Slovakia - Day 20: Durkova Chata to Chopok

Civilised

The weather was fantastic, blue skies and a view. The High Tatras to the north, and some other bits to the south. On a day like this names are not important, I won’t bore you with the superlatives describing the view. If you do nothing else of this walk – do this bit.

It was a short haul so we took our time and admired the view. Our guest was happy that it wasn’t as up as yesterday. There were lots and lots of people. From all over the world we spoke to an Australian with a Slovak wife who both lived in London (carrying a little dog each in a specially designed pouch –unfortunately we don’t have a picture. But despite, or maybe because of, the dogs they were nice people.)

Infinity

The south side of Chopok was being destroyed by bulldozers – to make the skiing better I guess. It might look Ok when it is finished. But who gives planning permission for such things. Unbelievable.

Two of Us plus One

We sang “Nellie the Elephant” by the Toy Dolls with the dance (try YouTube – British Punk at it’s, let’s say, best) at the top of Chopok. It’s our current walking anthem, if you’ve watched the video you will see why it cheers us up. We didn’t all know all of the words – but we knew the tune. And what it meant to us: a lot of very strange looks from what we take to be very nice people.

Dr. Suess famously said “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened”. To today is the last day on this section of the walk. Tomorrow Day 21 will actually take place next year. So we are having a rest day.

It has taken us 144 hours of walking. 

One

A journey of 3:34 in a car.

The End is Nigh

But we have had fun.

Closer

We’ve seen some beautiful parts of Slovakia that we would never have seen any other way.

We are shy

But no bears.

	Day 20	Cumulative
Distance Walked	12km	436km
Meters Climbed	749m	17,182m
Walking Time	4:49	144:47
General Comment Beautiful. Simply breathtaking. One of the best ridge walks in Slovakia. We have climbed 8.5 times the height of the mountain that we are standing on – Chopok 2,024m.