Powiat tatrzański

Having only one full day in the Tatra mountains and not having packed any appropriate hiking clothes and shoes, I decided to do the most easily accessible hike (17.5 km): Morskie Oko, or the 'Blue Eye'.

To get there, you need to take a minibus from Zakopane or any of the stops along the way. The buses are very frequent and were so full I had to stand all the way. I wondered how many people would be on the trail today.

The hike up to the lake is fairly easy terrain. It is a wide paved road winding up the mountain. It isn't too steep either, but the incline is constant. Those who cannot (or don't want to) walk, can take a horse-drawn carriage instead.

As I set out to walk up the mountain, Pablo, another guest from the hostel, caught up to me and asked if he could join me. I warned him I was a slow hiker, especially uphill, but he was ok with that. In fact, he turned out to be quite pleasant company and we made good conversation as we followed the winding road.

If we had expected a walk through forest trails with nothing but nature around us, we soon stood corrected. All the way to the lake, the infrastructure was designed to support crowds. There were porta-potties every half hour or so and even a restaurant with ATMs half-way up.

When we finally reached the lake, there was another restaurant and such a huge crowd of people trying to take selfies on the narrow shore that I first felt walking all the way up here had really just been a waste of time.

It wasn't until we walked around the lake and the crowds thinned that we could really appreciate the scenery - with the murmur of the masses at the restaurant barely audible in the distance.Read more