ALEXI K - SLOVENIA

Six years ago, I was on a summer holiday in Slovenia. The weather during the entire first week was terrible. To give you an idea just how bad, these shots are taken on a coach trip around the Karavanken Mountains, one of Europe's longest mountain ranges. Even though our guide was mortified that the weather did not show his country in the best possible light, I reassured him that these mist-shrouded peaks were, to a Brit such as myself, utterly spectacular. 

Being a nexus of Europe, Slovenia is a thoroughly modern country with friendly, well-adjusted people and excellent infrastructure, but its imposing geology is a constant reminder of the millennial weight of history and pre-history. 

I'd never been to the interior of Europe before, so was unused to the views that greeted me. At that elevation, the forests seemed to actually breathe, and the mist behaved more like plumes of smoke in a volcanic landscape, rather than the dreary fog we get back home.

I'm including these pictures for the Halloween edition of MONOBLOG because they evoke the forboding music of Mussorgsky's 'Night On The Bare Mountain'...even though they were taken in the middle of a summer afternoon.

They also resemble the sort of cover art you'll see in the Black Metal genre, and so perfectly fit the theme of this Halloween edition. All they need is a Christophe Szpajdel logo in the corner to complete the look!

All photos, copyright Alexi K, 2008