Where have you been?

Day two of our Tatra trip saw us going to the most popular and crowded section of the mountains, the Dolina Rybiego Potoku and the famous Morskie Oko. Morskie Oko, which means "Sea Eye" in English, is by far the most popular tourist destination for Polish people and it is said to have been the favorite of the late Pope John Paul II. Because of its popularity the "hike" to the eye is up a paved path and, if you are especially lazy, you can even ride up in a horse drawn cart. The truly lazy also ride back down in the carts! However, those that brave the hazardous sidewalk to the lake are rewarded with views of a breathtaking lake as well as some of the most impressive climibing areas of the entire Tatras.


After the leisure two hour walk we were greated with this amazing view of the lake and surrounding peaks. The mountain pass (the dip in the middle above the trees) is the spot of the path I showed a few post ago highlighting some of the more dangerous trails.


Here is another view of the lake from the mountain lodge located along its shores. We reached the eye around 9:30 in the morning, fairly early, and there were only a few people on the beach. Czarny Staw is located in the upper valley (the saddle point to the left) and if you look close enough you can see the thirty minute trail up.


This picture was selected because of the amazing view it provides of the lake, valley, and mountain lodge. Without realizing it, however, this picture is looking in the exact opposit direction as the one above it. This photo was taken from Czarny Staw looking directly at the mountain lodge; the photo above this one was taken from the mountain lodge looking directly at Czarny Staw. Excellent. The hazardous path I was talking about above and in another post is seen to the left of this photo as a large "Z".


Once at the Czarny Staw level you can walk around a bit and that is just what we did. This path leads to the trail up Rysy, one of the highest peaks in the Tatras, but we only walked part way around. You can see from this photo that the lakes are exceptionally clean and pure. It goes without saying that the water was freaking cold, even in July!


Here is a view of both Morskie Oko and Czarny Staw. I walked up the first 10 meters of the very difficult trail to Mięguszowieckie Szczyty to get this shot. The people seen in this photo are only a fraction of the number to be found down at the mountain lodge.


After climbing down from Czarny Staw we walked around the far side of the lake to get this shot. In it is shown Niżny Źabi Szczyt (main peak in the middle). This peak along with Rysy, Mięguszowieckie Szczyty, and several others mark the border between Poland and Slovakia. Rysy can be seen in this photo; its the peak about 1/3 from the right hand side. The trail to the top is the diagonal line from the snowy area that is almost in the shade.


This range is seen from the path to Morskie Oko and is also runs along the border between the two countries. I can't figure out which it is exactly, and therefore its name, but its a nice photo anyway.

In all our trip took about 9 hours and we were both really beat after. We attempted to hike over one of the passes to the valley of the five lakes but were stopped by an impassable (for us) section. I will talk about that in another post however. Here is a map of our day two hike. Please notice the strange dead-end purple mark indicating our aborted mountain pass attempt.