In the first few centuries that we call CE, Ptuj was a comparatively important Roman Military Stronghold. You could get across the river Drava here and two important roads converged on the crossing. So you could go from Northern Italy further East, or from the alps down to the Balkans or the Adratic coast. At that time the population of the city was maybe 40,000. It was never higher at any later time.

It would probably be easier to list the armies who did not sack the town than those that did.

But from the earliest times the wine produced in the surrounding areas has been exceptional. Plenty of sun, misty heavy condensation in the mornings, steep well drained slopes of Marl soil … combine to produce white wines of surprisingly high alcohol content (13 to 15 %) that retain their upfront fruitiness even when aged. They have white wines here bottled over a hundred years ago. We didn’t taste anything like that, but the aged ones we did try were wonderfully complex with a beautiful mouth feel.

Here we are tasting in a thousand-year-old cellar.

Again, the town is tiny, but with a few interesting buildings and a big castle on the hill. Here are some postcard photos:

We have found the Slovenian countryside to be quiet and very picturesque and we had some fine walks around Ptuj.

And that ends our foray into Slovenian wine country. It has been a nice introduction to some surprisingly good white wines. I would like to come back some time to taste the red wines they produce on the Adriatic south of Trieste.

But now we are going west to their big capital city: Ljubljana for some city living.

Thanks for coming along.