Municipality of Žirovnica

Žirovnica is a municipality in Slovenia. The municipality borders with the municipalities of Bled, Jesenice, Radovljica and Tržič, and with Austria along its northern limits.

There are ten villages/settlements in the municipality: Breg, Breznica, Doslovče, Moste, Rodine, Selo, Smokuč, Vrba, Zabreznica and Žirovnica. The municipal administration is based in Breznica.

A number of figures, important to Slovenes, come from the area of Žirovnica municipality, namely the poet France Prešeren, the linguist Matija Čop, the pioneering bee-keeper Anton Janša and the writers Janez Jalen and Fran Saleški Finžgar. Bronze busts of all five have been put up in front of the school in Zabreznica. There is a well-marked walk throuh the villages called 'The Cultural Heritage Route' (Pot kulturne dediščine in Slovene) . This can be followed to visit certain monuments associated with the above figures (e.g. Prešeren's, Čop's, Finžgar's and Jalen's birth places, all of which are small museums, Janša's beehive) and a number of other historical and cultural monuments in the area. A good starting point for this walk is Vrba.

On 13 January 2008 the statues of Janez Jalen and Fran Saleški Finžgar from in front of the school, as well as the bronze figure of a hostage from the monument in Moste were stolen. They were found cut into pieces four days later.

In the valley of Završnica, behind the Reber range that overlooks the villages the first public hydro-electric plant in Slovenia was built in 1914 and in 1952, after building a 60 m dam (the highest dam in Slovenia to date) in the Kavčke gorge, a second hydro-electric plant was opened in nearby Moste. This was the first hydro-electric plant to operate on the river Sava.

External links

• Web page of Žirovnica municipality (in Slovene)

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