20 years of photography... and mount Wolowiec

I remember very well how exactly 20 years ago I traveled by car from Lodz to Krakow to pick up my first digital camera bought online. My dream gem was the Minolta S404, a camera that I spent my single salary on! The camera was powered by four AA batteries, the memory card had a capacity of 256MB, and the special feature of photos taken on the hottest days were vertical artifacts caused by overheating of the 4 megapixel matrix :) But there was a lot of joy, because in 2002 hardly anyone knew what the digital photography was, and absolutely no one was aware of the upcoming photography revolution. Today, almost everyone takes photos, almost every day. Countless numbers of photos taken with mobile phones flood the Internet, but to vast majority of the photos no one comes back. But I am still faithful to digital cameras, and I often look at old photos. Because there are a few things only that give more satisfaction than a photo taken by yourself and for yourself, that will revive memories over time. Camera in hand, the world seen through the viewfinder, looking for frames, captured colors, shapes, places and events...

Wolowiec, located on the Polish-Slovak border Tatra peak with a height of 2063 m above sea level, caught my attention for the first time during a spring walk in the Chocholowska Valley. Covered with a thick cap of white snow, it reminded me of a large crunchy meringue. The idea to reach the summit, however, appeared a bit later, when Marcin and I were climbing the neighboring peaks of Malolaczniak and Krzesanica in September 2020.
We finally managed to implement the plan on the last Friday of June 2022, on one of the longest days of the year. But since it was summer, the summit no longer looked like a meringue. It looked like broccoli! Just like the whole trail leading to Wolowiec from the Parking Lot Under Spalona through the peaks of Grzes and Rakon, in the strong sunlight everything was intensely green, like broccoli!

Click to see the route.
Distance: 18.98 km. Total ascent: 1,230 m. Walking time: 5:57 h.
Total time of the trip: departure from Krakow at sunrise, return to Krakow at a bit after sunset :)