Ski Greeting to Summer – From Snow to Sea

In recent years, many athletes have opted for various marathon challenges, connecting different parts of Slovenia with different sports, e.g.: across the Slovenian Mountain Trail in the shortest possible time, triathlon to Triglav, from the sea to Triglav, Tour of Slovenia. Similar challenges have also taken place abroad. Times for expeditions and tours have been greatly shortened, and in many projects the idea is to complete everything in less than one day. So about three years ago, I came up with the idea of connecting skiing on snow and swimming in the sea. Of course, all in one go in one day under own power – which would not be a problem in winter or early spring, as with a bit of luck I could ski quite close to the sea. At that time there is still no swimming season, the water is still cold and it would somehow be "forced". Closer to my heart was the idea: in the morning we go skiing a bit, in the afternoon we go swimming in the sea, like the others. The basic idea was to carry out the project on 21 June or later, when calendar summer begins, but unfortunately winters are stingy with snow and I decided on 1 June, i.e. the first day of meteorological summer. In June 2015, my brother Gorazd and I started cycling, but I fell and damaged the bike, so we had to interrupt the challenge. Last year I put it all aside for a bit, but this year the idea resurfaced. On the "face" (read: Facebook) I created an event and invited friends and others. Jure Noč and Rok Svetina responded and we were three fighters. Klemen Kunaver (Studiokunaver) offered to accompany and photograph – thus solving the basic logistics.



On Thursday, 1 June 2017, we loaded the equipment into Klem's van and drove to Jezersko. At 3:10 a.m. we started walking from the Ravenska Kočna valley with all the touring ski equipment and via the hunting trail past Kranjska koča na Ledinah headed to the glacier below Skuta, continuing to the highest point of the snowfield, to the wall of Skuta. For this time of year there was really little snow and a lot of rocks. However, the descent with Elan Ibex 84 skis was very good. Without a longer break, we descended, as we knew that almost two hundred kilometers of cycling to Tartinijev trg in Piran awaited us. In the valley we put all the equipment in the van and ran/walked the sandy section of the road, so we started cycling on asphalt – we used road bikes. Just before nine o'clock we were already cycling, but Rok's rear tire burst right away in the village of Zgornje Jezersko. Since we had no spare, a local helped us and we could continue together. Cycling proceeded very well from there – only to Ljubljana we were a bit organizationally confused and thus lost some time, but it was not in the first plan. Then it really started and cycling with the Scott Foil 20 bike was a real pleasure. Later, around Kozina, fatigue began to show and speed dropped. In Koper we reached the sea for the first time, but we decided on Piran and had to overcome two more climbs. We finished the cycling part around 17:40 at Tartinijev trg in Piran. Then we jumped into the water and treated ourselves to a draft beer.



In 14.5 hours we: hiked 1,100 m elevation gain and 13 km, cycled 193 km, 1,400 m ascents and over 2,400 m descents, and swam about 100 m.



The tour succeeded, but I see quite a bit of room for improvement. We could improve the time. Perhaps in the future we will change the cycling goal and add swimming in the sea with some meaningful goal.



In carrying out the project, besides friends, Prolocotrade (Scott), Elan, Slatnar, Actionmama store, Obris sports equipment service, and photographer Klemen Kunaver helped me. Thank you all very much, as we would not have succeeded without them.



Author of the photos is Klemen Kunaver.



Prolocotrade

Elan

Slatnar

Actionmama

Obris

Studiokunaver

Photos at: http://www.obris.si/turno-smucarski-blog/smucarski-pozdrav-poletju-od-snega-morja/