This is a personal diary note of my trip to Maribor, Slovenia. I left home at 6.30am on 28 September and unlocked the back door at 2.35am on 30 September. It was a VIP trip with Birmingham City FC to watch the away match against Maribor in the Europa Cup League Game.
Having pre-booked my parking ticket in Long Stay 1 at Birmingham International Airport, I found parking quite difficult. It’s a truly massive car park that was 99.9% full. Eventually found a spot and was grateful for the courtesy bus to turn up so quickly as I was cutting it fine given the earlier M42 traffic jam.
Into the airport and quickly found Adam from the club. Bag was soon checked in and I stood back and watch the players and manager arrive along with the other 50 VIP’s. Needless to say, two TV crews were lurking and Chris Hughton, the manager was soon being interviewed. No rest for the wicked then!
Chris Hughton being interviewed after checking in at B'ham Int Airport
It was easy to spot “Big Zig” our Slovakian centre forward as it is a bit difficult to hide when you are 6′ 7″. He was soon accosted for signatures and duly obliged. As in fact did all the team.
Having managed to get a window seat, I took the opportunity of grabbing a couple of pics during the 2hr flight:
English fields near B'ham International airport
Classic puffy clouds from plane window. Probably SW France below
Sat next to me on the plane was Keith who was well know to lots on the trip. He totally outgadgeted me. In one hand he had a Blackberry and an iPhone was in the other hand. He was like that for about 20 mins while awaiting take off, then he tutted as his 2nd Blackberry rang.
Having left in sunshine and pretty good warmth, we arrived to a clear blue sky and warmth of about 24C.
Maribor Airport sign
It is a small ramshackled airport that somehow added to the charm. You picked your baggage off the trailer yourself. Then onto the coach and off to the 5* hotel which was only about 20 mins drive away.
City Hotel. Not exactly a great looking building!
It is a brand new hotel, having opened in July 2011. The inside was magnificent. On checking in, I was in room 301, so needless to say, I pressed button 3 on the lift. Err, wrong. Quite wrong. I did what everybody else did and failed to look at the buttons a little more closely. I was on level “P”. And the 5th floor for the restaurant was reached by pressing button “2”. Clearly a local quirky thing!!
Oh yes, the confusing lift buttons
As you walk straight out of the hotels main entrance, the river Drava is right in front of you. It’s a proper river as well given it is well over 100m wide. These pictures should give you a good idea:
As you can see, it's a decent sized river
There is ample parking all along the riverside, and it was a nice surprise to find a modern ticketing machine.
Solar Powered Parking Ticket machine
Close up of water feature
Water feature underneath road bridge
So a nice gentle walk to the right along the riverside and the first item of note is…………a sex shop. And next to that what looked like a lapdanding club. I’m as confused as you as to why I didn’t pop in! Anyway a little further and there are several bars to sit down, enjoy the view and sample the local beer.
One of the local beers. It's pronounced "Onion"
And then a little further on, an by now I’m only 400m from the hotel and you find the oldest vine in the world.
At 400 years of age, this is the oldest vine in the world
Oldest vine in the worls plaque
Now I do like my wine, but I’m no expert. It turns out that Slovenia is one of the top 5% of quality wine-producing regions in the world. As it is a small country, production is small which probably accounts why I do not recollect seeing any in my local shops. So if you ever come across any, indulge yourself. I believe the better ones are of the white variety.
Rather than use scarecrows to keep the birds off the fruit, the locals developed a wind rattle. mightily impressed with that thought process.
Wind rattle. Better than the usual scarecrow??
Having arrived at about 4pm local time, that was pretty much it for the day. Found a nice pizzeria and wondered back to the hotel via a bar or two. I had no language problems at all with the majority of people speaking excellent conversational english. I found out that about 20 years ago, the official second language was German. This was then ditched for English.
The evening ended in the hotel bar where I asked for the local lethal spirit, There were big smiles on the bar staff faces and was given a shot of the local clear brandy free gratis. Guess they don’t get many requests then!
And so onto the day of the game. Brummies everywhere. Blue sky, and nice and warm. the centre of the town quickly filled up and I took some video coverage.
All the VIP’s gathered at 3pm at the hotel and then we had a fantastic meal together before the game, How about this for a menu:
Pre-match menu at a first class restaurant in Maribor
Blues players (wearing yellow away kit) warming up
The stadium is only two years old and was built on the site of a cemetery. Plenty of history then! The locals had warned us that their fans were notorious for all the noise they made. Whilst they started off in good voice they gradually became quieter and quieter. I subsequently had an email from a Maribor supporter who said “you didn’t out sing us, we were a silent movie”. What a great comment!
As for the game itself, we let a silly goal in and were losing 1 – 0 at half time. All the fans were scratching their heads wondering how on earth we were going to score. Thankfully, the second half was much improved and we won 1 – 2. Total astonishment. Our first away trip in the Europa Cup League format and we only won. What a great way to end a trip.
With that it was straight onto the coach outside the ground. Just to show how small the airport is, we were given our boarding tickets on the coach! A happy trip home is always welcome and the time just whizzed by. We landed at 00.30am on Friday. Then back to the car and drive home. Opened the back door at 2.35am feeling utterly knackered. A quick cuppa to relax then I hit the sack. Trouble is some bugger rang me at 9.50am, so I felt groggy for the rest of the day. Cannot wait for the Brugge trip!
My videos are on you Tube and can be found here. I finally finished this blog somewhat late as it is now 16 October. At that date, all the following videos had been viewed a total of 2,220 times:
The Oldest Vine in the World http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3Oqwtaaa0s
Players after the game http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZle55fC39s
Maribor Stadium http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcogImM9QBk
Maribor Centre Square http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2Q3R6NCs9A
City Hotel View http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBgk9uHkIvI
City Hotel Room http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msEkBkjkBJY
City Hotel Lobby http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVTDjP2HOCg
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