Bučan - Hajnžev Praprotnik / Zeller Prapotnik

Access to starting point:
From the highway Ljubljana - Jesenice we take the exit Ljubelj (Tržič), then continue driving in the direction of Celovec / Klagenfurt. After the Ljubelj tunnel the road starts descending, and on the Austrian side we follow it to the first left turn, where the old Ljubelj road branches off to the right. We park at a suitable place by the intersection, or even higher on the Austrian side of the border crossing Ljubelj.

Path description:
From the starting point, we head onto the old Ljubelj road, which is closed to public traffic by a traffic sign. The road first moderately ascends through two hairpin turns, then continues along the stream to the ruins of the former church of St. Lenart, beside which stands a somewhat larger marker. Here the road turns left and gradually distances itself from the valley. From the road nice views begin to open onto Palec and other surrounding peaks. The road further leads past a smaller intersection, where we sharply continue right on the "main" road, then in a moderate ascent cross steep slopes (danger of falling rocks, or in winter snow avalanches and slips). Higher the road makes a few more hairpin turns, then brings us to a marked junction.
From the junction we continue left in the direction of the marked path to Košutica / Loibler Baba (straight to Koča na Ljubelju less than 10 minutes) and continue the path on a poorer road. The marked path soon turns right uphill from the road and initially ascends steeply. The path soon levels out and turns left. A traversing ascent to the left follows, on a path that is usually quite slippery. After a few minutes of traversing ascent the path brings us to the border ridge, where it first ascends gently to moderately, higher for some time quite steeply ascends. During the steep ascent a nice view opens on looking back towards Stol, Vrtača, Palec..., and the steep path brings us to a metal ladder, where with the aid of safety gear we steeply ascend. Above the ladder a few more steel cables follow, then the path levels out and the demanding part over Rjave peči is behind us. A little further we cross another grazing fence, then the path leads us across the grassy slopes of Grunt. With nice views on Lokovnikov Grintovec, Košutica (Ljubeljska Baba), Veliki vrh in the ridge of Košuta and other surrounding mountains, we soon arrive at a marked junction, where we continue slightly left in the direction of Hajnžev graben and Koča pod Košuto (straight Košutica, right planina Korošica).
From the junction the path first descends slightly, then turns right and crosses the slopes of Košutica to the left. At first we still descend slightly, then the path behind an interesting cliff begins a traversing ascent. After a few minutes of traversing ascent, with nice views on the surrounding mountains, we quickly reach Dovjakovo sedlo, where we cross the grazing fence once again.
At the grazing fence a path branches left to Lokovnikov Grintovec, we slightly left seek the continuation of the marked path, which traverses descending to the other side of Lokovnikov Grintovec. After a few minutes of traversing descent the path brings us to an indistinct ridge, along which we continue the descent to an indistinct saddle between Lokovnikov Grintovec and Hajnžev Praprotnik.
At the mentioned saddle an indistinct marked path turns right downward toward Hajnžev graben, we continue left across the grazing fence, then easily descend toward the northeast. On this section the trail completely disappears, we continue over gentle terrain to a cairn, behind which a poorer trail appears on the slope (if here we continue left downward we arrive at Lokovnikova planina, if we keep right along the ridge the passage is blocked by dwarf pines).
In the continuation it is very good to stick to the poorer trail, as it leads us through the steep section without major difficulties. Above the steep slope the path enters among dwarf pines, occasionally still steeply ascending. Higher we reach the ridge of Hajnžev Praprotnik, the path then continues for some time through occasionally quite overgrown dwarf pines. Despite occasional greater overgrowth, the trail through dwarf pines can quite easily be followed.
On the ridge the path levels out, and a few shorter ascents and descents separate us from the main summit. Before the ascent to the summit the dwarf pines end, we first steeply ascend to the ridge, along which then in some 10 steps we reach the panoramic summit.
Starting point - Dovjakovo sedlo 2:25, Dovjakovo sedlo - Hajnžev Praprotnik 55 minutes.

On the way: Dovjakovo sedlo / Dovjaksattel (1728m)