Trieste, my final European outpost

I've been staying in the dorms of a woodwork school in Postojna. The building is much like a woodwork department in any school (with the addition of bunk beds, engraved with the names of travellers who've shagged on the mattress you're lying on), but the grounds are something special, covered in tall pines, spruces and firs that go on to cover over half the country's surface area. I've heard that Egypt isn't green, so I'm savouring it while I can.

I catch an very early bus back to Trieste, my final European outpost in this journey. In many ways, it seems like an outpost of Italy too. Situated on the easternmost extent of Italy, it is snuggled between Slovenia to the west and Croatia to the south, and has in the past been under both those countries' rules.

It now just about clings to northern Italy, and the names of the squares in the heart of the port town, as well as the architectural treasures that adorn them, are very much green, white and red.