Leaving Hungary – Whistle Stop Tour of Slovakia and Poland
26th – 1st August 2010
This week has been a mixed bag really. On leaving Budapest we spent a few days in the Bukki Nemzeti Park wild camping to save the pennies. Problem was it started to rain, and rain and RAIN and so far Saturday morning was the first day I haven’t woken up to the sound of torrential downpours outside.
Driving into Slovakia we headed for Slovensky Raj National Park. On all accounts the book read that it had hiking that involved scrabbling over ladders and walking up wet gorges and waterfalls. This is totally my bag and I was not disappointed. Heading for the national park office we gathered some information about the different gorge walks and decided on the Sucha Bela. Well. Little did the park ranger or leaflet say anything about (don’t try it if you have any issues with heights, serious levels of exertion and heart defaults. Not that I have any of the above issues but I think some warning may have been required!) anyway, I stuck my walking boots on and headed for the gorge.
At first it was easy, stepping over large rocks to cross the small stream and crossing a few wooden bridges. Then it got a little more tricky. As the rain had been coming down the stream was a little higher than usual so you couldn’t literally walk up the middle of the gorge. This meant you were forced to take detour routes on the steep sides. There were no defined paths so it was totally up to you how you made it round! At times you had to scramble over vertical drop sides to get to the next stage. At one point I had to turn around as it was just way to dangerous, one slip and you be a goner 20 metres down into the gorge, but this in a weird way gave the hike its beauty. It was exhilarating on one hand and just so amazingly dangerous on another! We got to the first interesting obstacle. A metal ladder split into three stages which scaled a waterfall of 40m.
There were no harnesses or safety devises here! Basically just don’t slip which is tricky when its still pouring down with rain! First ladder was fine, no problems. Then you climb on to a ledge with a metal chain to hold onto drilled into the rock. The beauty of this hike were the ladders weren’t all straight inclines, some were vertical others tilted so if you slipped off you fall straight into the gorge. Brilliant! As you move up the gorge you come across 500m long step-ladder bridges where you have to carefully balance on each individual step in case you fall through. Some parts of the gorge had metal chains to help you scale the rock face other times you were balancing on steps submerged under water. All in all it’s the best hike I’ve ever been on! What a shame we can’t have things like this in the UK. Anything remotely risky like this at home would have health and safety – CLOSED sign all over it!
The rain was still coming down and we were becoming slightly depressed and damn right cold so we kept on going and drove up the north of Slovakia and crossed into Poland in the Tatras Mountains. I really wanted to take the cable car up and stand with one foot in Slovakia and one in Poland, but this unfortunately did not happen as the weather was just….well SHIT basically! I think the visibility would have been pretty much zero so we sadly drove on and hoped to find a place to wild camp for the night.
We had on good authority that wild camping in Poland was fairly easy and had a wealth of places to stop. Well, we must have been in the worst possible region, as we have found none! We drove for miles in the hope of somewhere to stop in till we unintentionally met our destination for the next day, the town of Wieliczka. Defeated we saw a lot of campers were paying for overnight parking so we found cheap car park and stopped for the night. Next day off to the Wieliczka Salt Mines! I was a little apprehensive as to whether to go, as it was EXPENSIVE. But, I thought to myself “will I ever return to Poland just to visit these mines?” “No” I thought, so I may as well check them out now! The tour took two and half-hours and was mind numbingly boring! The mines had been made to cater for the thousands of customers that pass through their doors so on the whole everything was shiny new, clean and very unmine like if you get what I mean! (no big pit soot here!)The underground salt church was the highlight of the tour where the floor tiles, alter, sculptures, absolutely everything is carved out of salt. Apart from this everything else on the tour was pretty tedious especially the description of each bloody salt statue! On the whole, I wouldn’t really tell people to visit unless they have a crazy fascination with salt.
Next stop Auschwitz. We tried to look for somewhere to stop and park up for the night along the way. This failed miserably again so we ended up staying overnight in the camping car sorry that’s French motorhome section of Auschwitz car park. I do hasten to say that fortunately we chose the car park to the left which was over the road from the Auschwitz so thankfully I didn’t have to look out of the window direct, which I think would have put me off my dinner. However, it was an eerie night sleep.
Bright and early we were at Auschwitz entrance. There were hundreds of visitors everywhere so after fighting past the swarms of group tours we took ourselves around Auschwitz without a tour guide.
Quite frankly it is darker than you could ever imagine it to be. After firstly walking around the buildings and reading different descriptions of what happened in such places as the mass execution shooting area, torture and execution yard and visiting the gas chambers and adjoined crematorium you really do have a strange feeling about you. The prison blocks have been turned into separate exhibitions to tell you the full story of Auschwitz. As you move through each prison block you learn of the everyday life as a prisoner, living and sanitary conditions, what happened to prisoners in the death blocks and the methods of deportation. It is both harrowing and disturbing that people could have been not only been mass murdered in such a calculating and industrial way but also the way prisoners were treated by the guards to ensure they broke them both physically and mentally.
There are thousands upon thousands of prisoners photographs hanging on the walls of the prison blocks taken as they arrived in the camp. Looking closer you notice surnames that are the same. Pictures of a father, lower down, on another row his two sons. Pictures are of both young and old. A very poignant prison block holds prisoners personal items taken as the entered the camp. Millions of shoes of men, women along with baby shoes, toys and clothes. Nazi guards took absolutely everything. Walking on you find mountains of combs, razors, brushes, shoe polish, reading glasses, suitcases, bowls and kitchen ware, prayer shawls, the list is endless. When the soviets liberated the camp they found seven tons of human hair used to make tailored suits and clothing. The stories and experiences of the camp make you quite sick to the stomach.
Nothing prepares you visiting Auschwitz, but of course it is important to go and observe first hand what happened to nearly two million people only a stones throw away across the channel. Luckily for us we lived over that big pond but for everyone else who lived in main land Europe, life was certainly very different where first hand experiences of the war still lingers.
After my stomach churning morning we left Auschwitz and headed with heavy heads and hearts to the border of Czech Republic.
Poland was a little disappointing. Although you could see, driving through, the countryside is beautiful it unfortunately had zillions of houses running through every valley and field. When one village stops the next town or village begins. At no point did we find any countryside where you can stop and look out and see or hear nothing but fields and nature. I hope that central and northern Poland are much more unspoilt as I would only want to reflect on the small amount of the country we passed through. Maybe if we had more time we could of investigated further. On the whole the Polish people were a little reserved, and stern. Maybe this is down to their hard past. Who knows, maybe next time we’ll have better luck getting to know a lighter, happier, Poland.
We comfortably rolled into Czech Republic. First impressions, very pretty, typical green rolling hills with dense alpine forests. The countryside has a more Austrian/german feel with wooden lodge style homes darted about the countryside.
We settled into the campsite and went for a cycle around. I am quite fascinated by people’s choice in food after watching the family next door to us consume a large quantity of big sausages with two slices of boring bread! Later on I spotted a guy picking up his takeaway order of exactly the same thing! This gets me thinking..are we western Europeans addicted to frills. I mean for example burger with salad garnish, different mayonnaise or BBQ sauce, melted cheese?! The eastern Europeans LOVE mayonnaise but apart from that I cant say I ever seen any food offered with frilly bits. Anway…
After looking around the Telpice Rock formations and feeling quite suffocated by tourists I made a quick escape to the nearest exit. The next day we headed deeper into the Czech countryside and found a place to stop the night by a lake. Unfortunately, the lake was not enjoyed as the next day I developed a massive dirty cold and felt horrible. For the next two days I took to lying down with paracetamol and a book, so Prague was postponed till better health.
