The climax just before exiting the vintgar gorge
With its 13-metre drop, Vintgar’s powerful gatekeeper is the largest river waterfall in Slovenia and a valuable natural feature of designated national importance. At the exit from the Vintgar Gorge, resisting the flowing water ever since the gorge was formed, is the stone step or ledge that we know today as Šum Falls. Below the waterfall is a deep pool, constantly hollowed by the falling water. The waterfall is most evident in spring and autumn, when the melting snow and plentiful rain means that the river’s flow rate is at its highest.
Until the path through it was built, Vintgar Gorge was impassable and unexplored, but already known to locals and, later, to visitors from nearby Bled, because of Šum Falls. In 1878 a wooden bridge was built above the waterfall, suspended from steel cables. This made life easier for the locals as they worked in the forest, while at the same time it offered visitors a fine view of the waterfall on one side and the picturesque backdrop of the Karavanke mountains on the other.
the Vintgar hydropower plan
On the right bank of the Radovna, upstream of the waterfall, is the reservoir of the Vintgar hydropower plant. It was built in 1903 when additional electric power was needed to construct the Karavanke railway tunnel and the Bohinj Line. Still operational today, it is the oldest functioning power plant in Slovenia.