Fruit Road between Javor and Janče , , ,
The entire area kept the rural image as the villagers are still engaged in agriculture. Fruit growing and live stock farming are prevailing activities. It is possible that due to favourable location and soil, the first inhabitants in the area were already involved in fruit growing. Apple, pear, plum and cherry production for sale has been present at least since the beginning of the 20th century. Old sorts of apples (such as golobar, bobovec, voščenka, gambovec, mošanček, čebular, carjevič), pears (dišečka, rumenka, medenka, mešiček, tepka, rjavka), plums (ciber, home-grown plum) and cherries (belica, morka, hrustavka) have been preserved until today. In the period between both World Wars, the cultivation of strawberries for home use and for sale began in the area of Janče. Only a few farmers cultivated them at first, but mass production of strawberries started only between the 1950s and 1960s.
In 1993, the implementation of the CRPOV (Comprehensive Countryside Development and Village Renovation) project began in the area of the Besnica Valley and Janče. The fruit road between Javor and Janče was created. Within this project, pastures and contemporary plantations for integral fruit production (strawberries, apples, pears, cherries, plums, peaches, walnuts, chestnuts etc. are being produced) were arranged, the project of the revitalisation of grass plantations and gardens was implemented, and 11 water reservoirs to irrigate fruit trees and berries were set up. Farmers established a tourism society, within which all activities regarding the Fruit Road are performed. Farms are always open for all visitors; they offer various agricultural and other products. Within the framework of the Fruit Road, several traditional events take place each year.
Prežganje and the Church of St. Margaret
Prežganje is a scattered settlement. It is located on the sunny side of the slope and isolated hill which is a watershed between the Reka and Besnica streams. The settlement has two groups of houses. The Baroque Church of St. Margaret from 1777 has rich interior equipment from the 18th and 19th centuries (Metzinger, Cebej). A belfry from 1873 is on the west. The church is enclosed by a cemetery and the walls. The image is completed by the parson's house with commercial buildings, a well and a chapel from the 18th century. It is located at 657 metres high observation top. There is a small astronomical observation site (astronomical observatory) at Prežganje. During World War II, between 1943 and 1944, bloody battles took place nearby.
Veliko Trebeljevo ,
Veliko Trebeljevo is a clustered village with a branched system of village paths, which used to belong to Stična Monastery. The Church of St. Cross was also built on the southern side of the village. The year 1698 on the belfry probably also denotes the year of the construction of the church. The settlement was first mentioned in 1145 and is nowadays developing into an attractive tourist spot and is a starting point for pleasant trips. There is an arranged ski slope at the hill above the village. The area of Trebeljevo is known for the plantations of garden strawberries.
Archaeological sites and forts
Numerous archaeological sites, which prove the area was settled already in the old Iron Age, are located in the section of the Posavje Hills which you'll cycle. Some of the prehistoric forts have been already discovered and some are only assumed according to the configuration of the terrain and fallow names. The forts were discovered (or are at least assumed to have been located) at the villages of Volavlje (Lanišče fort at the slope north of the village), Prežganje, Malo Trebeljevo (fields south of the village where the fort and the walls from the Roman times were partly uncovered), Mali Vrh pri Prežganju (Križatec fallow), Nad žitnicami fallow between Ravno Brdo and Javor, the wider area of the village Javor (Iron age burial ground, Antique graves and prehistoric mound burial ground have been partly explored) and Zagradišče.
Tufa wall and waterfall ,
Tufa wall between Volavlje and Prežganje at the spring of Pečen potok Stream is 17 metres high and is one of the highest in Slovenia. The water partly falls from the wall as a 8 to 10-metre high waterfall and partly slides over it. It is overgrown with typical Cratoneuron commutata mosses. The tufa piles from the calcium carbonate saturated stream which flows on dolomite.
In 2003, the waterfall and the tufa wall were arranged for the visitors. A secured footpath leads to the waterfall.
Fossils and minerals in the valley of the Kižlovka Stream
South of Zagradišče, there's a fossil and mineral deposit in the valley of the Križlovka Stream. Among minerals, the beautiful quartz crystals are really exceptional and locals refer to them as 'little churches' because of their typical pyramid-like shape. Near Gradišče, a hill above Zagradišče, where remnants of a prehistoric settlement were found, there's also a smaller, once quite renowned deposit of special quartz crystals which are as beautiful and clear as, well, crystals. They resemble chunks of ice with frozen green moss inside them. Actually, it isn't moss, but a mineral called chlorite, which is clearly visible through the transparent layer of quartz. One of the deposits of quartz crystals was also a quarry of quartz sandstone and conglomerate, which is today disused and inaccessible.