Europe · Slovakia

The High Tatras

Four days in the Tatras with a guide from Kysuce. Rysy for the experienced, Zelené pleso for everyone else.

We run the Tatras because we know them. Marek has been walking here since he was fifteen and has done most of the routes in winter too. The tour is four days, based in a guesthouse in Starý Smokovec, with the electric mountain railway included — it is the best way to move between trailheads.

The programme splits by fitness. The easier branch goes up to Hrebienok, past the Studený potok waterfalls, and on to Zelené pleso through the Biela voda valley: about 14 kilometres with 700 metres of ascent. The demanding branch climbs Rysy — 2,501 metres, the only Slovak two-thousander with a marked tourist path, nine to eleven hours there and back, with chains on the final section. The trail is legally open only from 16 June to 31 October.

Day three is calmer: Štrbské pleso, Popradské pleso and the symbolic cemetery, with plaques for climbers who did not come back. On day four, if the weather turns, we go to the Belianska cave or the TANAP museum in Tatranská Lomnica. The Tatras are weather, and the plan bends to it rather than the other way round. This is the cheapest tour we run — from 189 euros for four days with half board — because the transfer is short and the beds cost less. Families with children from eight upwards are welcome, though not on Rysy. The tourist tax in Starý Smokovec is 1.50 euros a night, paid in cash on arrival.

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