My highest-flying thoughts have I inhumed,
With all the pain of wishes unfulfilled,
Like Črtomir’s, all hopes in earth entombed.
Days bright and dull are both to night distilled,
And hearts to suffer joy and sadness doomed
Will all in deepest grave at last be stilled.1
I started toward Šmarje-Sap on 20th December. I took the old road from Ljubljana, which leads from Škofljica with many hairpin bends to high ground and the town of Mali Vrh. This is where Ljubljana’s hill-encircled valley creeps into the hilly regions of Dolenjska. Mali Vrh is linked to Šmarje and Šmarje is merged with the village of Sap, and the road moves away further to Grosuplje. I was not here for the first time; I had passed this place many times, most often on bicycle.
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1 France Prešeren, Baptism at Savica, To Matija Čop, 1836; translated by Tom M.S. Priestly and Henry R. Cooper, Jr.