One of the nicest things about living abroad for a year is having the time and opportunity to really explore our surroundings. Although where we live isn’t exactly a tourist hotspot, we have an ever increasing list of “must see” places that we like to take visitors to. Just recently, a drive into the mountains to visit a little town called Tarvisio led to a rather wonderful discovery.
I love driving into the mountains. I have mentioned before that much of Friuli Venezia Giulia is incredibly flat until you reach the mountains which seem to erupt quite suddenly onto the landscape. I love to see the soft greenery of the wine region gradually become more and more dramatic.
Many of these pictures were taken from a moving car so they are not the best quality. I still thought they were worth sharing though.
We stopped for lunch in Tarvisio which, as you can see from the above sign is very close to Austria and Slovenia.
We continued our journey in the direction of the Slovenian border. At some point we picked up signs for a place called Laghi di Fusine and, as we had a little time to kill, we decided to investigate. This turned out to be a very sound decision.
We parked the car and started to walk. As we progressed the scenery became more and more dramatic.
It was such a shame that it had started to get cloudy when we arrived so these pictures don’t really do it justice. Seeing it actually made me feel a little emotional! I think the only other place that has ever had such an effect on us was Lake Atitlan in Guatemala – I guess our forever home will have to be by a lake!
I think this is my favourite picture of the day. My husband captured it on his phone. He has a knack of capturing a good shot!
What I loved about this day was, for me, it sums up the best of the landscape here: lush greenery and dramatic mountain views. I can’t wait to visit again!
Ambrosia Stitches 
What a beautiful trip and stunning discoveries…perfect for painting :-)!
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It was an amazing discovery. When we came home we were telling our friends in Udine all about it and they just responded with “oh yeah, Laghi di Fusine – beautiful place”. It makes me wonder what other places they have forgotten to tell us about!
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What a gorgeous location!
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It really is. I can recommend the top, right hand corner of Italy for a visit 😉
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Oh Italy… I can dream!
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😀 – you never know…keep dreaming!
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It looks amazing. I would love to live somewhere like that. The views are just spectacular!
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A little cabin right by that lake would be perfect, wouldn’t it?!
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I know both Udine and Tarvisio from the drive to our vacation spot in Slovenija, but haven’t been back since mid teens. This post is really stirring my wanderlust, and a bit of nostalgia.
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You will have to try and take a detour this summer 😉. Slovenia has been quite a discovery for us! We visited Piran a little while ago and fell in love with it. We are planning another drive along the Adriatic coast down to Croatia very soon so if you have any suggestions of where to go please do let me know. Thanks for stopping by!
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Sorry for getting back to you late, I’m busy these days. I haven’t been to Slovenia since mid teens either, which was like 30 years ago. I do long to come back. I loved Rovinj and the Limfjord next to it, a beautiful coast town in Croatia, with an intact medieval inner city, lots of little shops, bars and restaurants, and next to it a oh so beautiful nature reserve. But also quite a tourist spot. It is not at the coast, but the grotto of Postojna is great and IMHO a must if you have no problem with subterranean caves.
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Thank you for this. We are hoping to drive to Croatia in September with a couple of stop offs. I will keep your suggestions in mind 😀
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Glorioius! Thanks for sharing that, Amber!
Funny, my experience had been rather the opposite the 3 times I lived abroad: I was always so busy with ordinary life that really getting to get around and see things frequently took a back seat. The most recent year-long was the best for seeing the island (Taiwan), but we still have a list of ‘never got to’s.
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Thank you! I can relate – although we have had time to see some things, there is still quite a list to get through. We expect to be moving on soon and we have created quite a list of things we still must do whilst we’re in the top right hand corner of Otaly….go to Croatia, visit Ljubljana, go back to Verona to watch an opera, visit Vienna….we’ll see how that goes 😉
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