soča River.  So, while the kids went swimming again with Mommy and Petra, we got a raft and gear and started off.  I knew we were going to hit level four rapids at some point but had no idea what that meant, so at each rapids I’d ask what level they were.  When Rok kept responding “That was somewhere between one and two” after we’d bounced through what seemed to me to be fairly significant rapids, I was questioning the wisdom of what I’d gotten myself into.  But, of course, I couldn’t chicken out…that would be even more dumb.  Eventually, we got to the challenging part of the river and actually made it through fairly smoothly, despite Rok falling out of the raft twice and us getting completely spun around in the middle of one of the rapids.  And it was fun.  I suppose maybe I'm hitting my "second puberty," as the woman at Pipestrel suggested.

Once again, we have to give the kiddos credit for being troopers on the trip.  They were way off schedule and way worn out.  On Saturday, we got stuck behind a logging truck coming down the mountain and didn’t get to lunch until 3:00.  I’ve never seen the kids collectively eat that much at one meal.  And we didn’t get home Sunday night until 10:00.  I got to go to work on Monday, which means I not only owe my wife for the three hours of rafting on Sunday but also for dealing with nine hours of “vacation hangover” alone.

  

Haircuts and Umbrellas

On Tuesday, we went to our favorite salon here to get the kiddos haircuts.  They all thought they were very cool, especially Celia (who we are certain takes after her mother in all things fashion).  I can’t say I know what a typical salon experience is, but this goes way beyond any service I’ve gotten from the barbershop on the corner:  the kiddos get juice and cookies afterward and Mom and Dad get coffee and cookies while they wait.  They even let Rosetta test out the “automatic shampooing chair,” which brought that goofy little smile she gets when she thinks she’s doing something big-kid.

Yesterday, it was sprinkling a bit when we left the apartment, so the kiddos got to use the new umbrellas Grandma Rose bought them for our trip:  two princess umbrellas and one Spiderman.  Again, very exciting.  We made the fifteen-minute walk down to the open-air market, at which point it turned into a torrential downpour.  Thunder, lightning, and buckets and buckets and buckets of rain.  Luckily, we forgot to bring the laundry in from the clothesline (yes, our washing machine does have a dryer this time, but no, it doesn’t actually dry the clothes; and yes, you would think that reasonably intelligent folks would think to check the weather before heading out).

We camped out at a café underneath one of the footbridges by the market and watched the rain on the river.  We then café-hopped at each minor break in the rain, inching our way back toward the apartment.  By the time we got home, everyone’s sandals were soaked (but we were otherwise dry thanks to Grandma Rose’s umbrellas!).  And, of course, when we got up to our apartment the sun came out.

Apparently, it was a lot of fun for the kiddos…they are very disappointed that it’s not raining today.