Outdoor

Due to my passionate mother who was a life-member of K.Č.T. (Czech tourist and trekking club) and the establisher of the foremost youth trekking and camping organization in Czech Repulic (A.T.O.M.), I have been living in trekking and hiking world since birth. I literally grew up in a backpack and with a backpack on me, spending almost every weekend and holidays in different place in Czech Rep. and Europe, especially outside in the nature. In this way outdoor sports naturally became an important part of my lifestyle which they stays till these days.

Before I reached adulthood I trekked through most of significant natural destination and mountain ranges in Czech Rep. And also visited many European countries that were long time, due to the communist regime, forbidden to us. We started traveling abroad in big groups of adventurous explorers straight after the borders opened in 1989. We were poor so we travelled very low budged, in old rented buses, camping wherever it was possible and always cooking our own food that we carried from the home country (imagine 40 people sleeping in tents on random farms or under the bus in parking areas and queuing there in front of huge steaming pots when the meal time approached). Sometimes we went through whole countries cycling, carrying all the bikes on the trailer behind the bus, crossing even the highways as we did not know what the highway is (there were no highways in Czech Rep. those days).

In the past, as a member of K.Č.T. and A.T.O.M., I was regularly participating something that was called “tourist competition”. In older times the word “tourism” had a very wide meaning in Czech. Apart from cognitive traveling, as we usually know it today, it was an area of activity (and also an university subject) that represented wide range of outdoor sports like trekking, hiking, cross-country running and skiing, rock-climbing, cycling, kayaking etc. It also included first aid training and theoretical knowledge of geography, topography, botanics, zoology and history of Czech country. Then, in such sense, were also held the competitions.
In these competitions there was a cross country running combined with theoretical tests from the subjects mentioned above as well as time-stressed physical tasks like building a tent, tighting various knots, walking on rope, crawling under a net, shooting a target with a heavy ball or searching hidden spots only with compass and map according to given coordinates. Many of this knowledge and skills that I practiced for the competitions as well as for our outdoor camping and trekking trips (either as a member or later as a senior guide of A.T.O.M.) prepared me for my outdoor future.

In the years that followed I trekked and hiked numerous coutries and mountain ranges in Europe, Asia and Polynesia and eventually created my “permanent outdoor camp” in the form of my little farm and hermitage in Romanian mountains.

If I am not in Romania I am basically living as a nomad while a big part of my wandering through the world consists of trekking, hiking and rock-climbing.

Till now the most challenging outdoor adventures I have undertaken were hiking the sacred mountain trail Koyasan in Japan, hiking Te Urewera national park in New Zealand, climbing the Alpine mountain Piz Barnina, and walking almost 3 months and 500km long trek through Romanian Carpathian mountains with a horse together with my Japanese ex-partner and our 1 year old child on the back.

In 2019 was the first time for me to taste rock-climbing. I immediately fall in love with it. Soon after I have become a climbing instructor and visited many important and beautiful climbing spots in Czech as well as in Italy, Romania, Greece, Kosovo and Albania. I mostly climb barefoot. The grades I feel most comfortable with lies between 6a and 6c (actual for spring 2021).

I also act as a certificated trekking guide especially during my zen-yoga retreats which include 60km long mountain trek (see below). Occasionaly I am giving theoretical lectures and presentations in climbing gyms, I am writing articles for the foremost Czech climbing/hiking magazine eMontana and I am promoting the practice combining zen, yoga and outdoor sports (the latest project in this field is an extensive video-serie “The way of rocks” recorded in various climbing and hiking spots in Alps and southern Europe).

The lifestyle combining zen and yoga with outdoor sports, farming and art can be experienced in Kolíba Ashram in southern Romania. Everybody is welcome!

“With a baby and horse through the spine of Carpathian“ (2014)

Video about two and half months long trip through Carpathian mountains in Romania with horse and one year old baby. Altitude: 1000-2000 m. From August to November. Almost 500 km. Self made music (Tibetan-Japanese-Czech band Inadanian)