Category Archives: Hiking

Hike on a rainy day

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While the weather is at least decent on most of my hikes, and probably over half of them has weather close to perfect, there are times when my luck just runs out. Sometimes that means just gloomy and misty weather, which is the best of the bad possibilities, but sometimes it gets to outright rain. If it’s my own plan, then I might just delay it, but if it’s during a longer stay or just an event I signed up beforehand, then I just go and take some shorter route, but go anyway. As we say here, there’s no bad weather, only bad equipment.

In the past years, November was usually safe bet for at least gloomy weather if not rain. Compared to the shining colors of early autumn, it usually gets sad in that one month. It’s probably the reason why I have the least photos made in November.

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Look back: January hiking

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With this winter being quite warm here so far, I am looking back at the previous years. Even then, the experience was vastly different. There was a year when I was hiking a day before Christmas and it was muddy, and two weeks later it was close to a meter of snow. And there were years when it was the exact opposite.

2015

New year had lots of snow. Four days before this photo was taken, I hiked the mountain that is covered in clouds, and there was a lot of snow around, even in these lower portions. Not so much now. Eventually some snow returned in February for one more winter-like walk around, but that was all.

2016

This was pretty much the opposite. The snowfall started pretty much on new year, and it went on for the night after. Even in this place that is pretty much lowlands, the land got quite nice cover of snow. Thin, but still enough for a good winter feeling. Combined with the fact that the temperature was just below zero, it was quite pleasant time.

The original plan was something around 10km, but being in easy terrain, I decided to extend it, ending up at nice 17km. Unfortunately both lookout towers on the way were closed.

 

Two weeks later, I went for another hike. It was place that is normally crowded, and was so during the weekend. Needing to clear my head before exams, I went there on Monday. It was -13°C and there was quite a lot of wind the previous night, which meant I had to push my way knee-deep in snow in the side path I used. It was better on the main path, but I did not stay long there.

If you can’t see the way, make one.

The (almost) circuit ended up at 18km, but in the cold and the fact I was making my own path for most of it, made me quite exhausted. More so than 25km in summer.

2017

I admit I have no clue how the new year looked like. I made some mistake on the day before and my overly sensitive digestion took it very poorly. I had to force myself to eat at least something for the next four days and lost almost 4kg of weight. But I did not want to cancel coming for the planned hike. Fortunately, by Friday I was doing better and so I went for it, despite still feeling quite empty and not having eater seriously since 1st.

The weather was, in a way, perfect. Dry and frozen weather is the best for far sights, if it’s sunny as well, the best for really nice winter photos. There was a small trouble: -22°C and my weakened body. But then, I am long saying that there is one solution that fixes all problems: Go to the hills. It worked. I went on and even with the cold, reached the peak in my usual time around 1h 40 minutes, something many would have trouble in summer.

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Ain’t no mountain cold enough…

Even though it’s place I am visiting pretty much every year, this was something I had to enjoy. Usually very crowded place now being almost empty and with sights I only saw on pictures before. I walked around for almost twenty minutes, just enjoying it and taking some photos here and there, which is not easy in such cold. It’s hard to take them with gloves on, and it’s definitely not comfortable to remove gloves in such cold, even if for a few second. The fact that the gloves I had can uncover just the fingertips helped, but my thin fingers get cold far too easily.

I had a bit of adventure on the way back, as I decided to take different trail than I used to get up. Unfortunately, the snow-covered trees meant the trail marks were invisible and so I just followed some trails. This eventually sent me somewhere into wilderness on steep descent and I was hoping every single moment that I won’t end up tumbling down and that no one will see me as the are is natural reserve and I was not even sure it was legal to be there. Still, in retrospective, it was very nice day and so far my best winter hike (and coldest one.)

I guess I might do such looks back for every month in the future.

Photography look back: fungi

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Even though most of my photos are pictures of the magnificent peaks and valleys I visit, I have a special fondness for taking photos of mushrooms. Some, like Amanita muscaria are greatly photogenic on their own, others need a bit of help from their surroundings, like crouching at a tree’s stump, obscured by the grass or growing from a soft moss.

Due to when most of them grows, these photos are usually limited to late summer and most of autumn, before the temperatures drop below zero. Every year, I stop by and take photos of fungi several times, whether they are edible or not. I rarely collect edible ones, mostly because after the long journey home, they’d be in quite bad state (my general rule is to collect them if I can return within 2 hrs of finishing the hike). So, here are few of the best photos I made this year.

As for this year, my biggest surprise was to find this beauty high in the mountains – by my memory, I guess it was in elevation around 1850 meters ASL.

‘They don’t grow high in the hills’. Myth busted.

That was fifth day of my stay in Slovakia, and I had some nice finds the seventh day as well. Even though they were edible, I could not take them with me as that day, I had quite difficult hike ahead where I would need all my four limbs for progress.

It’s sometimes strange feeling to know that probably hundreds of people use the trail daily during the summer, yet overlook them. I doubt that everyone going through there would go as high as I did. Slavic nations are quite into gathering edible fungi and so seeing this just next to the trail is even better feeling.

I would say that Amanita muscaria is my most photographed mushroom, because it’s probably the most photogenic one, and each year I collect more evidence to that claim.

It’s even better in cases like this, when these majestically looking fungi are seen pushing they way through the foliage.

Or, like the right one, when you manage to capture and insect sitting on it. On mushroom that in my language is called ‘fly killer’.

And likewise majestic are photos of fungi that grow out of somewhere with very little space, yet they manage. And unlike me, they don’t have any problem with spider nets – for which I’ll break my initial decision and post two pictures from 2016.

And that’s the photo show (off) from me for this time.

Look back: A place nice in any season, but best in autumn

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This time, I’ll write a bit about a place I like to visit, and one that I found to be great for seeing the seasons change. But as with any mixed forest, it’s autumn when it truly shines. This post will be about the southern part of ‘Rychlebské hory’ mountain range on CZ-PL border, near the Jeseník and Horní Lipová spa towns.

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Seeking the first snow

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Autumn is quite diverse season. It starts as slightly colder summer, then moves into colorful art for a while before fading to gray. And in the end, it gets a bit white as well. November, by my experience, is one of the worst months for hiking, at least here. Most of the time it’s cloudy and it lacks the color of October. In fact, those are the months I end up returning with my clothes wet and (almost) no photos taken the most, the only decent competition was April 2017. But sometimes it’s not so bad.

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Goodbye, summer…

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I know that astronomically, it’s over for more than a week, but especially in the last years, it’s not like weather cared much for that. Yes, the days are colder, but late September and sometimes even early October are still great time for a hike, especially when it combines the warmth and the autumn colors.

And that’s how my last cross-border hike of 2017 looked like…

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Bieszczady, third day

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Third day’s plan were the grassy peaks I’ve seen from the previous hikes. After the rainy second day, I considered it quite great deal of luck that my clothes managed to dry overnight, but outside it was still quite misty in the morning. Typical early autumn, I guess. The forecast was optimistic, but I refused to blindly believe it. Also, this time we were using one of the most used trails, so the ticket and souvenir shack was active in that place, meaning no free entry this day.

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Bieszczady, second day

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Second day of the stay, the plan was to reach Krzemieniec, the peak where Polish, Ukrainian and Slovakian borders converge. Just as the first day, the night was rainy and it did not look better for the day, but unlike the first day, now the situation repeated here in the hills, not in the city now far away.

While we boarded the bus in very faint rain, it changed to worse while it carried us some 10 minutes on the main road to reach the start of the trail. It was now raining consistently, though it was still not too bad. This fact probably saved us a bit of coin, as entering the national park (Bieszczadzki Park Narodowy) costs 6 PLN/day (roughly 1,4€ or 1,6$) but in this terible weather and the main hiking season gone, the shack selling tickets and souvenirs was closed.

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