ON THE RISE
ON A 200-FOOT SIDE-STEP ABOVE AN ANCIENT SINGLE CHAIR,
Nika Radjenovič traverses the apron of a jagged peak towering overhead. Mini cyclones swirl around her boots as she moves past limestone formations dusted with fresh snow. Shallow bowls of powder unfold below her skis in the early morning sun she hadn’t expected to see in mid-March.
From this perch above Vogel Ski Resort in Slovenia’s Julian Alps, you can see the country’s highest summit, Mount Triglav, punching through a blanket of low-hanging clouds. On good snow years like this one, it’s skiable from the 9,396-foot summit.
A physical trainer for the Slovenian women’s national ski team, Radjenovič, 35, has a commanding presence on and off the hill. Her slender, muscular frame is dressed in trim-fitting skimo outerwear, and she keeps her silky black hair cut to a chic pixie. Radjenovič skis, drives, and moves at one speed: Mach. Forward in an aggressive stance, she makes three technically perfect turns, illuminating her years of ski racing, before she drops over a blind roller and out of sight.
The snow isn’t deep, but the skiing here is easy, pure, untouched; it’s a tidy metaphor for Slovenia itself—a mountain nation offering everything a skier needs with few frivolous accouterments.
Crowned by the Julian Alps, a limestone range stretching 1,700 square miles from northeastern Italy down to the Adriatic Sea, Slovenia’s 50 or so ski resorts capture the maritime moisture before it has the chance to move inland. Most of the lifts are old, with wooden seats the size of pizza boxes folding down like weathered stadium seats. The gondola cars are small and metal, but no
