Explore Radovna Valey in Triglav national park by ultimate Bled e-bike tour

Explore Radovna Valey in Triglav national park by ultimate Bled e-bike tour

The valley is named after the Alpine river Radovna, situated between the Pokljuka and Mežakla plateaus. Radovna valley surprises us with many historical monuments and natural attractions, which are much easier accessible by e-bikes.

Itinerary
This is a typical itinerary for this product

Pass By: Radovna Valley, Radovna, 4247 Zgornje Gorje, Slovenia

We ride e-bikes to Radovna valley from Bled, taking the side roads through village Poljšica at Gorje and Krnica, where we cross the bridge and admire the trickle of the river Radovna for the first time.

Radovna valley lies in the national park Triglav, and it is named after the Alpine river Radovna – approximately 20 km long beauty, that begins in Upper Radovna and descents 250 m to its outflow to Sava Dolinka river.

We take the less trafficked road through the valley and observe numerous natural and cultural landmarks.

As the Carniola region was brought to life in the Middle Ages by ironmongery, we will find some of the blacksmiths remains along the path. There used to be more than 10 buildings here, where they used to melt iron with the help of coke fuel from the 16th century to 1901, but most of them are gone now.

The valley narrows down on several places and nature's surface dynamics is shown by numerous boulders at the bottom of the valley. The most famous boulder is called »ta debev kamn«, meaning The fat stone, that stands right next to the road. At one point, it rolled down from Mežakla plateau and the legend says, there was supposed to be the French army in the valley and one of the soldiers has carved Napoleon's initials into the stone, so it became known as »Napoleon's stone«.

Požgana Radovna (meaning Burnt down Radovna) reminds us of the horrors during World War II. The monument and remains of Smolej homestead are silent witnesses of the tragedy when the Germans burnt down 12 houses along with 24 locals in Srednja Radovna out of revenge.


Pass By: Lake Kreda, Radovna, Zgornje Gorje Slovenia

Radovna used to be known for digging quality chalk – one of the finest in Europe. The lake Kreda (literally meaning Chalk) arose when the water slowly filled the hollow, made by an open pit. The digging was namely dropped in 1985 because of its economic insufficiency as well as its out-of-date machinery. The lake is usually not found in maps but was found by many species of amphibians, and in summer the shores are full of swimmers.

Pass By: Radovna River, Krnica Slovenia

The Psnak sawmill and watermill are located 300 meters from the source of the Radovna River in the village of Zgornja Radovna. They were built at the end of the 18th century in the times of Maria Theresa and operated till the 1970s. They were renovated in 1997 to keep a proof of former way of working, knowledge, and resourcefulness of the people, who knew how to exploit natural resources for their own good and at the same time preserve the nature. It is interesting, that the mill wheel only turned in spring and autumn, as in summer there was barely any water. And even then, their use was extremely carefully aligned, since the same water powered both the water wheel and the sawmill, so they could both operate at the same time.

Next to Gogal homestead in Zgornja Radovna stands a mighty Gogal linden tree. At 25 m high, its trunk measures more than 2 m in diameter and it is estimated to be 380 to 450 years old. According to locals, the tree is even older – 800 years.

Pocar homestead in Zgornja Radovna is one of the oldest homesteads in Triglav national park. At first, there were supposed to be only pasture hills, and only later people moved to the valley and stayed forever.

The homestead is mentioned as Potzer's in a preserved document dating from 1672, and it has a year number of 1775 curved into its house beam. The house was inhabited by many generations and today it is a monument that represents life, work and cultural heritage to its visitors. We will see its interesting exhibit.

In Zgornja Radovna, the valleys Krma and Kot, which go up towards Triglav (Slovenia's highest mountain), meet each other. Here you have 2 options:

If we feel sporty, we will go to Krma, where there is Kovinarska mountain hut waiting for us after a few kilometers of mild ascent. We'll take a break and have some typical mountain dishes. Otherwise, we can turn back to Radovna valley before heading to Krma – in both cases, we return to Bled by the same route.