Champion golfer(!) and international events in Bled

In our last week here in Bled and we have had a super time.

Start of one of the races

However, there has been time for me to do a few more things before we leave. Starting with the 54th 1st May Rowing Regetta which was held from the 21-22 April (I know, go figure that one out!). It was quite a low key event with mainly rowers from Bled, Ljubljana, Maribor, Koper and a few others taking part. Prelims in the morning were followed by finals in the afternoon. Needless to say we did not get up in time for the prelims.

We managed to make it in time for the finals on the Saturday and we saw the start of a few races but as it was a nice, sunny day we decided to forego a bit of racing and went to the local wine bar instead where we sampled a (quite) few of the local wines, which were excellent especially the sparkling wine and a local red (Teran).

Gemma enjoying the rowing!

For those who know me, for me to like a red wine is quite unusual as I usually prefer white wines but Teran is well worth a go if you ever get the chance to try some. According to the owner only 20% of people like Teran when they try it so I thought it would be good for me as some say I am unusual as well!

Unfortunately, by the time we finished the wine the rowing was over. Whoops!!

During the past week Bled has played host to the European Taekwon-do ITF Championships. I was tempted to volunteer to help at the event but decided against it as it would be quite soon before we left Bled and I wanted to enjoy the time with Gemma before our return.


Paris Carbonari

I went to the Sports Hall for the events on the Friday where I managed to speak to a couple of people who gave me some tips on how the scoring worked which was useful but still didn't explain some of it, especially how you get points for kicking your opponent in the head!! After watching some of the Welsh and Scottish teams get a bit of a kicking (literally!) I noticed that one of the two English competitors were just about to "have a go" so I went over to watch her in the individual sparring junior 16-17 female under 52kg category. Paris Carbonari managed to get through to the semi-finals but unfortunately came up against a more experienced person from Russia and lost out on a place in the final, but still managed to get a bronze medal. Congratulations to Paris.

For the past couple of weeks the mini-golf course in Bled has been open and Gemma & I have played a round(!) or two there. The first round we were both a bit rusty but OK. Second round we were both terrible but by the third time we went we were both getting the hang of the course. We think it helped that we had both had a couple of beers beforehand.

Gemma scored a 44, which is considered well for the course and I scored a 42, which is considered par for the course and so I was very pleased especially as I had scored a 4 on two of the holes.

Gemma did get the better of me though in that she recorded 2 holes in one whereas I only managed 1. I had the last laugh on this though as it meant that Gemma got to pay for the beers.

Now it is time to start the packing for the return journey, although a couple more rounds of mini-golf will probably be had as well as a couple more beers!!