It was a hike with Izdak.org. The weather forecast promised rain, but at first, as we walked through the forest, everything was fine—just cloudy. But as we climbed higher and left the forest behind, the weather took a turn for the worse. There was heavy fog, wind, and rain on the mountain, which at times turned into hail and then snow. I had to hide my camera and start fighting the precipitation. The raincoats didn’t help much in the strong wind. I had brought thick winter gloves, but after a while even they got wet. And one person didn’t even bring a raincoat!

We started a little late, around 11 a.m., so we encountered tourists who were already descending from the summit. I must say that many of them did not look very well—they were wet, cold, and exhausted! But our group pressed on despite the worsening weather. Another determined group was ahead of us, but at some point they stopped and turned back. Our guides paused to think. They talked to an athlete coming down from the summit, and he said that without crampons, it would be very difficult to continue. We didn’t have crampons, so the guides decided not to take any chances. With a heavy sigh, our group turned around and began the descent. Not this time! We didn’t make it 250 m to the summit.

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