Exploring the amazing Old Town walls in Piran, Slovenia

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Interesting how diabetes is always the most vital thing happening, but even in the face of high blood sugars you can have what you consider a “perfect” day. Today was proof of this conundrum; Masayo and I explored the seaside town of Piran, Slovenia in the pleasant December sunshine, hiking up to amazing views and eating great food all day. The fact that my BG acted up was merely a trifling annoyance. The beauty of Piran overcame even diabetes.

We just arrived here yesterday and are leaving tomorrow, so this was our only full day in this small and ancient town on the Adriatic Sea. And unlike overcast yesterday, today was sunny and clear morning until evening.

My first BG of the day was in the morning before the buffet breakfast at Val Hostel; I was 145. The buffet, downstairs in the dining area, was pretty extensive: cereal and milk, bread, cold cuts, coffee, fruit, pieces of cake. It can be easy to underestimate insulin for a meal like this, but I shot up some Humalog at the table (through my Bluff Works pants) and hoped I’d do ok.

Another guy came in and had a piece of bread as he chatted with the staff, but nobody else was eating. In fact, I hadn’t seen any other guests staying at Val while we were there. It seemed like the breakfast buffet, promised to us when we found the room on booking.com, was laid out all for us.

Now that’s a good start to a perfect day.

We finally headed out into town a little while later, and as the sun shone off the gorgeous, wide Adriatic, I checked my BG and was disappointed to find the breakfast had made me 238. We were planning on walking a lot though, so I took no insulin.

Do you ever try to bring your BG down with exercise alone? Today was a chance for me to try.

The old town wall of Piran

We hiked up a large hill to the east of town, where remnants of the old city wall stand. The wall dates from the 1400s, and has in the past acted as a defense for Piran, a town which has changed hands several times in its thousand-plus-year history. Access to actually climb up the wall is €1; you drop coins in a little box and are allowed through a turnstile automatically; no staff.

And in fact, today, only one other couple as tourists. Otherwise Masayo and I had the wall to ourselves. Stairs lead up to the top and you can walk along the length of it, including up into the occasional lookout. It reminded me of a warmer and more open version of the town walls we’d discovered in Tallinn, Estonia. (A few weeks ago, but it seems like a lifetime already.)

On the top of the old stone structure, the views were breathtaking, literally. You cast your glance down one side and see nothing but vast blue sea, almost imperceptibly joining the equally blue sky at the horizon. In another direction, a sunnier section of sea with some low mountains and characterful houses dotting the slopes and the shore.

And to the west, you look down on Piran itself. The peninsula it is built upon, coming to a point that features a lighthouse (that we walked around yesterday), seems so small from atop the wall. The tower of St. George’s church and the inviting town square are little toy models. The red roofs of the jumbled buildings are all the same color, and offset the blue of the sea beyond.

It’s one of the best views of anything I’ve ever seen, anywhere in the world.

I took the opportunity to get a cool BG selfie with Piran falling away in the background behind me; my blood sugar reading for this was 180. The exercise was working after all!

Lunch in the plaza

Having gotten our fill of the views and the agreeable sunniness of the wall on this Sunday afternoon, we hiked down some steep residential streets past tall private concrete walls and quiet-looking domiciles back to the town square. More people than yesterday were in the plaza – Italians, Austrians, and Slovenians all like to visit Piran on the weekends and this was a nice day for it.

We took out place at an outdoor cafe in one corner of the square and ordered coffees. Masayo also got some strawberry crepes, but they turned out to be larger than expected and she only wanted one. So I took some Humalog (I’m getting very used to doing this in public, discreetly) and had the other.

And so the perfect day rolled on: coffee and crepes in the world’s most beautiful but unknown town, in an outside plaza on a clear and warm-ish winter day, with a small and friendly international crowd and with the great flat sea lapping away in the harbor. Hard to think of a nicer place to be.

Near ear damage in St. George’s

After the snack we returned to St. George’s, which we’d visited yesterday briefly. Today, the campanile (bell tower) was open and there is a lady who lets you climb up to the top for €1. We went in, again with few others around.

The climb is kind of terrifying: up wooden stairs that curve around and around and seem to be held up by nothing. The inside of the campanile is very dusty. The stairs seemed surprisingly sturdy, but still – why were they supporting our weight?

You just have to trust the locals. Slovenia wouldn’t let me climb around this thing if it were unsafe, right?

The views from the top of the campanile were excellent as well, of course, if lower than those from the town wall. The sea was closer but no less stunning, and you can make out more details of the red-roofed town just below.

There are four large bells in the tower, and we walked and played among them and took photos with them. When it was time to go we went through the hatch in the floor we’d emerged from and set off down the stairs.

About eight seconds later, the bells begun ringing right over our heads. Loudly. We were instantly jolted to attention – not one minute ago I was resting my head against one of those bells for a photo! What if it had gone off then? I’d be deaf for days, if not permanently.

Slovenia has some tricks up its sleeve.

Back on the ground, feeling fortunate to still have working ear drums, we hiked along a winding back alleyway to the lighthouse at the tip of the land, and next to a pale statue of a topless mermaid I checked my BG. The strawberry crepe had been less thick than I thought; I was 63. I had a Snickers bar, and we went to rest up in the room at nearby Val Hostel.

Is anyone else seeing this sunset?

We didn’t stay too long though – the sunset looked like it was going to be particularly nice so we went out to find a restaurant to sit in and watch. And there was the perfect one, with a patio offering unbroken views of the sunset. I got a beer and Masayo got a hot tea; the sky was already turning all kinds of orange and purple over the endless water.

Nobody else was at the restaurant, and the staff left us alone to gaze at the natural spectacle that they must all be used to by now. The sun slowly worked its way down the sky, disappearing over a small, barely-visible piece of land in the distance that is in fact Croatia.

Thanks for the show, Piran.

Afterwards we went to a place off the main square where Masayo had seen a souvenir coin-crushing machine, and she added one coin to her collection. Then we went looking for dinner.

Masayo didn’t want cheese and crackers again (I wonder why) so we found a place called Fontana on 1 May Square, a little local place with, as usual, no other customers. I think we were lucky to find such a nice place open on a Sunday evening in the off-season. I had a big plate of fried shrimp and squid, plus bread and sparkling water. i was hungry and it was excellent.

When it was time to pay, though, they said they didn’t accept credit cards. And we didn’t have much cash on us. After briefly staring at each other in wordless panic, we decided that I’d have to go hunt for an ATM and hopefully get some cash. Walking briskly through the dark and deserted stone alleys of Piran I found the town square, where there was indeed an ATM. I got my euros and hurried back to the restaurant.

Crisis handled.

Back in the room after dinner Masayo realized that her favorite hat that she had knitted herself was missing; she must have dropped it somewhere outside. I went out myself, trying to retrace our steps even though it was now dark. I walked quickly all around, back to the restaurant and the little shop, scanning the ground for any sign of the little hat.

I didn’t find it; I had to return and tell Masayo that, like the hat I’d left on the bus in Slovakia, it might be a long-gone sacrifice to the travel gods.

I watched a football game on NFL Game Pass. I told Masayo that if the Atlanta Falcons won, I would officially designate this a perfect day. And they did – we beat the Saints and we deserved it, playing great.

A perfect day!

It ended on a slightly bad note though – at 11:00 pm I was a little high at 234. I think the breading used for fried seafood has more carbs than I always think. But, while 234 is high, it isn’t in the upper 200s (or in the 300s). I call that progress over my bad before-bed readings lately.

So Piran couldn’t have been lovelier. The views, the weather, the atmosphere, and the food (and the Falcons game) – all fantastic. Even my high BGs weren’t as bad as usual. Tomorrow we are heading back to the capital Ljubljana, but for tonight we slept well in our quiet, dark Adriatic paradise.

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