St James Pilgrim Path
If you have a quick look at a European map you can see that whether you are a general, a pilgrim or an elephant, then Green Slovenia is smack bang in the centre of everything and a major transit route for all types of journeys through Europe.
There are all sorts of marked routes, tracks, secret trails and other hikes criss crossing this little country.. We do not need to tell you that the very best ones are those that only the locals know and these will not appear in any hiking book.. On these tracks, maybe you might find the odd red circle pinned to a tree or painted on a rock to show you the way!
We are extremely lucky to have landed right on top of one of the most famous hiking treks through Europe.. the st James Pilgrim Path.. this goes from Zagreb in Croatia to Santiago in Spain and is marked by yellow arrows painted on the sides of walls and trees!
We kinda made our own luck too, locating the Lodge in the very best position for guests to easily access all the best bits in Green Slovenia..
So the Lodge sits with stunning back garden views of Mt Nanos, 1,313m which is the very start of the smaller Dinaric Alps, but a very big chunky bit of rock indeed!
We call Nanos "the Green City" and this lump of leaky Karst limestone forms a massive rock barrier all the way to the main European Alps AND is exactly the reason for the direction of the St James path and ancient Roman routes.. cos they didn't fancy hiking over Nanos.. much better to go around the side!
Parts of the St James path follow the old Roman road that squeezes past Nanos, bursting out into the Mediterranean Vipava Valley and marching off towards the Slovenian and Italian Adriatic coasts.
So if you don't mind, we are just gonna hike with you on the bit of the path that is closest to the Lodge, leading from the unique Cliff castle at Predjama all the way to the edge of Nanos.. So do your laces up, take a swig of water, grab your stick and let's go for a hike!
The St James Path from Predjama to Razdrto..
The very first thing you might be doing is taking one of those secret local tracks we mentioned earlier that are even better than the marked paths.. in this particular case the secret track that leads from our village of Landol to the most unique castle in the world at Predjama.
Deffo visit the castle and also go see the amazing Batcave below.. don't worry, there is plenty of time to do all of this in one amazing day!
There are yellow arrows showing the way from the top castle castle car park, but Lodge guests will be lower down on the secret forest track to get the best view of the castle and this is where the post marking a steep often muddy track up into the forest joins the St James Pilgrim path.
The main St James path marker to look for around here is a yellow arrow, but you might also find yellow shells.. generally anything yellow is a good sign!
This section of the St James path is mainly forested, but there are lots of open vistas to enjoy with views across the Postojna valley and the furthest mountain you can see in the distance is the volcano shape of Mt Sneznik, 1,796m, the highest non Alpine mountain in Green Slovenia.
Another little tip comes up real fast into this hike and you will need to pause for breath anyway at the top of this first little hill climb from the sign post.
There is a field on your right and a little yomping here will give you very special unique views of the castle sitting in front of a cave, two thirds the way up this huge cliff.. quite stunning indeed.
The forest path flattens out on the way to Smihel Pod Nanosom.. which is a bit of a mouth full, but translates nicely into St Michael before Nanos!
We are not showing off, we are just lucky to live here, so we have pretty much explored every path and forest track that shoots off into the forest in every direction along this particular main path, so we are entitled to say that there is so much other hiking around here to do with loops back onto the Pilgrim path if you have time and an app like Komoot!
This section is where we saw the biggest wild stag we have ever seen on our walks anywhere here and he was massive.. maybe just 20m away on top of a forest rise, suprememly confident with massive antlers.. and then he turned his head and was gone!
St Michael or Smihel as locals call it, is a lovely little village, perched on the hill just above Landol and the yellow arrowed route pops out from the forest high up, just under the pretty church.
This will be your first of several village tests where you have to look out for yellow arrows painted onto the side of walls, but soon enough you will be leaving Smihel on curvy farm tracks with sensational views of your impending meeting with Nanos.
The path heads up into the Nanos foothills towards Strane and this is where you get the best views across the Postojna valley.
Most of the path here is stone track, but there is the odd purely forest track bit where you need to keep your wits about you to avoid wandering off the wrong way.
In this section we were also once lucky enough to see the phenomenon of some crows attacking a much larger Buzzard.. You will hear this encounter first as the crows make a hell of a racket to surround and drive off the hunting bird. It is one of those miracles of nature that we probably would never have seen had we stayed sat in our comfy office jobs.. absolutely no regrets!
The forest is thick here and we also once saw up to 7 deer racing past us, just one track above in the forest.. You have close to zero chance of taking a photo of this if you are lucky enough to see it.. so our advice is to not waste this gift mucking about with your phone, but just suck it in and enjoy!
Strane is another tiny Green Karst village and you pass a stone bunker used by the occupying Italian army between the wars as you enter this village.
This is where you feel a firm connection with Nanos as you need to crane your neck up now to see the formiddable white rock cliffs, scree and green forests that you will be walking up towards.
Strane is typical of many Karst villages with another pretty church and you won't miss the huge dark green tree in the church yard, but it is worth knowing this is the largest Yew tree in Slovenia!
We are also lucky enough to have a beautiful old Yew tree in our garden at the Lodge, we guess maybe 150 years old, but Yew trees are VERY RARE in the 3rd most forested country in Europe.. the chopped wood is excellent as a canvas to mount all the hunting trophies accumulated here.
The yellow arrows now lead you on forest tracks out of Strane and along the lower side of Nanos to Veliko Ubeljsko, which is bigger than Mali Ubeljsko, cos Veliko means Big and Mali means Small!
Indeed you pop out of the forest at the top of the village of Veliki Ubeljsko and you won't be surprised to know this is another pretty little Karst village with a church!
The route follows the main road out of the village for the final stretch of this particular section of the St James path down to Razdrto, where you will finally crack Nanos and get to the end of this huge ridge!
These local roads are not busy at all, so it is not a problem to hike along on tarmac for a bit and you are directly below the picture perfect Nanos nose in very beautiful Karst farmland.
Your final target is Razdrto which is a popular starting place for locals to come park and hike up Nanos.. there are several ways up.. A major marker will also be the wind turbine at the foot of Nanos.
The Way home..
Razdrto is where the motorway and main roads squeeze past Nanos to go to the coast and Italy, so actually if you have come as far as Razdrto, the best way home now is to turn around and come back on the same route!
This hike is varied, peaceful and packed with so many types of views that it is one of those strolls that feels like a new walk going back the reverse way.
But there are multiple routes back to the Lodge.. the best ones leave the Yellow route from the villages, Veliko Ubeljsko, Strane or Smihel.. our favourite would be to get back to Strane and then walk down the incredibly steep village road to join with the old Roman road and hike back to Smihel, then dropping down to Landol and the Lodge.. job done, what a day!
Maybe you will be doing this path one way on a longer expedition through Green Slovenia and at the Lodge, we ONLY allow one night stays for guests travelling green on their own two feet, by bike, e bike or E Car.. so we totally support what you are doing!
There are lots of other bits of the St James path to find all around Slovenia and another very popular Via Dinaria or the Dinaric Way starts from Nanos heading all the way down into the Balkons for yet another Green adventure!
It doesn't really matter if you are on a marked path or not, the key thing is you are out there enjoying green nature in Slovenia, but it is so easy to get lost here on the multitude of tracks and dead end loggers' roads that we wanted to recommend this stellar and easy to find section of the St James path from the Lodge!
Your final question.. Predjama to Razdrto, maybe 2-3 hours, maybe all day, depends on you, have a great hike!
French Connection en Slovenie
