Poland is presently undergoing a boom in the organisation of gravity sports. Many characters have come out of the woodwork to be involved in the beloved passion that is rolling down a hill as fast a possible.

There are several Dirtsurfers, quite a number of Street Lugers, and a sizeable handful of people with long skateboards.

There have been two events, the first I missed as I had my mum over, the second I have just come back from. As I write this I have countless bruises, grazed elbows, the obligatory 50p sized graze on my left butt cheek, a stiff neck, a pulled muscle, and trench foot (never take just one pair of shoes on a skate trip to the mountains, in case of sudden torrential rain). It was a mixed bag for me as I slammed like barn door on the central plains during a windy night; however there was also some splendid riding and lots of fun.

One of the real bonuses, apart from the plethora of skateable hills, is the bargain accomodation available near ski resorts, bike trails, rambling ways, and natural parks. If you are thinking of taking a skate break in Poland it’s totally feasible, affordable and I think you’ll find a bunch of dudes willing to hook-up.

There are a few Polish longboard galleries and video links knocking around the web, there‘s also a forum. If you check out the sites mentioned above, you might find something more.

I was fortunate to meet two guys from www.antidote-krk.com, they are both engineers and have started to get into boarding and building.

Very close to Krakow there are some very good hills (I had found a nice looking area that needed spotters to ride it when I was looking for somewhere to walk the dog) and we began to head out and bomb a bit.

Both Dawid and Piotrek have ridden streetboards (at the world championships no less), and they snowboard (I got into the sport looking for a handy alternative to a bike because I lived on the 5th floor of an apartment block).

I was blown away by how quickly they learnt, they are stoked on speed and getting more stoked by the day!

Piotrek’s nose wheelies still make me stop and clap and Dawid’s unquenchable thirst for speed definitely makes me bomb that hill one more time, usually with injurious results!

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Wisla Czarne was shown to us by a Dirtsurfer who goes by the name of “Flash“ There is a deadly forest road which is narrow and lined with log piles. I followed my new dirt surfing friend down to be animatedly signalled that it was not passable because of copious amounts of dirt , which was well ‘surfed’ by Michal, but caused me to make one of my now famous high speed crashes.

“Flash”/Michal, (www.dirtsurfer.pl) is very organised, and a driving force behind motivating the events here in Poland. I believe now he’s bought some Holeys and a budget deck. It‘s contagious this skating fast mularkey!

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This is from Wilk (Wolf). The ski lift takes you from the car parks (3) up to the reservoir on the summit of the mountain (2).

The lift is fun in itself and adds to the surreal nature of this run. I half expected the mountain to open up and a Bond style underground lair be revealed. Whilst I was musing about the prospect of monorails and boiler suits Krzys (a boy who lived for 4 years in Santa Monica and is cool as a cucumber) focussed on the matter in hand by recommending they drain the reservoir and we hit the banks!

The run down is about 6km. The surface is good. Piotrek killed it on his last run. There should be some video of that one day. The traffic is minimal, access only (BUT, I got carried away and had a pretty close call, so be warned!).

Sliding has not made a big impression here in Poland. Not yet anyway! However when the road was deemed too wet to ride and the visibility at the top of the mountain was bad enough to send some of the more experienced lugers to their cars, we with the long boards found a nice straight and played in the road. It was heralded a massacre. But a fun one!

We’ve had a bunch of sessions, there’s plans for more, and talk of trips to visit the Czech Republic (also with a blossoming scene). If anyone is looking for a place to search out some quiet long hills, this part of the world’s pretty good!