The rules in the High Tatras are getting stricter starting next year.

Toilets in the mountains, entrance fees to the national park and no entry with dogs. The long-awaited revision of the TANAP visiting regulations is slowly approaching. We will now outline how this change will affect the movement of tourists in the Tatra National Park and what this change means not only for dog walkers.

Popradské pleso, a popular tourist destination in the High Tatras

Popradské pleso - a popular tourist destination of the High Tatras

The end of trips with dogs on the Slovak side of the Tatras too?

On the Polish side of the Tatras, the ban on entry with dogs has been in effect for a few years. Violating this ban can result in heavy fines. Something similar now awaits four-legged tourists and their guides in Slovakia as well. For the duration of this season, the old visiting regulations still apply, which allow movement with a dog in the park, but only and exclusively on a leash. You can find the current TANAP visitor rules on the park's official website in the section "For visitors" www.tanap.sk/navstevnici/ .

According to the current director of the national park, Pavol Majko, the reason for the changes in the visiting regulations is primarily the protection of local plants and animals . There have been many situations where dogs have chased chamois or even killed mountain marmots. Even an unwanted collision with a larger predator - a brown bear - cannot be ruled out in the territory of the Tatras. At the same time, it is already stated in the current visitor regulations that untying a dog from its leash can cost the owner up to 300 euros .

A problem in the rare Tatra ecosystem is excrement, which some lazy owners do not pick up after their dogs, often with an excuse like: "Who would want to carry it all the time if there are no bins in the mountains?". With similar behavior of certain individuals, regulations could not wait long. With your dog, you can take a last look at the Green or Skalnaté pleso or the Tatra highway for the last time this year.

Dog owners do not perceive this regulation positively. Many of them cannot even imagine a vacation without their four-legged companions. According to the regulations being prepared, tourists with dogs would be allowed to enter the places that will be designated for this - paved and forest roads outside the alpine level . TANAP is preparing a specific map for its visitors. It will be marked where dogs are allowed and where not. Furthermore, the plan is to install information signs and boards directly in the field to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings.

Sunrise in the Tatras

Similar pictures of the sunrise, captured on the Tatra peaks, should already be a thing of the past

Hiking in the dark with a flashlight? Definitely not in the Tatras

In addition to the ban on entry with dogs, the newly prepared visiting regulations should emphasize the already valid ban on trips after dark . The reason is supposed to be the protection of nature again, this time especially the fauna . In an interview with Czech Radio from July 2023, the director of TANAP, Pavol Majko, emphasized that as soon as it gets dark, many animals in the park start looking for food . It is definitely not desirable to stress out night-grazing animal species. According to the director of TANAP, tourists should admire nature when they can see it.

Exceptions for movement in the national park after dark can be granted to scientific expeditions, tourists heading to a mountain hut for the night, or climbers who are going to remote corners of the mountains.

Velické pleso and Velické waterfall, High Tatras

For example, you will be able to pay a voluntary entrance fee for a walk to the Velické waterfall and thus support the development of the national park

News that will make you sit on your ass - literally

Toilets in the mountains will be a big novelty for tourists . Tatra National Park will try to install toilets in six places as part of one of its projects. However, more detailed information about their location is a mystery. Let us therefore be surprised. From this news, as tourists, we can expect greater cleanliness along the roads and less scattered handkerchiefs and wet wipes that pollute the rare nature of the national park. The question is whether such expectations will be fulfilled. Time will tell.

TANAP plans to make new cycling routes and educational trails available this year. According to the director of the park, a new attraction - the wildest river in Slovakia - should be a big attraction. The Belá River has been made available for boating tourism since 2022 . Especially for the spring months. This is a unique adrenaline experience. People have to take the boat out on foot , because there is a ban on entry by vehicle on the road. However, if they leave their car under the Permon Hotel in Podbánské and carry the boat on their shoulders, they can go down the virgin wild flow of the newly born Belá River and taste the Tatras again from a slightly different barrel.

Another novelty is to be a voluntary entrance fee , which the park plans to collect through the application.

Stone path in the Tatras

Hiking trails in the High Tatras attract thousands of tourists every day to explore this exceptional high-mountain location

Reconstruction of the Freedom Road - Tatra transport artery

If you went to the Tatras this year, you probably noticed the changes taking place on the main traffic section – the Freedom Road. This is a general repair of the road leading from Podbánské to Tatranská Lomnica with a length of 43 kilometers. It passes through all the main tourist centers and is therefore crucial for the movement of tourists who go to the Tatras by car. So if you are still planning to drive to the Tatras this year, it will be a real test of your nerves. By the end of the summer season, queues will almost certainly form there.

The freedom path connects fifteen Tatra settlements. Its construction began already in 1967 , and ten years later the responsible persons stated that the road was overloaded and the number of cars was unbearable . It has multiplied over time, and even so, the road built in this way has served up to the present day.

But it was already in such a deplorable state that after 56 years it finally underwent reconstruction . However, each kilometer of the new road will cost less than a million euros. But for that kind of money, visitors can already look forward to a modern road repaired next year, on which four rest areas with shelters, toilets and information boards will be built. There will also be bike racks and playgrounds.

The repair is divided into six sections of approximately seven kilometers each . A total of five companies will work on it, and the main parts of the reconstruction should be completed by the end of this year. The rest should be completed during 2024. Ambition and plans are one thing, the unpredictable Tatra weather, which has already ruined several similar plans in the past, is another. But we believe that everything will work out and that the next summer season will be a bit more pleasant for tourists arriving in cars.