Slovenia’s Bohinj region introduces Austrian-style resort card

Proving there is more to Slovenia than just Melania, the country’s mountainous Bohinj region aims through its resort card to ameliorate the area’s traffic problems by offering incentives to those using public transport.

Until recently Slovenia had been light years behind neighbouring Austria when it came to offered resort cards to tourists. Despite sharing a border along the Carinthia/Styria-Gorenjska/Koroska frontiers there has always been a large difference between the relatively fledgling Slovenian nation and a tourist mainstay ingrained in the psyches of hundreds of thousands of British alpine travellers.

The sophisticated, well-oiled Austrian tourist machine have for some years offered a multitude of integrated guest cards which in many areas are provided free of charge to guests staying at a resort, or, for a nominal fee when compared to ‘paying as you go’ for individual cableway journeys. Slovenia is of course a much smaller nation with only a handful of alpine resorts, most of which are scattered and not contained under the aegis of one region, as would be the case in the Oetztal, Stubaital, and the Wilder Kaiser, to name but three. There are though signs that Slovenia is slowly beginning to recognise the importance of offering a comprehensive resort-specific product that could tempt tourists to stay longer than perhaps they originally intended.

Bohinj, the jewel of Slovenia’s Julian Alps and the obvious antidote to the nearby tourist trap of Lake Bled, have introduced the Bohinj Mobility Guest Card that affords guests a plethora of discounts and free use of the local Alpetour buses. Predicated on the benefits of sustainable modes of transport the card seeks to encourage the usage of the public transport network, the Ukanc-based Vogel cableway, and an electric boat that plies its way back and forth between Ribcev Laz and Ukanc on the area’s eponymous lake. Traffic and parking issues have increasing become bones of contention and whilst the card still facilitates free parking, the sizeable discounts offered on train and bus journeys within the area speak of the greater emphasis, and incentive, for the use of public transport instead of less environmentally friendly and disproportionately space-consuming private vehicles.

Although only one cableway is included in the package it again must be remembered that this is Slovenia, not a larger and heavily concentrated region of Austria that might offer the use of half a dozen cableways, which is the case for example when using the Saalbach, Hinterglemm, and Leogang Joker Card. Even if only using public transport to explore the wider region a ten day Bohinj Mobility Guest Card – https://www.bohinj.si/en/soft-mobility/bohinj-mobility-guest-card/ – priced at €29 represents outstanding value. Whilst being an initiative that is long overdue I strongly recommend a visit to Bohinj before mass tourism finally catches up with Slovenia, and it with Austria.