Vršič Pass
After visiting Jasna Lakes on the morning of Monday 21st October, we decided to drive on up the valley towards the Vršič Pass, at 1611m the highest mountain pass in Slovenia. The current road was built in 1915 during the First World War when the Austro-Hungarian Empire wanted a route to transport supplies to the Isonzo front against Italy. A lot of the workers on the road were Russian prisoners of war, and today the road is known as the Russian Road.
As the road climbs up through woodland, there are not too many places to stop for a shot, however we did manage a view towards the head of the valley, though still shooting through the trees.
On The Way To Vršič Pass
Above a series of hairpin bends, the road emerges at an alpine meadow where there is plenty of space for parking. The meadow gives views of the surrounding mountains
Alpine Meadow Below Vršič Pass
Velika Mojstrovka from the Alpine Meadow
As the sun was shining through the trees, we once again experimented with some light and shadow images, as well as some close ups of the autumn colours.
Woodland Shadows
Autumn Colour
Woodland Shadows
Exploring the meadow area we can across an interesting old barn, which provides some good foreground interest.
Alpine Hut and Meadows
Continuing on up towards the pass, the Erjavčeva Mountain Hut is located just below the pass. Although the hut is in sight from the road, when we climbed higher to look down on it, the hut was hidden behind trees, so we could only get a view of the car park!
Erjavčeva Mountain Hut
From a vantage point just below the top of the pass there is a view towards Škrlatica, at 2740m the second highest mountain in Slovenia. The image below is a stitched panorama using a long lens which picks up plenty of detail in the cliff faces.
The Škrlatica Ridge From Vrsic Pass
We had planned to drive over the top of the pass to look at the views on the other side, however the very top of the pass was closed for road-works, so we had no choice but to return the way we had come up. On the return journey we came across another road closure due to road-works, and had to wait about an hour for the road to re-open. This was a bit frustrating as the day was one of the few sunny days of our holiday, and we would have preferred to be off exploring somewhere else rather than sitting in the car for an hour!