Hard evening and day in Tatra

Trip Report

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Geography

Trip Reports in Slovakia

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High Tatra/Vysoke Tatry GROUP

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A Week of Challenge in Winter Tatras

Hard evening and day in Tatra

Pilgrimage to the Eagles' path

Hard evening and day in Tatra

Page Type: Trip Report

Location: Slovakia, Europe

Date Climbed/Hiked: Aug 24, 2008

Activities: Mountaineering, Bouldering, Scrambling

Season: Summer

Page By: Ivona

Created/Edited: Aug 26, 2008 / Aug 26, 2008

Object ID: 435635

Hits: 291

Page Score: 88.78% - 12 Votes

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Table of Contents

Saturday afternoon and evening

Cold and windy Sunday

Images

Saturday afternoon and evening

Me outside Zbojnicka Chata

Scrambling a nice ridge

Me and my climbing friend Natalia haven't been together in the mountains since a longer time because of Natalia's absence in my town.We wanted to spend a nice time - talking,climbing and feeling again mountain atmosphere with all adventages and disadvantages;)We knew that the weather forecast wasn't good for last weekend.We decided to leave our town Saturday afternoon and do some climbing shopping in Slovakia.We planned to reach mountain hut Zbojnicka Chata in darkness.We both love night climbing and hiking and we knew the trail very well.Climbing shopping makes me crazy;) I could spend in such shop even more time then in common women clothes shop;)Shopping was very successful,so we decided to celebrate it in the small restaurant with Slovak specialities.It was 19.30 when we finished delicious dinner and were ready to go.We needed about 2,5-3 houres to reach the hut from parking in Smokovec.Whole Saturday was rather rainy,but when we entered the trail there weren't many dark clouds.We enjoyed warm air,silent and peaceful night,but we couldn't see how quickly the sky was changing above our heads.In the middle of the way we felt drops of the rain on our faces.It started to rain stronger and stronger.There wasn't sence to stop and look for jackets in our sacks,after 10 minutes we were whole wet and desperated to climb faster.When we were at short rocky part with metal chains suddenly a big lightning crossed the sky above our heads...Shit...it was really scary..There was no brake between lightning and thundering.Wet rocks,metal chains and storm in the middle of the night just above us-deadly combination.That was the most terryfying moment in the mountains in my life.But what could we do then?just try to be calm and think clearly.We had to leave those rocks with chains immediately, so it wasn't climbing but jogging;) We reached the hut at 22.30 almost running inside.Just after our entering rain changed into the hail.How lucky!.We met some Czech climbers sitting on the hut stairs,watching the storm and drinking a beer.They were shocked and surprised to see 2 girls in the night,during heavy rain and storm.They thought that they were completely drunk and we were the ghosts;) Unfortuntelly there wasn't any sleeping place even on the floor:) but it wasn't a problem for us,we could sleep anywhere except outside;) Czech climbers were admiring so much our night climbing in such extreme conditions that they made place especially for us in the middle of main hall.Andriej and Henrik-thanks a lot!!! it was very nice of you!!After changing clothes we enjoyed funny talking with other climbers and drinking a hot tea;)

Cold and windy Sunday

Climbing down from Polsky Hreben

after climbing down nice ridge from Sedlo Prelom

Next day wasn't much better.Mountains in the fog,wind and much lower temperature.We got up at 6.00 am,ate tasty breakfast made by ourselves and boiled a water for tea on small gass cooker,because the kitchen in hall was closed at that time.We planned to cross a nice steep ridge and climb to the second Velicka Valley via Sedlo Prelom(2290m).We thought about summit Vychodna Vysoka (2428m) but everything depended on weather conditions above 2000m.We enjoyed funny scrambling via good but wet rocks.Unfortunatelly it started to rain again and when we reached the pass it was snowing;) We abseiled from the ridge using chains and metal steps and saw our summit whole in the fog and probably in the snow.We had a lot of time but we decided to climb Polsky Hreben (2200m) and climb down to the Slaski House in the Velicka Valley without reaching Vychodna Vysoka.There was nobody on the trail during our climbing,so we could enjoy extreme and wild beauty of Tatra,silence,climbing and buldering.We had much fun even if we had to climb down in strong,cold wind and during snowing.After tasty dinner in Slaski House we backed to the car smiling and happy that everything worked enough well.Sometimes climbing in hard weather conditions can satisfy more than in the sun;)