Apartma Katarina

Apartma Katarina is in Bodešče, a farming hamlet of the municipality of Bled stretched along the Sava Bohinjka, at a little under 500 metres of altitude and around four and a half kilometres from the island in the lake. It is a different choice from that of anyone sleeping on the shore: here you are away from the coming and going of carriages and coaches, in a row of houses with a vegetable garden in front, and to reach the centre you need the car or the bicycle. Anyone looking for silence as part of the holiday finds it already in the car park.

The accommodation is a whole apartment, not a room inside a shared house. It comprises three bedrooms, a bathroom with a tub or shower and a hairdryer, a kitchen fitted with a capsule coffee machine, a dining area and air conditioning; bed linen and towels are provided. The photographs uploaded by the host show attic rooms with beams and light wood, neutral fabrics and a bathroom with a washing machine available, a detail that counts on a long stay. The most successful space is the wooden terrace facing the trees and the meadows, with two small armchairs and sheepskins over their backs: that is where this apartment is at its best on summer evenings. The private parking is free and on site, the wifi is included, the whole house is non-smoking.

The rule that brings this property into the catalogue is blunt: the booking portal, in the section devoted to child policies, writes that children are not allowed, and adds that no cots or extra beds are available. There are no minors in the house, at any time of year. As for the exact age, it must be said clearly that no one publishes it: the property has no official website on which to check the threshold, the portal gives no figure and indeed specifies that no minimum age is required for check-in, which is a different matter and concerns only whoever signs the registration. The source of this entry is therefore the portal, and it is right to know it: anyone travelling with a seventeen-year-old must write to the host before booking, because the answer cannot be deduced from what is published.

The house's other rules are consistent with the promise of quiet. There is no smoking, no parties or events are held, and the host states that the property is not available for stag or hen gatherings. Pets are not allowed. Management is by a private host, which means that the protections provided for professionals in the sector may not apply: it is a point the portal flags and one worth reading before confirming.

Around it there is the Bled you see less of in the photographs. The Babji Zob cave is some ten kilometres away, the Vintgar gorge is reached in a few minutes by car, and the cycle path that follows the old railway line passes a short way off. Ljubljana airport is thirty-four kilometres away, so the property also works as a base for arrival and departure. Bled castle is a little over five kilometres away.

It suits anyone who wants a whole house for a week, to cook, to have three rooms available among friends or for two couples and to come back in the evening to a place where you hear no one. It suits less anyone who wants to step out of the hotel and find themselves on the lakeside promenade: from Bodešče the lake is an outing, not a view.