I’ve visited most of the important peaks in the east half of Czech Republic as these are the places easiest to reach for me. For the west half, my travels there are mostly limited to at least weekend stays due to travel time, but I’ve seen my share of nice places there as well. They are the places where I go to relax and think.

During my childhood and teen years, I’ve been hiking exclusively with parents or with the local hiking club we joined in 2005. In the early days, we went for only a few hikes each year and mostly to places in reach.

Since 2010, I am often going on solo hikes to places in reach, though the meaning of “in reach” has changed. For the most time, I use trains to get around and, if the schedule aligns, my “reach” is up to 250km of actual journey.

As much as the lublic transport schedules allow, I try to plan my hikes to start between 8:00 – 9:00 and end before 17:00 as frequency of public transport drops a lot past 18:00.

At first, I was hiking exclusively in late spring and summer, though this gradually changed to all-year-long, as much as the weather (and my gear) allow. Since then, I’ve faced temperatures over 30°C and as low as -22°C.

Over the years, my experience led me to push my boundaries – while my hikes in my late teens were in the 17-20km range, I’ve eventually began pushing it over 25km and even over 30km. Currently, most of my solo-hikes (apart from winter) are in the 23-26km length range and my personal best at 36km with the usual timespan of 6-8 hours.

During my solo hikes, I usually head for less-known locations as I carry enough food and drink from home to be self-sufficient and the lack of infrastructure is not an issue for me – all I need is a bus or train stop where I can start and end my journey.

While I am equipped to handle bad weather to some degree, I am not actively seeking it. Thus, all the hikes done in bad weather are pre-planned events of the hiking club.