Park Days are behind  us! Three days of films about nature conservation, sitting in the comfortable shelter of the garden of Krpan Gallery, and a day spent in the intact nature at Lake Cerknica with lots of activities, workshops, craft and culinary stalls, with a varied program on the stage.

 

 

Visitors had fun observing birds, taking a walk along the beekeeping trail, riding on a hay cart, rowing across the lake –which in at least four previous decades in the month of May hadn’t had that much water – hiking along the idyll of nature, buying handmade products, which can not be found in ordinary shops, buying souvenirs and tasting good local food and drink.

For children, pony carriage, body painting, scout training ground, “trap” workshop for trapping a dormouse and other creative workshops were available. Most of the activities for them (as well as for older participants) were available at the Life corners. There were four of them – LIFE Stržen, LIFE Lynx, LIFE For Lasca and LIFE Naturaviva, and it must be admitted that they were located at the most beautiful corners by the lake.

 

At the LIFE Stržen Corner our biologist Jošt Stergaršek presented the life of small insects living in the lake, kids had the chance to draw the Eurasian Bittern (the mysterious bird that the Notranjska regional park will, thanks to the LIFE Stržen project, restore a large part of its natural environment and enable a quieter nesting) and also to play a memory game with typical plant and animal inhabitants of Lake Cerknica.

 

Little Mark’s wolf.

 

At the Fisherman’s Corner there were the LIFE For Lasca team accompanied by the fishermen who were catching redfish from the lake. The visitors were then able to observe them in aquariums and learn a lot about their lives and characteristics. The children were able to make their own fishing pole from a bamboo stick and even try fishing. There was also a quiz, and the youngest were making fish out of paper and painting their Lasca – South European nase.

 

 

 

At a workshop at Life Naturaviva, the visitors were able to learn about a many of different animal and plant species we have here – through original coloring books. In the Lynx corner, you could learn about the activities of the LIFE Lynx project. They made footprints of plaster, lynx’s ears and  for children coloring book about lynx were handed out.

At one of the stands in the central venue, there was Nataša Šip, the European Commission in Slovenia represantative. She was standing next to the big wheel of fortune that brought beautiful and useful rewards to all those who answered correctly the questions related to Europe, nature and the Notranjska regional park.

It was a beautiful, unforgettable day, even the weather was favourable to us as the warm sun shone most of the day and the sky was azure. It wasn’t until the afternoon that the rain came, but most of the visitors were not chased away, they only retreated under the tent.

Thanks to everyone involved, the co-organizers and the visitors for the really successful, wonderful, interesting and exciting Park Days of the Notranjska regional Park.