Ljubljana Marshes boast a rich and complex history. 6.500 years ago there was a shallow lake covering the area, and people settled on it – they built so called pile dwellings, platforms and houses bitld on stilts, driven deep into lake bottom. Many of these pile dwellings were found around the river Ižica, one of … Read more
Kite aerial photography in urban areas is exciting and intense (you always worry about a multitude of imaginary mishaps), but the results are usually well worth the effort. Very little story this time – just nice photos of northern Ljubljana suburbs, with Stožice Arena and Stadium (by Sadar & Vuga architects) in the foreground. . … Read more
Strunjan is a village on Slovenian coast between Izola and Piran in northern Adriatic. It is a quiet, pleasant coastal village – and at the first sight it does not look like one of the pillars of the prosperity of the region, spanning many centuries. Yet it was: at the end of the bay there … Read more
While cemeteries are inherently somber places, they can be beautiful too. Žale – the largest cemetery of Ljubljana – are both. (Northwestern part of Žale cemetery – ‘New Žale’ – with urn and coffin burial plots. The hills on the right are a place for scattering ashes.) First burials were performed here in May 1906, … Read more
Beyond the northwestern end of famous and beautiful Cerknica intermittent lake lies the village of Zelše. And on the top of the hill just beyond the village there is a small church, dedicated to saint Volbenk – as bishop Wolfgang of Regensburg is known in Slovenia. (Church of St. Volbenk, Zelše, Slovenia – from a … Read more
This is Ljubljanica river’s first (partly) artificial channel, called Stržen: The Romans dug it in the 1st century AD al the way through the Ljubljana Marshes in order to shorten the travel between Nauportus (today Vrhnika) and Emona (Ljubljana). It silted up hundreds of years ago, and the water flows here only after intense rains. … Read more
March 22nd is World Water Day, so KAP Jasa went to Ljubljana Marshes in search of the last remaining wet meadows: Iški Morost or Iška moor. (A north-south view of eastern part of Iška moor. Wet grasslands transitions to shrubland to flood forest.) Within the Iški morost nature reserve, some of the finest examples of … Read more
Not all kites are workhorses. Some are pure fun: This is our Giant squid called Liggie, a showkite. Sewn by Janez, plan by master kitebuilder Ivo Van Olmen. As a showkite, Liggie the Squid can’t fly by itself; it is attached to the line of a lifter and let to wiggle in the wind. Here … Read more
First flight of our new KAP kite; 2×2 m French military design; 3,3 square meters of fabric, 738 grams including spars. It is extremely stable and has an enormous pull, so a lot of hopes are riding on this kite aerial platform. Alas, the wind was just barely enough to lift it (<5 km/h), so … Read more
We always say kite is a great scientific tool and that kite aerial photography can lead to actual discoveries (great masters at West Lothian Aerial Archaeology proved that so many times) – and now this! (TL;DR: did we discover something in the river? Probably not.) As we checked our kite aerial photos of river Unica … Read more