The Pokljuka Gorge

Almost 2 km long, the Pokljuka Gorge was carved out 10 000 years ago by the former flow of the Ribščica River as the glaciers retreated. When the water dried up, it left behind the largest fossil gorge in Slovenia. In some places, it narrows to just a few metres, and its walls are up to 50 metres high. Intermediate widenings are called nurseries.

The narrowest part was spanned by wooden bridges as early as 1930.

A walk through the Pokljuka Gorge

'Ribščica' Gorge

The 2 km long gorge was cut into the hard limestone by flowing glacial rivers from the glacier tongues of the Pokljuka glacier some 10,000 years ago.

Waters

In the Pokljuka Gorge area, torrential water flows only during heavy rainfall, even forming a waterfall in a side valley. Otherwise, a small stream appears in the lower part of the Pokljuka Gorge, at the starting point in Jela. It soon hides under the rubble and comes to the surface just before it flows into the bottom of the Radovna valley.

Walls

The steep, and in many places overhanging, limestone walls are up to 50 m high, and up to 150 m in the lower part. In the narrowest parts of the gorge, they are only a good metre apart, and in several places they almost touch. The walls are built of grey limestone with dark, sometimes conspicuously convex nodules of hornblende (quartz), which was formed from limestone sediment deposited at the bottom of the deep sea some 200 million years ago. The Slovenian Geological Trail also runs through the gorge.

The wonderful world of plants

The valley part of the Pokljuka Gorge is under freezing conditions with abundant moisture, which is why some plant species are found much lower in the gorge than their normal habitat.

In the initial part of the gorge, common fern, hardy perennial honesty, nine-leaved toothwort thrive. Higher up, dwarf and cushion-like plants are found, such as early white-flowered saxifrage, Lesser London-Pride and Round-leaved saxifrage, beautiful auricula, scheuzer's bellflower and others.

The Pokljuka Hole

A cave hall with two entrances and three windows. For centuries, it has been a path leading to the Old Pokljuka and then through the ravines to Pokljuka. It is the shortest passage from Gorje to Pokljuka.

Pastures

Above the Pokljuka Hole, there are typical "rovtes" or grazing areas, which have their own names: the Janez rovt, Pustovo polje ... At the beginning and at the end of the summer, farmers graze cattle and sheep there, thus making an important contribution to the preservation of the cultural landscape and biodiversity.

The diversity of the animal world

The forests here shelter many animal species: roe deer, red deer, chamois, mouflon, foxes, badgers, dormice and many birds.

Forest

The surroundings of the Pokljuka Gorge belong to a natural monument, where the forest is left to its natural processes and is not intervened in. The forest is composed of beech, spruce, fir, white maple, black hornbeam and small ash, with occasional alpine undergrowth.

'Vrtci'

A distinctive feature of the gorge are the larger extensions, known as "vrtci". The three most prominent are the 'Climbing vrtec', 'the Central vrtec' and the 'Last vrtec'. Behind the 'Last vrtec' , a path leads across a mound where charcoal was once burnt.

Ostrich Fern - Matteuccia struthiopteris

The wet and cool conditions make the area very favourable for ferns. Of particular interest is the ostrich fern, which has two types of leaves - for photosynthesis and for reproduction by dispersal.

Galleries of King Andrew

In 1930, in the narrowest part of the gorge, in the vertical wall, technically demanding 35-metre-long galleries were built, thus providing the shortest route from the Radovna valley to Mrzli studenec. They were called "The King's Galleries Andrew", in honour of the newborn son of King Karadjordjevic, who was at the time Kingdom of Yugoslavia, was a hunting tenant in Mežakla, in the Radovna valley and in part of the Pokljuka.