I love Slovenia, but given your short time frame, I’d probably pick the high Tatras is Slovakia over the Julian Alps in Slovenia. I’d do Bratislava (with maybe a day trip to Vienna) and then Poprad or elsewhere in the Tatras.

Thank you for your feedback, it was a great start! I have some additional questions based on the information you posted.

What was your reasoning for not including Budapest….was it based on the amount of time we have for traveling?

My husband and I are not big hikers, with that point in mind, would we enjoy the Tatra Park?

Does the Eurorail run through Slovakia?

My husband loves the beach, which is why I put Piran, Slovenia on the list…….how long is the train ride from Prague to Ljubljana?

Thank you for you time!

1. I liked Budapest. Time was the big reason I didn’t suggest it. Also, since you’d mentioned Ljubljana and Piran I thought maybe you were interested in some scenery instead of or in addition to more cities. There really isn’t time for many cities if you want to get to mountains or beach. Vienna, Bratislava and Budapest are all cites on the Danube and the scenery is not spectacular. I like Bratislava best. My son likes Budapest best. My husband’s favorite is Prague. None of us care for Vienna.
2. The high Tatras are rugged, high mountains, so maybe not your thing if you’re more interested in the “Heidi land” scenery of the Alps. We did some hiking (what we refer to as tennis shoe treks), road chair lifts, saw waterfalls, visited some interesting villages and generally did the sort of “I love to be in the mountains” things we relish every time we’re above 5,000 feet. We did not spend a great deal of time in the park. We learned about local wildlife because the biologist was the park staffer with the best English skills. We didn’t have a typical tourist experience as we had local friends (fairly high ranking local officials) who either took us everywhere or bartered with their friends to have them escort us. This was 1996, the Slovaks were short of hard cash, very anxious to establish ties with all things American and willing to go all out to entertain us.
3. Slovakia is not a member of the Eurail group, but they have decent train service to many locations. We took the train between Bratislava and Poprad.
4. Slovenia has only a tiny sliver of Adriatic coast, but it’s supposed to be gorgeous, so I assume Piren would be great. We loved Ljubljana and particularly the mountains. We spent a couple of days driving around the Lake Bled area. Slovenia is, IMO, the easiest place in Europe to navigate in “English only.”
5. Prague to Ljubljana is about 11 hours by train. Use the German national rail company websites for schedules anywhere in Europe: http://reiseauskunft… I’d look for a flight…. Another option would be to go to Bratislava/ Vienna (I much prefer Bratislava, but Vienna is a better transit hub) for a day or so and take the train from Vienna to Ljubljana — its about 6 hours.