Slovenia’s Top 3-tourist sights probably are the Lake of Bled, the Postojna Caves, and the horses at Lipica. The Skocjan Caves are much less known, but that doesn’t mean that you’ll be the only one visiting. Some 80 people showed up this Thursday for the 10 a.m. guided tour. Fortunately, we were divided into 3 groups later on when entering the cave system, but a “mass tourism alert” certainly is appropriate here. Skocjan lies just next to the main highway going southwards from Austria/Ljubljana to Croatia. The road is full of caravans and motorhomes heading south.

I’m no big fan of caves. The other reviewers did get me interested, however, as they all got praise for these at Skocjan. So I set out expecting quite something. The route underground is rather long, so it’s a serious hike to reach the end. Some of the older / less fit people in the group were struggling at the end and breathed a sigh of relief at the funicular taking us back the last stretch. I was tagging along at the back of the group, thinking all the time “when will the interesting part start?”

The dripstone formations are there of course, but I found them not really spectacular and I’ve seen better ones at several other WHS. The trail starts at the Silent Cave, which mostly is one big and empty hall. You can admire the size of it. After the silence, the noise of the flowing river announces the second big cave. The river nowadays flows at the bottom of the caves, and you’re far away from it. There’s a sign indicating that the caves were flooded in 1965 when the water came all the way up to the upper caves.

After 1 hour and 45 minutes, we were back at the entrance. The 16 EUR ticket was a steep price to pay, as the guide only made 3 small talks en route. Before and after the tour I walked around a bit to see the cave system from above. The natural surroundings are pretty, covered by thick forest. From a viewing point, you can see the river on the surface, the same one that ducks underground.