Borovnica – Bohinjska Bistrica 2012

Vrhnika

Ever since my failed attempt to walk toTriglav, Slovenia's highest mountain, from my home in 2005 I itched to try again. Actually, I can hardly believe it has been 7 years already since then. I guess there just never was enough motivation or opportunity. But this summer, my daughter Martina is working in Bohinj and so it seemed like the perfect excuse to go and visit her – on foot. Thus the expedition Borovnica – Bohinjska Bistrica 2012 was born. The previous time I walked to Bohinjska Bistrica it took me four days and lots of lessons learned and so it seemed only reasonable that I should be able to make it in two days this time. I only planned to go as far as Bohinjska Bistrica, foregoing Triglav on this attempt, because I have a half marathon coming up in September and I don’t want to jeopardize my running training by doing something as crazy as overstraining myself.

First of all, before starting, I reviewed my lessons learned from my previous expedition:

• First lesson, make sure you know the way. Check: now I have GPS navigation (was GPS navigation even plausible 7 years ago?)
• Second lesson, get better hiking shoes. Check: new, lighter shoes, tested twice previously
• Third lesson, don’t go in a straight line. Check: allow GPS navigation to dictate the route (should I really allow technology to take over route planning?)

On my previous attempt I made it as far as Goropeke on the first day and to Cerkno on the second day. I figured that if I started early enough and did not get lost along the way (like I did the first time) I could make it all the way to Cerkno on the first day. And I did! It was a long day though, starting at 6:00 in the morning and hiking all day, making it to Cerkno just before it was completely dark at around 21:00 for a total walking time of 15 hours. I only got lost briefly about two times, using my GPS navigation to realize that I took a wrong turn and getting back on track promptly.

Sovodenj

I checked into the Cerkno hotel, the same one I stayed at 7 years ago. It was quite funny when the guy at reception asked me, “Where are you from?”

And I told him, “From Borovnica.”

He obviously noticed my backpack and deduced that I must have hiked there so he revised his question, “I mean, where did you come from today?”

“Yes, from Borovnica.”

OK, that sank in then. I was too tired to even consider the hotel swimming pool, I just went straight to bed. My shoes stood up reasonably well, although I had two blisters on my feet but I doubt they invented shoes that wouldn’t give you blisters after 15 hours of hiking.

The next morning I continued my journey to Bohinjska Bistrica. I decided against climbing the Porezen mountain because it would mean going back down into Petrovo Brdo and up onto Soriška planina again, as I did 7 years ago. Instead, I trusted my GPS navigation that a way around through Davča had less altitude changes and was shorter in total hiking time. The device calculated my route at 8 hours and I was already looking forward to reaching my destination in mid-afternoon. What did I mention at the beginning of this post regarding trusting navigation software? Actually, I wasn’t too surprised to find out that after 3 hours of hiking time the device calculated that I still had 6 hours to go. Now, where is the math in this equation? Of course, the navigation software didn’t consider altitude adjustments and so it calculates the time it takes to walk 3 kilometers on flat terrain the same as 3 kilometers going steeply uphill. Oh well, I was actually glad that it forecasted only 8 hours when I set out in the morning, had it been more, I might have been discouraged to even start walking.

Davča

There is another lesson learned regarding GPS navigation. I was aware that GPS positioning is not exact and I soon figured out that the software on my device has a built in algorithm that wants to position you on a road whenever you are at least X distance away from a known road (I didn’t quite manage to guess what X was, in hiking time it was too much if you ask me). So if I went off course, it would take more than distance X until my GPS started screaming “recalculating route”. Even worse, whenever there were two roads close together, such as for example a V shaped fork in a road, or one of those spaghetti crisscrossing types of junctions where several roads come together, I could never be quite sure which road I was following until I was more than X distance away from all other roads. But aside from this feature, I was really thankful for the GPS navigation because it guided me quite well most of the time, sometimes even along unmarked paths through the woods. And the few times that I did find myself lost, I was at least able to use the GPS navigation to figure out where I was and which way I was supposed to go. Yes, it’s good to have technology. How did we ever manage without it?

I dragged myself up to Soriška planina, the highest point of my route, unfortunately during the hottest part of the day in early afternoon and under a scorching sun. But it was all forgotten after a cold beer at the hut and from where it was only a relatively short descent down into Bohinjska Bistrica. Yes, I managed to get lost one last time. When I had less than 20 minutes left to my destination according to the GPS, it started recalculating my route again, making it 35 more minutes. I have no idea where or how I managed to go off course, although I have a suspicion that it was somewhere in the fields where each farmer has their own road to their own field and I probably missed the correct one but the GPS didn’t notice it immediately because I was less than X distance away. In the end it added up to a total of 11 hours hiking time on the second day.

Overall, the trip was successful. I made it to Bohinjska Bistrica in two days as originally planned. If I were able to get up the next day (I admit, I was tired, my feet hurt, I had a new blister and I didn’t want to even think about hiking another step) I proved to myself that it would have been possible to reach Triglav in 3 days from my home if I really wanted to do it. Perhaps next time?