Our second day in Zakopane I woke up and my first thought: "whoa...I am definitely sick." Phlegm, cough, snot, the whole package. One of my cousins had to drive home early that day for work, and I considered going with him, but I knew I would have regretted it, so I stayed. I thought they were going to just have a pretty relaxed day and I would be fine.
I was right, I would have regretted it, but it was not a relaxed day.
At first we had planned to go to Morskie Oko:
"Morskie Oko (literally "Eye of the Sea") is the largest and fourth deepest lake in the Tatra Mountains. It is located deep within the Tatra National Park, Poland" - Wikipedia
But we had driven to the wrong place or parked wrong or something like that, and we ended up way too far to have made it, so we quickly changed out plans and decided to hike up to Giewont.
Here's a pretty good video, we only did one of the trails, these guys did a lot more, but if you watch the beginning and then skip over to 5:00, that's more or less where they show Giewont
The hike was both absolutely beautiful and completely grueling. There was eight of us, including my eight-year-old nephew. None of us had any idea what we were getting ourselves into, we had had breakfast but didn't buy anything for lunch, we had a tiny bit of water, I had brought my little $5 shoes from Payless (bad idea, my feet were bleeding later).
But off we went.
The first hour and a half up was fine. Like I said: gorgeous. If you are the slightest bit of a nature person GO TO ZAKOPANE AND HIKE!!
It was prettier in person, trust me, breathtaking.
But then after about two hours it started getting steep. And it was hot. I was definitely sick, I
thought to myself: “kiddo, you’re going to suffer for this later.” Oh boy I was
right.
I had taken apples for everyone (my mom is laughing as she reads this, I just know it), those were gone, almost all our water was gone, my cousin had taken a few candy bars, those were gone. Lots of moaning and groaning. At one point we started asking the people going down "how much further?"
"To the top? Pretty far"
"Is it this steep all the way up?"
"Hah, the worst is yet to come."
We sat for a little bit, looked at each other, and considered calling it a day and hiking back down. One of my cousins had started to feel really weak, probably not enough water or too much sun or both. We didn't know if the rest of us should keep going at all. Finally we decided that she would stay with her boyfriend and the rest of us would try to make it. So we kept going.
We all made it to the first lookout point, and at that point my cousin said her and her son, the little 8-year-old, would stay behind. Probably a good choice: once you get to the top of Giewont the rocks are so slippery and steep you have to hold on to chains to get up.
So then there were four of us.
For me, the chains were the most fun, I felt kind of like I was rock climbing again.
After about three and a half hours, half of us made it to the top, and oh my goodness, totally worth it. At the top the view is amazing. There's a cross that marks where the top is:
photo credit: http://www.trekearth.com/gallery/Europe/Poland/East/Malopolskie/Tatry/photo1146095.htm
We sat up there for a bit, then made our way back down, which was much, much easier then going up. It took us a little under three hours. By that time we hadn't really had a meal in 12 hours, I was absolutely starving, my nose was a faucet, I was coughing, tired.
But the hike was just...ah, best thing ever, please, please, skip Paris and Rome and go to Zakopane. I love nature-y things, so for me it was amazing.
At one point I saw a lady give some crackers to her toddler, and for a second I seriously considered taking them from her. But I controlled myself.
We got to the car and drove to the main downtown area for some food. I started to feel so bad I thought I was going to die. I assumed I was just really hungry, so I went to a restaurant and ordered all the things. I felt like an idiot, I spent like three times more on food than I should have, but I didn't care.
I couldn't quite form sentences, and after I ate a little bit, I felt worse. It took whatever energy I had left to keep from bursting out in tears, I didn't know what was wrong with me. I think my body was just exhausted from lack of sleep, food, water, being sick, and then a day-long hike on top of all of it. I don't remember ever feeling so weak. I've had food poisoning and it wasn't as bad as this was.
I ate quickly, gave my cousin my wallet to count out my money because I felt too horrible to do it myself, and asked if I could go lay down in the car while they walked around a bit.
I may or may not have used this time alone to cry like a little baby because I literally thought I was going to die or go to the hospital or something. I can neither confirm nor deny this.
On the way home we had some car trouble. I was in a half-sleep state the whole time, so I don't know the details, but there swear words. We ended up getting home later than expected, so I stayed at my other aunt's house, decided I absolutely had to sleep that night so I ate a couple ZZZ Quil.
The next day it was hot and we did nothing. And it was fabulous.
I didn't die. I'm still a little stuffed up a week later, but I don't regret it at all, best choice ever.
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