If you haven’t heard of Lake Bled or the country of Slovenia yet, don’t worry you haven’t been living under a rock. Slovenia really hasn’t been on many people’s radars, until now. Its magical, fairytale land is much less undiscovered because of how beautiful it is.

Lake Bled is probably one of the gems of the country. It is at the least what the country is slowly becoming known for. Lake Bled, the scenic, picturesque lake with a stunning island in the center.

There really isn’t a bad view or angle of Lake Bled. Let’s be honest, it’s photogenic from all sides. I, however, found the most beautiful view of the Lake and it’s from above. No, you don’t have to pay tons of money to see it from a hot air balloon, though that would be a dream. The Ojstrica hike is by far the best way to take in Lake Bled. Here’s how to get there.

Be warned, this hike can prove to be a little difficult, both to find and while on it.

TRAIL HEAD

The signs for the entrance to this hike are pretty hidden especially if you get there at 5am in the pitch black to catch the sunrise at the top which I highly recommend. There are actually two ways to start this hike. One is from a parking lot and the other is just off of the main street. We were dropped off near Camping Bled. When you see the Camping Bled sign, look to the far left in the brush. There will be a slight opening and a sign that reads Ojstrica. The sign at the driveway of the parking lot also says this.

The First picture below is the view of the trailhead from the street. The second is the entrance to the parking for the second entrance.

PATH

The path can be a little tricky especially since it is actually pretty steep and at multiple points very rocky. On top of that, we took 2 wrong turns. The first one was because we missed the turn to start heading upward and is the reason we discovered the alternate entrance from the parking lot. For the most part just follow the dirt trail that looks cleared. It was rather slippery when we went since it had poured the night before, so be careful!

OJSTRICA VS. OSOJNICA

While these two words look crazy similar, they are actually two very different hikes! Don’t be fooled! This was our second very wrong turn. Since there was no service, we had to rely on our memories of what we had read on our research for this hike. We were pretty sure that the best unobstructed view was a shorter hike called Osojnica. Boy, were we so wrong. This mistake lead us 20-25 minutes out of the way and to a small view point surrounded by a chainlink fence. Not to mention a very steep hike up what seemed like a vertical hill. Osojnicia is actually the longer hike, to a higher viewpoint. As we backtracked, we found the faster, easier hike up Ojstrica was only 5 mins vs that dreaded 20.

Our mistake did lead to making it to the viewpoint just after sunrise when all the hikers were starting to leave! If you want the place more to yourself, head there just after sunrise, or wait 10-15 mins and the people will start to clear out.

You can see in the photo below, the Ojstrica sign points up to the right.

TIME

If we had taken the correct path, I believe the hike would’ve only taken us about 30 minutes to get to the top of Ojstrica. Remember if you head out in the dark, bring a light. You are hiking through the woods.

That’s it! Now you know how to get the best view of Lake Bled. And you know the difference between Ojstrica and Osojnica. Don’t get them confused!

Here’s a funny story to go along with this hike. Not only did we take a couple wrong turns in the dark, but we also did this hike in dresses. Not the most practical hiking attire and probably not something I would recommend. Though, they did make for some beautiful pictures. Oh Instagram! I did tie up my dress and hiked in tennis shoes, so I wasn’t totally crazy. If you did happen to see us on this hike though, you probably would’ve thought we were.

Happy hiking!

Yours Truly // Shannon

Best View of Lake Bled