You might know already there are a few big Caves in Green Slovenia?

Well actually there are over 15,000 discovered caves and over 30 show caves and with respect, every single one of those show caves is probubbly more amazing than the best cave in your country..

There are also quite a few Ice Caves here too and we are gonna tell you all about the one known as "the Golden Cave", cos in it's pomp, ice cubes from this little old Slovenian cave were rattling around the glasses of Martini drinkers as far away as Eygpt!!

final steps down to the cave..

And that is not all for this particular story, cos these ice caves are geologically very different to other caves here & around the world and this is the reason they have ice inside them..

So imagine the green terrain of the third most forested country in Europe, with huge Karst forests absolutely covered in white limestone rocks..

Then as you approach these very special ice caves, the flora & fauna starts to merge with the underground as the large trees turn to dwarf pines, then shrubs and moss the nearer the cave you go..

Above the cave..

Now  inside the cave, this green persists until you meet a covering of snow and then at the very entrance of the cave there is ICE ICE BABY! (If you got this last reference, congratulations, but it means you are pretty old too)!

We always knew there was a famous Ice Cave near the Lodge, but there are a lot of amazing wonders of Green nature around here, but we finally decided to go visit when we heard the forest gravel road that leads to within a few KM of the Ice Cave location had been upgraded to a tarmac road..

So now we just had to go see where this road actually went and find the cave too!

Way down to the cave from the little car park..

How to get to the Ice Cave..

We are so lucky here at the Lodge to be just around the corner from the uber beautiful Vipava Wine Valley, just 20 mins by motorway and on the other side of the mountain that marks the gateway to the Mediterranean AND the start of the Dinaric Alps.. Nanos..

But there is another spectacular "kinda off road, but still on road route adventure" for guests to reach the Vipava Valley, taking a secret stone road up through the forest above Predjama castle and then snaking along a stunning Karst road that reaches a long plateau, 1,000m up with incredible views over the Valley AND an epic hike to see a Natural Stone Window.. the Okno..

The cute little village of Predmeja sits just 45 mins from the Lodge at the end of this Green adventure, 1,000m up with epic views OVER the Vipava Valley and ACROSS to paragliders floating around in front of your very eyes!

This tree had funghi all the way up like an escalator..

From Predmeja you take a left turn down into the Vipava Valley on a fantastic wiggly mountain road with 3 little tunnels blasted into the rock to go off and start your Vipava Valley adventures..

Well, from Predmeja, you could also turn right, (have a look at a map on our location page if you like), but we had never been that way before, partly cos it is so much fun driving down to the Vipava Valley and partly cos we already mentioned the way towards Čepovan was previously a stone forest road..

Well now there is a shiny new road to try out and just follow the signs towards Lokve and Čepovan and there will soon be a sign for the "Big Ice Cave", VELIKA LEDENA after a few km, so swing a right and your forest adventures can begin!  

Hard to imagine how the ice was transported out from here and ended up in Eygpt..

the Ice Cave..

You should not be surprised to find out there are A LOT of forest roads in Green Slovenia, but you might be surprised to find out how well maintained they are..

Maybe there will be the odd pot hole or two, but these roads are principally used by tractors or trucks transporting logs, locals getting to their forest plots and local hunters, who all know exactly where they are going, so this is often the reason you will usually find ZERO signs and it is very easy to get lost in a maze of forest roads!

The signs to the Ice Cave are fortunately very good though as long as you remember that Led is ice and Jama is cave and it is not so far from the shiny new road!

This way to the cave..

There is a dinky little car park with a picnic table and for most visitors you will have an overwhelming lovely feeling of being completely surrounded by trees!

Maybe this will be the only time you get to go into a proper forest on your Green Slovenian adventures and now you need to leave the car and walk down the rock driveway to the cave..

Little car park with picnic table..

Cave History.. or at least "Recent" History, cos it is pretty old!

The reason there is such a good rock road down to the Ice cave is that locals realised they could sell blocks of ice if they could transport them, principally to the main port in the area, which was Trieste..

So the ice was transported from the cave using ever evolving methods and provided a valuable income for local people, who otherwise pretty much only had forestry or frming as the other possibility to make a living.

You can see the green undergrowth inside the entrance to the cave..

Apparently the ice was packed into wooden boxes and put inside bigger boxes lined with ice and leaves to keep the ice frozen, but any body who has been in Trieste in June can tell you how hot it can get..

Trieste is an old Slovenian town, made into a city port for the Austro Hungarian empire and still the major entry point for Europes coffee.

But even knowing this it seems incredible that ice dug from this cave made it all the way to far off places like Eygpt!

Slippy forest steps down..

Down to the Cave..

From the access road there is a short hike down into the forest, just be a bit careful of slippling and the anticipation rises as you wonder what an ice cave will look like?

The answer is a normal cave look from the outside, with steep steps down and safety wires on the even steeper path into the cave mouth.

The green vegetation is there to see and we would never advise to do anything dangerous, so you will have to decide what to do next when you meet a sign that tells you not to enter.

The answer to this question might be to find a local cave guide who can safely take you into the cave.. We saw ropes and steel cables inside, so respected the sign.

This is what a Karst forest looks like, with trees growing out of the white sharp limestone rocks..

Where did that new road go, by the way?

The newly surfaced route is nothing short of a revelation for us, cos it is ANOTHER way to get to the uber beautiful Soca River and stunning places like Most na Soci and Tolmin.

Yes this road will take a little longer than the googled alternatives, but some days you just wanna jump completely into Green nature and this is one fantastic way to do it..

It is bendy, curvy and wiggly, dominated by hills and forest with surprising little villages along the way, so why not consider giving it a go!

The Boroevic Road between Cepovan and Most na Soci with lots of trees and notta lotta other cars..

Of course you can return from the Soca Valley much quicker, but this is a really Green, fully tarmacked option to go explore, for which we have an Austrian General Boroevic to thank for building this epic connection to what was the WW1 Isonzo Front at the Soca river..

Anyway, if you are interested, we did another article about using the Boreovic road coming from Most na Soci direction and you can read that here.. The Cave with the 60,000 Yr old Flute..

We will certainly return to this Ice Cave with a local guide and let you know all about it then and if you remember the words LED and JAMA you might now spot where other Ice Caves are all over the map!