I awoke from the sunlight on day 2 of my hiking odyssey to the Czech Republic. It was around 7 am. For an instant, I expected to see the breezy pictures of bamboo leaves that lined the bedroom of the apartment I rented in Wroclaw. Instead, there was a worn green radiator in front of me, its rusty tubes running up and into a drab wall. My room was a thin and rectangular dingy box. If not for the two large windows in the room I would swear the walls were squeezing out the air.
I pushed away my blanket, swung my legs over the side of the bed and sat down for a while in silence. The pain in my traps and legs reminded me of the exhausting hike the day before. I wondered if someone could give me a ride to the village of Stříbrnice, but I was on a mountain – the car would probably have to go back down to the town of Międzygórze, my starting point, and cross the Czech border from there. The Śnieżnik peak is only 500 m away – just 500 m of hiking up an incline path until the natural Czech border. From there, the rest of the way to Stříbrnice should be downhill.
I felt hungry, reached for my food supplies bag and took out a snickers bar. A vile smell suddenly wafted up from the bag. I looked inside and found that my bananas have gone rotten – they were in their own clear plastic bag along with a rotten banana peel that I forgot to throw away. Shoving the rancid smelling supplies bag away from me, I faced the dull radiator and chewed furiously on my snickers bar.
I carried my gear down the stairs, sat for a while in the dining room where I drank a cup of coffee, paid for my stay in the lodge then said my farewell to the two fellows I met the day before – the English speaker and the big man with the yellow jacket. The chilled air outside shook my bones and chased away any leftover trace of sleep. I took a quick look at the direction where I came from the day before: neighboring mountains spilled in the valley below, their face covered by dark trees and snow. A mist cut off the peaks of mountain ranges. My shoulders started to sting from the weight pulling down on me. I swung around and walked through steam from my breath, towards the thick of trees that hid the Śnieżnik peak.
It took me about an hour to finally reach the Śnieżnik peak. The summit was barren of trees and was thrashed mercilessly by a furious wind. To my right was a row of tall sticks firmly planted in the ground that ran down the side of the peak – on top of each stick were sharp icicles pointing horizontally. To my left was an elevated viewing point.
A person in a red jacket stood there alone, looking through binoculars at the panoramic scenery around him. Setting my gear down on the snow, I stared at the horizon and other mountain peaks in the eye.
According to my hiking plan, I had to follow a green marker for a trail that runs down the Śnieżnik peak, across other mountain ranges, before branching off to another trail that leads into the Czech Republic. However, everything on the Śnieżnik peak was buried under snow – there were no markers to be seen. I took out my compass, found the direction the trail should head towards and walked that way. Buried in snow was an object similar to a distance-marker. There was a hint of green on it. I brushed off the snow and saw the full green hiking. Beyond the marker are rolling hills and thick snow – there were no footprints or other signs to indicate a used path.
The situation did not look good. I could go off of my compass and educated assumptions, but that would be risky. There were about 6-7 hours of sunshine left – I did not want to waste them on backtracking. I went back to my map: there is another hiking trail – indicated by a red marker – that heads down the peak on an Easterly direction. I took out my compass for another reading: East happens to point in the same direction where the tall sticks planted in the ground head towards. But there was no red marker on the sticks. Not sure of the trail, I decided to climb up the viewing point and ask the man in the red jacket for advice.
I greeted him in Polish, spread out the map in front of him on a sheet of snow, pointed to Stříbrnice and to where the tall sticks run down the hill. The man looked in his mid to late 50’s, his mouth was twisted in a grimace that showed discolored and crooked teeth. A stubble covered his tired face and a large water-drop hung from his nose. He asked if I spoke German. Even when I replied that I did not he went off in a long-winded and passionate monologue, his voice swelling as he pointed to the different peaks on the horizon with his gloved hand then at the medals that hung on his chest. Among the medals, one had the insignia of the Russian flag while another medal had that of the Chinese flag. After his long monologue died down I again pointed to Stříbrnice on the map and to the tall sticks. He looked at me for a few seconds, the wind howling around and between us, and then nodded. I thanked him, climbed down the viewing point and hurriedly put on my gear.
Looking back over my shoulder one last time, I noticed the man in the red jacket went back to his binoculars, surveying the world around him as if watching over his land.
I felt relieved – there was a proper sign that indicated the direction to Stříbrnice and the trail was all downhill. More so, there were people hiking up in the opposite direction, towards the Śnieżnik peak. Each time we greeted the other with a friendly ‘Dobry Dan’. At one point I spoke with a hiker. He confirmed that I was heading in the right direction, then, out of curiosity, he asked where I came from – I answered by pointing a finger up to the Śnieżnik peak.
It got warmer the further downhill I went and the snow melted to uncover the dirt and gravel underneath. Strangely, there were hardly any trees on this side of the mountain, just stumps. Looking in the distance, I could clearly see all the villages scattered in the valley below me and nestled on the sides of mountains. The sky was clear and the sun brightly lit the valley in its warm rays. A couple of kilometers away the gravel road changed to a windy street I shared with cars, on one side was a tree-covered hill on the other side a steep drop to a stream.
The street eventually ran into a serene gathering of houses – no cars drove by, a few people walked in a barn-like building and came out with tools in their hands. There was a sign by the road. The closer I got to the houses the more legible the sign became: it read Stříbrnice. I held my breath. All of a sudden the strain in my shoulders and the weight on my back vanished. I made it – I hiked to the Czech Republic from Poland! Walking past the people working in front of the barn, I instinctively punched the air above my head and held my fist up high as I walked past the village sign.
Note from the Editor:
Mohamed Asem is a writer from Kuwait and currently on a journey across eastern/central Europe. When he was in Poland he visited Warsaw, Krakow and Wroclaw. During his stay in Krakow, he visited the Auschwitz Birkenau museum.
A Smile from Auschwitz.
https://polishnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1962:a-smile-from-auschwitz&catid=93:historiapolish-history&Itemid=329
Crossing the Polish-Czech Border on Foot
Part 1 of 4
https://polishnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2001:crossing-the-polish-czech-border-on-foot-&catid=87:podroetravel&Itemid=305
Part 2 of 4
https://polishnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2033:crossing-the-polish-czech-border-on-foot-&catid=87:podroetravel&Itemid=305