Postojna Caves

Postojna is one of those places in Europe whose magical, underground assets are unlike anything that exists aboveground.

The temperature plunges as the rattling carts take me down into the labyrinth, which stretches for over 20km of what looks like a baroque palace. The caves were in fact discovered in the seventeenth century, but for around two million years, the stalactites and stalagmites have been forming, sculpted from the brightest white flowstone.

I meet a guide and we continue on foot through long, dark corridors. He brings me to a ridge, and we cast our gaze down into a deep pit. Among the needle-thin reeds I see hippos, some emerging from the water and others piled on top of one another.

We walk for some time, then through a small opening, we crawl into another alcove, and in doing so disturb a family of storks who spiral elegantly from the rocks on which they've been standing.

We walk and walk for some time longer, and arrive at the most spectacular of all the spaces, known as the Great Mountain. In the pits surrounding the mountain, I spot sleeping dragons, with their wizened heads pressed to the rock. It must be here, in this great hall with its tremendously high ceiling, that the rock animals spring to life and converge for night-time feasts and councils.