Ride Lugged

Ok, so this time I was tricked into going for a little hike in the mountains.
There are actually some nice mountains, maybe 3000 feet, about half a mile higher than in Prague, and pretty close to the city.
Not at all bad really, so I hear. Anyway it’s been warm and everyone keeps talking up some weather inversion.
It seems that when it’s overcast in Prague, it’s sunny in the mountains, so it should be great, right?

Anyway, so it snowed, and there was a cloud bank so thick you could see about 100 feet in it.
What you could see was quite picturesque though.
But you couldn’t really take any good photos, what with the fog and snow, that is.
So I’m told, the “inversion” caught up with us or something?, whatever!

So anyway, the apparent reason for the trip was to show me something.
A unique Czech creation. Some famous piece of architecture.
(and to secretly gauge my response/reaction to it, so I learned.)
the Hotel Ještěd. Apparently, it is something that sits majestically atop the mountain.
anyway all I saw was a cloud, and some pretty trees covered in snow.

finally as we were almost upon it..
(and thankfully we had just stopped for food and beer, and to wait for the cloud to thin a bit, after the arduous trek up the mountain, which was really only very difficult in the steep sections because of the ill planned footwear of the men on the icy/slippery slopes, but I digress… )
Hotelu Ještěd.

so there it was in all its bizarre glory.
a spaceship from the late 1960’s landed on a foggy wintery mountain.
(or so I must assume. I have to this point climbed steep hills and passed a couple of ski lifts (at both the bottom and top!!), but as of yet, haven’t been able to see enough for any real reference.)

and here was the ascent party (of whom all had independent opinions, but were bound all by a common disdain) to such a freakish construction atop the mountain:
Veronika, Tom, and Vendulka (and of course Cory with the camera)

Luckily the spaceship was in the Czech Republic still, so there was a pub inside to warm your bellies with beer and pickles.
(ok, so we didn’t have any pickles, but I’m sure they were available upon request.)

Then we of course had to hike back down.
The way up was 6km I think?, and back down maybe 7 or a little more.
Anyway it was an all day affair, what with the stopping for refreshment and all.
plus the snow. (note + additional time for snow)
but only 90 minutes from Prague, it wasn’t bad.

We did manage to find a small path with 15-20cm of untouched snow (hiding ice at points) thanks to the expert map reading of Vendulka and Veronika. Thankfully the walking/hiking/biking trails in the Czech lands are both well marked/signed and well mapped, because…

We saw a very nice sunset.
(did I mention that it cleared up a bit, and we could actually see some of the other mountains from the top at Ještěd. yeah, no good pictures there, but trust me it was nice.)

The only problem was…
We were still about 2.5km from our car (and the sunset, remember… )
Thankfully, the fresh snow helped our night vision and again there were the nicely marked trails.

So a bit after dark we arrived back to our car, aided by a well placed and well planned bottle of Fernet citrus (click ano, and poke around) after an earlier similar helpful pint of czech potato rum.
All was well. We all had a good time.
After numerous slips and falls and a couple of gallant break-throughs testing the way over some ice over puddles along the way,
all were warm and the men had only some wet feet.

Not so worse for the wear.
I’d try it again.

go to Hotelu Ještěd’s website and look around, it’s bizarre (did I say that already?).

take care.
ciao -cory