Bitenjska planina - Gladki vrh (Ratitovec)

Access to starting point:
We drive to Bohinjska Bistrica and continue driving towards Soriška planina. After a few kilometers of ascent we get to a crossroad, where the road towards Soriška planina branches off sharply to the right, and we continue straight in the direction of Železniki and Škofja Loka. Further, we drive for approximately 1 km, and then we get to a smaller crossroad, where a road towards Ribčeva planina branches off to the right. At the crossroad, there are signs for Ribčeva planina and Ratitovec. We park a few meters before the crossroad on a macadam parking lot.

Route description:
From the parking lot, we first walk to the nearby crossroad, by which we notice the first signs for Ratitovec.
We continue right on the road in the direction of Ratitovec, and at first the still asphalt road quickly leads us into a dense forest. We walk for approximately 10 minutes on the mentioned road, and then blazes point us slightly to the left on a marked footpath which continues on a grassy cart track, this one along the stream Bitenjski graben. Higher, we return to the road, which we reach right at the smaller crossroad. We continue on the upper right road, on which we quickly get to Ribčeva planina.
From Ribčeva planina we continue on the road, and a little higher it brings us to a crossroad, where we continue right. From the crossroad, we walk on the road for approximately 2 minutes, and then signs for the footpath to Ratitovec point us to the left on a marked cart track which higher changes into a somewhat steeper mountain path, which soon crosses a forest road and flattens behind it. On the other side of the road, we continue on the cart track, and then we quickly leave it as blazes point us right on a forest path, which at first still moderately ascends, then gradually descends to the nearby forest road, which we follow to the left. We continue the ascent on the road, and we walk along it in a few minutes to its end, where there is a larger parking lot and turning area.
From the parking lot, we continue on a wide cart track which starts relatively steeply ascending through the forest. After approximately 10 minutes of walking the cart track flattens, then a little further it brings us to the cottages on planina Pečana.
A few steps above the mentioned cottages we come out of the forest onto grassy slopes, and we continue on the right side of the planina only a few more meters, then at the junction we continue right in the direction of Krekova koča (straight Kosmati vrh). The path ahead starts moderately ascending through increasingly sparse spruce forest. Higher, we finally step out of the forest onto the expansive pastures of Ratitovec, where we leave the cart track and continue the ascent on a somewhat less visible but marked path, which after a few minutes of further walking brings us to the summit slopes of Ratitovec, where the path from Soriška planina joins us from the right. We continue left on the increasingly panoramic path, which leads us past the winter bivouac, all the way to Krekova koča na Ratitovcu, which we reach after less than 5 minutes of further walking.
From the koča we continue left on a somewhat steeper path in the direction of Gladki vrh. We then follow this increasingly panoramic path all the way to Gladki vrh, which we reach after 5 minutes of further walking.

Along the route: Ribčeva planina (1115m), Planina Pečana (1472m), Krekova koča na Ratitovcu mountain hut (1642m)

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