Maps Events Restaurants Cafés Nightlife Sightseeing Shopping Hotels Ljubljana October - November 2015 Autumn Festivals Film, fashion, food, wine and more! Slovenska Cesta inyourpocket.com Ljubljana gets a dazzling new promenade Issue Nº44 FREE COPY Typical style of an Argentinian hacienda. Always fresh meat, best quality beef from Argentina. Indulge yourself with our grilled specialities. Old Argentinian recipes, on typical grills imported from Argentina. Wine cellar with over 130 Argentinian wines. Argentino, Šmartinska 152, BTC, Ljubljana, Slovenija, mobile: +386 31 600 900, www.argentino.si Contents ESSENTIAL CI T Y G U I D E S Arrival & Transport 8 Planes, trains, buses, taxis and transfers Culture & Events 11 Festivals, exhibitions, music and much more 2016 Green Capital of Europe 16 Ljubljana’s greener than green status is now offi cial! Restaurants 18 Everything from A to V(egetarian) Cafés 31 Coff ee, tea, ice cream and cake in the capital Nightlife 37 Dance and drink the night away Sightseeing 40 Bridges, museums, the castle and more Cemeteries across the country, including Ljubljana’s Žale (pictured here), transform into seas of red lights in the days leading up to 1 November, which is known in Slovenia as the Day of Remembrance of the Dead, photo by Xseon / Shutterstock Shopping 48 Where to go and what to buy Beauty, Health & Wellness 52 Salons, Dentists, Massages and more Where To Stay 53 Business suites to hostel bunks Postojna 58 Home of the world famous cave Directory 60 Embassies, hospitals and general information If you’re visiting Ljubljana in the autumn months, then you can rest Maps 62 assured that there won’t be any shortage of colourful leaves or fog during your stay facebook.com/ljubljana.inyourpocket October - November 2015 5 Foreword Somehow yet another summer has already come to an end in Ljubljana far too soon. And while we do like to complain about the colder temperatures and shorter days, the begin- ning of autumn is in fact one of our favourite times of the year! After several hot lazy months, Ljubljana’s students and Publisher holidaymakers have now all returned to town, and the city’s ESSENTIAL Ljubljana In Your PocketCI T Y G U I D E S vibrant buzz of work, study and social life can once again be Drenikova 33, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia felt after the summer’s tourist rush. Tel. +386 (0)30 316 607 The autumn season is also when some of the city’s biggest [email protected], www.inyourpocket.com events take place, such as the Ljubljana International Film Fes- Director Niko Slavnic M.Sc., [email protected] tival, where non-Slovene speakers can watch top international ISSN 1855-3486 fi lms with English subtitles, the Slovenian Wine Festival, where ©IQBATOR d.o.o. visitors can taste the best local wines in one of the city’s grand- Printed Evrografi s d.o.o. est halls (and practice their Slovene by repeatedly saying ‘Na Published Published six times per year zdravje!’), the Ljubljana Marathon, where more than 20,000 par- Editorial ticipants get up early on a Sunday morning to run 42.195km for Editor Yuri Barron ‘fun’, and Restaurant Week, when two dozen of Ljubljana’s best Writers James Cosier, John Bills, Will Dunn, Craig Turp, restaurants off er special fi xed menus for the same discounted Yuri Barron price of only €15. This year also sees the launch of new major Design Mateja Štruc Photography Tourism Ljubljana, Flickr, Shutterstock , Iztok event, the fi rst ever Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in Ljubljana. Medja/Postojnska jama d.d. You can read all about these and more in our Culture & Events Cover photo by Miran Kambič section starting on page 11. As always we welcome any and all Sales & Circulation feedback, be it on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+, Ello Tel. +386 (0)30 316 602 (it’s a thing, look it up!) or even old-fashioned electronic mail. Irena Jamnikar, Karmen Hribar, Stanka Parkelj Rozina, Štefan Kodila, Vito Babič Copyright notice COVER STORY Text and photos copyright IQBATOR d.o.o. Maps copyright cartographer. All rights reserved. No part of this publication Earlier this year several blocks of the city’s main may be reproduced in any form, except brief extracts for street, Slovenska cesta, received a pedestrian the purpose of review, without written permission from the publisher and copyright owner. The brand name In Your Pocket friendly makeover, and are now endowed with is used under license from UAB In Your Pocket (Bernardinų 9-4, extra-wide pavement, additional greenery and Vilnius, Lithuania, tel. (+370) 5 212 29 76). 2008-15. lots of café/restaurant seating, as well as being Maps closed to vehicle traffi c except for city buses. Monolit d.o.o. ABOUT IYP We have been busy these past coup- le of months. Aside from launching a ESTONIA brand-new guide in Milan, Italy, we LATVIA RUSSIA have also been applying the fi nishing NORTHERN LITHUANIA touches to our new digital platform IRELAND IRELAND BELARUS at inyourpocket.com. Radically redesi- NETHERLANDS POLAND gned and restructured to place the vi- GERMANY UKRAINE sitor at the heart of the cities we cover, BELGIUM CZECH REPUBLIC our new website puts you in total con- AUSTRIA HUNGARY trol of our content on whatever desk- SWITZERLAND ROMANIA GEORGIA SLOVENIACROATIA top, laptop or mobile device you are ITALY BOSNIA SERBIA BULGARIA using. Give it a go: it‘s the biggest di- MONTENEGRO FYR MACEDONIA gital leap forward we have ever taken ALBANIA and entrenches our position as a ga- GREECE me-changing publisher in all formats. DUTCH CARIBBEAN To keep up with all that’s new at In Your SOUTH AFRICA Pocket, follow us on Facebook (facebook. com/inyourpocket) or Twitter (twitter. com/inyourpocket). 6 Ljubljana In Your Pocket ljubljana.inyourpocket.com Ljubljana Basics CLIMATE SYMBOL KEY Temperature, °C Rainfall, mm P Air conditioning A Credit cards accepted 30 150 B Outside seating H Conference facilities 20 120 T Child-friendly U Facilities for the disabled 10 F Fitness centre L Guarded parking 90 0 R LAN connection 6 Pet-friendly -10 60 K Restaurant J Old town location -20 J F M A M J J A S O N D 30 D Sauna C Swimming pool I Fireplace W Wifi CRIME AND SAFETY ros, while banknotes come in 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200 and 500 Ljubljana is one of the safest capital cities in the world, euros. The Slovenian side of the euro coins are decorated with the only prevalent crime being bicycle theft, which with among other things storks, Mount Triglav, Lippizaner is unlikely to affect short-term visitors (which we’ve also horses and a Jože Plečnik design. avoided by adorning our bicycle with flowers). Nowhere in the city is unsafe to walk at any hour, although common sense says avoid going deep into Tivoli park in the middle SMOKING of the night. Out-of-control cyclists and negligent drivers Cigarettes can only be purchased by people over 18. Slov- not paying attention to pedestrians are the only real threat enia recently banned smoking in public indoor places, to safety, as well as slow-to-react automatic doors that except in special smoking areas in offices, hotels and bars. seem to be installed in shops across Ljubljana, although these only really cause embarrassment. TOILETS DRINKING Clean public toilets can be found at Dragon Bridge (07:00 - 15:00. Closed Sun), in the Plečnik Passageway west of Zvez- Alcohol can only be sold to people over 18, and sadly after da Park (07:00 - 20:00. Closed Sun) under Butcher’s Bridge 21:00 it cannot be bought in stores. (07:00 - 23:00) and at Triple Bridge (07:00 - 21:00). MONEY EXCHANGE RATES Slovenia adopted the euro in January 2007. Euro coins come in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 50 cents, 1 and 2 eu- €1 = US$ 1.12 = UK£ 0.74 = CHF 1.10 = CNY 7.14 = ¥135 = дин 120 = руб 73.34 = W 1336 (26 Sept 2015) BASIC DATA MARKET VALUES Population Slovenia 2,048,951 (2011 estimate) Product Price Ljubljana 280,140 (2011 estimate) McDonald’s Big Mac Meal €5.70 Area Slice of pizza € 1.80 20,273 square kilometres Slice of burek € 2.00 Ethnic composition Cup of coffee € 1.10 Slovenian 83%, Former Yugoslav minorities 5.3%, Hun- Bottle of name brand vodka € 12.50 garian, Albanian, Roma, Italian and others 11.7% Decent bottle of local wine € 3.50 Bottle of local beer in a shop € 1.10 Official languages Pint of beer in a pub € 2.70 Slovenian, Italian, Hungarian Pack of cigarettes € 3.50 Local time Single bus ride € 1.20 Central European (GMT + 1hr) Movie ticket € 6.00 Longest river Litre of petrol € 1.24 Sava (221km in Slovenia) Taxi ride across town € 5.00 Highest mountain Triglav 2,864m. Borders Austria 318km, Italy 280km, Hungary 102km, Croatia More information available online 670km ljubljana.inyourpocket.com facebook.com/ljubljana.inyourpocket October - November 2015 7 Arriving & Getting Around Officially part of the Schengen zone since late 2007 and are purchased from inside the station at one of the numer- nearly completely surrounded by other Schengen-agree- ous windows, with all the staff speaking decent English. ment countries, entering Slovenia has never been easier. The bus station operates many national routes as well as With a well-developed system of buses, trains and high- regular international services. QD/E-1, Trg Osvobodilne ways throughout the country, getting around is also fairly Fronte 4, tel. +386 (0)1 234 46 00, fax +386 (0)1 234 46 easy.