During the night I’d heard the neighbours above us closing the shutters after midnight. They were noisy, and inconsiderate since they’d arrived back. We suspected we knew who from our group was there. I did sleep in short blocks; so when I awoke to my alarm at 06:00 I was still ready to run.

Unlike previous runs where I didn’t really know where I was going to go, or didn’t plan on sticking to a route I’d come up with blindly before leaving home - here I stuck to the plan. Mostly.

I ran from the apartment down the road to the lake and then proceeded to run clockwise laps of it. There are places where the route moves away from the lake for one reason or another, and different types of surface too; but for the most part it is flat. The exception is when I was getting closer to finishing the first lap - there is a bit of a hill on one of the bends.

The advantage of running two laps around Lake Bled is that I got to see spots where I could take photographs with my camera later, though it was already looking photogenic. Extremely fine mist was hovering just above the water, and then at a much higher level, above the height of the island I could see fog rising up from behind. I wished I’d got my camera with me.

As the second lap was coming to an end I saw a sign up a dirt path that said it led to the castle. I decided this wouldn’t be a bad idea, so followed it and very quickly found myself jumping over a fallen tree blocking the path. It was a difficult path to run on in the rain - I had to be very careful not to go too fast, and in places it’d suddenly drop in height by a metre and I’d have to climb down.

Eventually I reached the castle, and after a lap of the car park I spotted a deer on the far side. It was standing straight, looking straight at me. Was it a statue? I couldn’t remember whether one had been there before, but it was motionless. I edged closer slowly, just in case, and found it then started to eat the grass. So it was real then.

When I started to get even closer it hopped into the undergrowth and vanished. If there’s one though, then there might be more so I decided I’d run along the road to get back into the town. It turned out this was a bad idea as I took a wrong turn at the bottom and found myself needing to check my map to determine where it was I needed to go.

Somehow, I found my way back to the apartment so I could have breakfast and get ready to go out. We weren’t sure what the weather would be like, but we decided we’d risk venturing out and catching a bus to Vintgar Gorge.

I expected a bus station to have plenty of buses outside of it, though this one didn’t which is what made it a little harder to find. For €1 we bought a ticket that would take us to the gorge at 09:45. When we got there we'd have a fixed amount of time before the next bus - or a long wait until the one after.

Once we’d entered the park the majority of it was on boardwalks along the gorge wall. In various places we’d cross from one side to the other with a constant stream of traffic in either direction. It wasn’t as busy as Plitvice, and I think this made it better. I could imagine what this would have looked like with the sun shining through the gorge - I think it’d have made the waterfalls look even better than they were now.

Towards the bottom of the gorge it started to rain, lightly at first, but once it got heavier we were able to take shelter at the ticket hut. After a quick snack we continued down from the hut to the last waterfall, and then began the return journey.

This was much quicker, and eventually the rain stopped altogether. Although it remained cloudy - just as it had been our entire time in Bled. We’d made it back up in time for the 12:45 bus back to Bled - the last one before there’d be a five hour wait for another.

Unlike every other stop along the route, which was the same as it had been going out; on the way back the Bled stop was not at the bus station but outside the supermarket we’d been to the night before. It suited us okay - it meant a shorter walk back to the apartment for lunch outside.

After some food, we walked back down to the lake, and paid €14 each to take a Pletna boat across to the island. This is a rowing boat, similar to a gondola but with two oars from a standing position. From the spot we took the boat it meant a reasonably long journey across the lake.

We had forty minutes on the island to see everything. As it happened, that was about right so I guess they know pretty well how long it takes. We started by taking the stairs up to the church, and paid another €6 to go inside, though all we could really see inside was a queue to ring the bell. It didn’t feel worth it.

It wasn’t until we went outside we found the entrance to the bell tower, and found this ticket covered that also. It seemed a little more worthwhile considering this was the first one Lindsay had been able to climb - she’d gained some confidence from climbing a tower in the fortress of Pula. Perhaps that made it worth the price.

The steps were big, and safe, so that was good. However, the windows at the top, weren’t actually the top so didn’t have as good a view as it could have been. A mesh also protected the windows, which prevented photography as well.

We looked around the island a little more, and got back to the boat five minutes before we were due to leave. On the way back to the shore the boat turned a few times to allow some photographs.

The only activity we could think of that we hadn’t yet done was to walk around Lake Bled. We bought a drink first, and then started our long hike. There were many photograph stops as you may expect, but having ran around it hours before meant I’d got a good idea where would be best for our stops. By the time we’d completed the lap, it’d taken just under two hours.

It’d been a long day, and my feet had already covered twenty one miles. Though we still needed to walk back to the apartment to meet up with the group for a farewell meal. On our way there I pointed at a grill and commented we’d probably end up there as it wasn’t too far away. As it happened, that was exactly where we went to eat.

It was a good meal, though it wasn’t the complete group. Two of them had been to Ljubljana during the day and had not yet made it back. One of them did however make it back in time to talk to the group after the meal, whilst we were standing around outside the building.

This was it - the end of our second tour. Tomorrow we’d be trying to find as much shelter from the rain as we could whilst waiting for our eventual transfer. Fortunately we’d be able to leave our luggage with the owner. It seemed we never really got to know anyone in this group, and now it was too late.