On the way to Bosnia we drove through Slovenia - which is also a very scenic country. I did not spend much time exploring this country but as with most of this region I am sure it has a rich history that would be fascinating to explore.

One stop we did make was at the Postojna Cave. Actually, its not really a cave rather a cave system and its the largest system in Slovenia and one of the world's largest and most diverse set of caves as well. So all in all, well worth a visit.

There are longer caves in the world, or so our guide told us, but a visit to a cave such as Postojna deserves full attention due to the diversity of shapes, expansive cave areas, stalactite and stalagmite formations and water characteristics.

What is especially nice is that most of these various shapes and formations can be seen by every visitor, meaning tourists and not just cavers with special caving equipment. Well kept paths for tourists comprise the greater part of Postojna Cave, making it a "horizontal" cave. Thus a visit to the cave does not present any difficulties for most visitors. As someone who does suffer from some claustrophobia the enormous spaces did not pose a problem especially since they were well lit.

There are tours that take place daily and the time tables can be checked out beforehand to avoid disappointment and what's really great is that the tours are conducted in a large variety of languages; including many European languages.

On the entering the caves we all sat in this cute train that would take us on the first bit of the tour - it was more like a "stare in awe" session!!

I found myself staring up at the ceiling many time in total awe. The stalagtites and stalagmites were on different scales - some were huge! The largest we saw was about 20 metres tall!!

Its hard to describe the cave - it was cold and damp and dark... doesn't sound very nice, I know! But totally worth it - to see these miracles of nature, deep underground. These great big limestone bits of melting rock are just so weird-looking - one has to see them! They seem to have some kind of power over your eyes as you just can't help staring at them - they seem to be bits of wax melting infront of your eyes.

I would advise anyone going to dress warm and wear proper shoes - I made the mistake of wearing cotten trousers and sandals as it was warm and sunny outside! The bottoms of my trousers got pretty dirty, the cotten didn't exactly keep me warm (average temperature inside the caves is about 8C!) and the sandals let me feet get nice and cold and wet.

The 1km train ride was followed by a 1km walk up and around the caves - according to our guide we didn't actually go too far into the dept of the cave. The walk itself is along some well paved areas - a path has specially been constructed through this part of the cave system - as this is the most visited cave system in Europe!

Be warned - its a long walk along some pretty steep paths!

The good part is that this gives you an opportunity to get up close and personal to the cave and the rock formations. There is a guide assigned to every group and the group size can vary. The guides are available in different languages - which is useful.

My group has a lot of fun exploring the cave while loosely following our guide (be warned - the lights turn off in a section once the guide leaves it - we learnt this the hard way!). There are photo opportunities aplenty and you get to really get close to some of the formation. There are so many different kinds. Some big, some small, some typically look like what you'd expect - big cone like structures, and others look like dripping water or curtains draping over rock.

The walk is followed by another train ride - this time for about 2km, back to the beginning. Once again the sights are awe-inspiring and the train ride is rather exhilerating!

There is even a display of some dinosaur they found in the caves - some huge skeletal beast that I cannot remember the name of but seem to be left with the impression that it must have been a vegetarian (don't ask me why!).

The caves are even home to some kind of weird worm-thing that looks like an alien species but is actually a species that exists nowhere else on Earth and is a species like no other. To me, it looked freaky and I stayed away! Its called the Olm and its "the largest trogloditic amphibian in the world." - or so our guide and later Wikipaedia informed me.

The whole Postojna Cave experiences is a good one; the tours seem to be well organised and they seem to work hard to preserve their cave system well.

So well worth a visit!