The beautiful resort town of Bled is only an hour northwest of Ljubljana.

Bled is a picturesque holiday destination popular with package tourists as well as backpackers, skiers and other travelers looking for peace and relaxation in a tranquil Alpine setting. Thew year 2004 represents an important date in the town`s history, as it is the 1,000th anniversary of the first recorded mention of the settlement in historical records.

The first known mention of Bled was in a title deed dated 10 April 1004, in which the Holy Roman Emperor Henry II ceded ownership of the Bled Castle and its surroundings to Albuin, Bishop of Brixen (Southern Tyrol). Since the 8th century, pilgrims have been coming to St. Mary`s Church on the island where the forefathers of Slovenes, the Caranthanians, worshipped Ziva, the Slavic goddess of love and fertility.

The development of proper tourism only started in 1854 when Swiss traveler Arnold Rikli first came to Bled. Recognizing the curative powers of the lake and thermal water, sun and air, Rikli built modest wooden huts and a Health Centre on the lake shore below the castle rock. Strict house rules were the reason why many guests decided to leave the resort even before their pre-paid treatment had ended. Not all, however, wished to go home. But at that time Bled had nothing more comfortable to offer to those who wished to prolong their stay. The locals were quick to realize that resort guests were willing to spend more money than the pilgrims, so they turned their old pilgrim pubs into inns and built the first hotels. At the turn of the 20th century Bled was already able to accommodate more than a thousand guests. The first railway line was constructed in the vicinity of Bled in 1870, and in 1906 another line was built. In 1903, Bled received the Gold Medal at a large international exhibition of spas in Vienna as the most beautiful spa of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

After the downfall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Bled became part of the new Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Members of the royal family and in particular Queen Maria of the Bavarian family Coburg-Ghota fell in love with Bled and regularly spent summers here. King Aleksandar invited foreign statesmen to Bled and soon it became the most cosmopolitan resort of the time, boasting more than twenty tennis courts and since 1937 a golf course. Between the years 1941 and 1945 Bled suffered under the Nazi regime, but after World War II the town`s luck turned: at the location of the old royal villa Marshall Tito had a majestic residence built where he received important representatives of East-European and independent states. New hotels were constructed, providing a total of 2300 beds. Since the 1960s Bled has been very popular with tourists from Great Britain and also continental Europe, especially from Germany and Italy.

After 1991 when Slovenia became an independent state, Bled had to sustain a few dry years before it could enter a new era of its development motivated by a common goal: to win back the international acclaim it once had. The 1000-year anniversary of Bled, celebrated in 2004, will be marked with a wide range of events that will attract crowds of visitors and hopefully persuade them to return to Bled time and time again.