So where does an estate agent in France go on holiday?

Ahh well this one got very lucky. Very lucky.

Long term ski buddies Denis and Marianne (D&M) have a Cessna T303 Crusader, an 8 seater plane no less, and invited us to join them on a seaside adventure ......... yippee!

D & M flew in to Albertville airport to collect us. Sue and Roy who have a ski apartment for sale in St Martin de Belleville drove us there and stayed with us for lunch. As this is a small airport it is popular for microlights and small planes and a really interesting place to sit and have a leisurely lunch. I can heartily recommend sitting out under the trees of the aerodrome restaurant being served good nosh by pleasant staff (good loos as well!). The airport is just 25 minutes from the ski lifts of the Three Valleys and about the same into the Valmorel ski area. Perfect for us.

Time to go......... I felt like the cat who’d got the cream ...... earphones on, luggage stowed, seat belts on, confirm ready to go with the tower and Denis launched us smoothly skywards with the flight plan set for Porteroz in Slovenia. I can’t tell you how exciting it was to be on our private plane heading for the sand and sea of a country I’d never been to before – no queues, no waiting, our own schedule to make – how cool is that!

We flew over the Alps passing over Paradiski where David Cowx is our agent on the ground, then on over the col du Petit Saint Bernard and into Italy with Mont Blanc on our left, then up the Aosta Valley and passing overish Milan, Verona and then Denis flew us over Venice and the Lido – a truly amazing place from the air and now I really, really want to visit there as well.

We checked out Piran before we landed and it looked lovely from the air, if you look at the photo you can see our hotel – it’s the blue one to the left of the bay.


We had an extremely gentle landing at Portoroz airport in Slovenia and were greeted by incredibly nice, smiling staff who handed us a quick, nostril flaring snifter instead of checking our bags (don’t you love it when that happens) and within 30mins we’re in a taxi.

The ride to our hotel in Piran, inventively named.... wait for it ...... Hotel Piran, was not as smooth or as confident inspiring as the flight but having clipped a couple of the slower pedestrians and collected a couple of shopping bags over the wing mirrors the driver’s work was done and he dropped us at the hotel, now slightly moist from fear as well as the heat, but none the worse for wear!

We had arrived. “Oh I do love to be beside the seaside ..... Oh I do.....” my husband clamped his hand over my mouth and dragged me inside.

Lovely location, should you sleep walk you’d find yourself waking up in the sea. The hotel was charming, nothing fancy but really nice and there were the really friendly people again. It was about 18.30 when we got to our room and there was only one thing to do - go out again for a swim. Lovely, warm, calm, lovely. Back to the room, 15 minutes later back out to check out the surrounding bars and restaurants, phew!

Everything was lovely, everyone was smiling, the sun shone, the sea sparkled. We found a good restaurant and nailed a sea view table to admire the sun set from. It was soon piled high with seafood and wine. Denis being Greek and therefore knowing about these things became designated fish chooser (of course being Greek means knowing about seafood – it’s in their genes!) and he sure picked a goody. We had this huge, tasty fish, big enough for four, which Denis expertly dissected at the table as the sun set into the sea. Oh the joy of it. Afterwards it was dancing to a band playing local, traditional music with a modern twist. They’d start with a very modern or highly recognised song like Dancing Queen by Abba or Billy Jean by ... well you know who sang that ....... and then slowly introduce their traditional slant. It was really good foot stamping, hand clapping, sing along (yes, we found we could sing Slovenian after a couple of bottles of the local stuff.....extraordinary how that that happens .......) music. There was a great clarinet/sax play who smoked in between phrases, lord knows when he actually took a breath. Marianne and I got dancing pretty early on, swirling around with the locals, while the boys concentrated on trying the local alcoholic beverages – normal set up! We finally went to bed at about 02.30, such a wonderful, adventurous day and we’d only left the house at 11.00 that morning........

We spent two days here swimming, eating and dancing – little bit of sightseeing – but mostly the swimming and the eating! What really struck us was how incredibly friendly and interested in us the locals were, if your brought something from a shop you didn’t just pay your money and leave, they wanted to know where you were from and what you were going to do with the purchase and generally smiled a lot. One chap even discounted the postcards which were only 30cents in the first place because we had a bit of a joke with him. It’s very hard to imagine this country at war and so recently as well. The beauty of the place and the people hides this unhappy past.

Soon we were choosing our next destination, it’s very exciting just to put your finger on the map and say “yep, let’s go there”, but I was very sad to leave this little gem, Piran. The Slovenian tourist board’s official slogan is “I FEEL sLOVEnia”. I did and I hope to go back there soon.

Fancy living near Alberville airport?
I've got a nice property for sale in Aigueblanche, its located just 10minutes from the airport, 15 maybe 20 minutes from Valmorel ski area and 5 minutes from the La Lechere thermal spa! Perfect.