Tatra Mountains Border Hike

The Tatra Mountains is a mountain range that forms a natural border between Slovakia and Poland. They are the highest mountain range in the Carpathian Mountains. The Tatra Mountains occupy an area of 785 square kilometres, of which about 610 square kilometres (77.7%) lie within Slovakia and about 175 square kilometres (22.3%) within Poland. The highest peak, called Gerlach, at 2,655 m, is located north of Poprad, entirely in Slovakia. The highest point in Poland, Rysy, at 2,499 m, is located south of Zakopane, on the border with Slovakia. The Tatras are protected by law by the establishment of the Tatra National Park, Slovakia and the Tatra National Park, Poland, which are jointly entered in UNESCO’s World Network of Biosphere Reserves. In 1992, UNESCO jointly designated the Polish and Slovak parks a transboundary biosphere reserve in the World Network of Biosphere Reserves, under its Man and the Biosphere Programme.

As I was travelling with my young children I thought an easy hike was in order. However the queues when we to got the cable car were huge so we decided to walk from Kuźnice (marked A on the topographical map below) to the mountain hut at Polana Kondratowa (outlined by the blue dotted line and marked B on the topographical map below). Deciding that Giewont was too ambitious for them as well as the ridge walk we aimed for the col at Prelecz Pod Kopa Kondracka following the green dotted path. (marked C on the topographical map below). Once there we walked along the ridge which marks the border to Kasprowy Wierch (1985m) (marked D on the topographical map below) before taking the cable car down. One difficulty is as we walked up we had no ticket and had to wait for a slot to go back down which meant a long wait!!!