Goodbye Poland, hello Germany! We made it safely and arrived at Burg Hornberg about one yesterday afternoon.
Where to begin? Where to begin? So much in just the last few days! First things, first: Major, major apologizes once again for the delay! In our hostel, internet connection is almost non-existent! We had one Ethernet cable to share and now only one to use this time in Germany!
Ok, now onto the goods…
Our last day in Czorsztyn, we made the trek to Tatra National Park. The park was absolutely awesome! It was brimming with both wildlife and mosaics of wildflowers, and of course, mountains! It made me miss Montana that much more! The Tatras are the highest peaks within the whole Carpathian Mountain range. You could equate the height of the Carpathians to that of the Appalachians along the east coast in that they are not the tallest in the world, yet still breathtaking. Along with us on our hike was, Tomasz (Toe-mak), who was probably the most interesting, exciting, and entertaining guide we could have asked for. Tomasz is one of the rangers in the park and so, was very enthusiastic about everything, not to mention, fit to leave us all in the dust on the way up the mountain!
Polish national parks, or at least this one, are somewhat different from U.S. parks in that everywhere you looked, turned, or walked there were always about 5-10 people headed in your direction. According to Tomasz, Tatra is one of the most visited parks in Poland, mostly because that is the only place where the good skiing in the winter is! On top of that it IS a very beautiful park. The trails were also very unique and different that what we’re used to as we hike, which is basically a gravelly path. In Tatra and other parks, the trails are made entirely of stones fitted together. The purpose of this was to help prevent erosion since the slope is very steep as you climb. Every trail in the park was this way and crossed over wide streams and rivers, so you are playing hopscotch and trying not to slip on the wet stones!
The overall hiking in the park was great! The change in elevation was fairly gradual until we reached a small alpine lake about half way up. After that it went up! Straight, straight up!! Literally. The trail was made up of stepping stones almost the entire way, save for a few spots of actual climbing! I had to catch my breath quite a few times along the way up to the top, which made me question what I was doing, but there was never a doubt in my mind that I wouldn’t go in the first place. I’m very glad I did it, even when I had minor heart palpitations at brief moments of slippage.
Ironically getting up was the easy part of the journey. Going up you can see exactly where to place your feet, which was crucial at some points when there were loose stones. Coming down was almost a nightmare. It was much more difficult seeing where to place your feet, and it began to rain just as we starting climbing down. The pressure on the knees also killed, but despite all the obstacles we all (the 28 of us who climbed to the top) made it back down safely.
From Tatra, we went to Krakow and spent a few days exploring the city there! More to come on that!
Again, sincere apologies. There will be a string of updates soon hopefully! We have learned we will be getting very limited time to use the internet! Trouble when people are trying to plan weekend trips... Are there pictures flashing across the top?
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