A friend had been trying to tempt me into crossing the Jeseníky mountains since last autumn.
For various reasons it didn't work out, so we decided to do this "trip" now. The plan was: on Friday we'd take the train to Ramzová, sleep there, and in the morning head off over Šerák and Červenohorské sedlo to Švýcárna for the night. Sunday morning we'd set off for Praděd and through Ovčárna to Karlova Studánka. Roughly 36 km in total. The weather forecast wasn't ideal, but I decided to take my DSLR and compact along with a tripod anyway — all in my photo backpack (Manfrotto Off Road Hiker 30L). The manufacturer claims the bag isn't designed to carry a tripod as heavy as the XPROB190, but they're wrong. This isn't the first or last time I've had it strapped on — it holds fine, the bag stays stable, and hiking with it is no problem at all.
We arrived to overcast skies and light drizzle. Checked in, walked around Ramzová, had dinner, watched a fairy tale, and went to sleep.
The next day the weather hadn't improved much. After a hearty breakfast we started climbing Šerák. The wind-packed snow that occasionally gave way underfoot was truly unpleasant — something we felt even more acutely during the afternoon climb towards Slatě. On Šerák there was nothing to see. Keprník wasn't much better. Before Červená hora the weather settled down a little and we caught a glimpse of the sun and the Hučivá Desná valley. From Červenohorské sedlo we could see the ski runs opposite, and the cloud gradually started breaking up. The worst stretch was between Výrovka and Slatě — drifted snow and every second step sinking in is quite exhausting. The reward was a beautiful view of Praděd right before Švýcárna.
Sunday didn't offer the same views — Praděd was in clouds and mist again. The closer we got, the better things became. From the summit we could only see as far as Ovčárna and Vrbno pod Pradědem. The path to Ovčárna offered a stunning view of the transmitter tower several times. The descent to Karlova Studánka wasn't particularly demanding. We did have to navigate more water than expected at times, but compared to Saturday it was nothing dramatic. Since our bus to Brno wasn't for a while we decided to walk around the town and then head upstream along the Bílá Opava as far as we could go. Over two and a bit days we covered roughly 45 km in total. We'll definitely go back to the Jeseníky — I'm still missing shots of Praděd with clouds and a panorama of the whole range wouldn't go amiss either. But above all, that nature! We didn't pass more than 20 people along the entire route.
And that silence — that's what real rest feels like.