Kékes (1,014 m a.s.l.) is the highest peak of the Mátra, a small Carpathian range in the northern part of Hungary. These mountains are interesting because they directly border the overwhelmingly flat and dry Great Hungarian Plain. Kékes is easily accessible via several hiking trails and… by car, as an asphalt road leads to the very summit. At the top, you’ll find a sanatorium, souvenir stalls, and a TV tower that also serves as a cafe and observation deck. As the highest peak in Hungary, Kékes belongs to the Crown of Europe. Welcome to the report from the ascent of this mighty mountain!
Table of Contents
- The Idea and the Journey Through Hungary
- Starting the Hike from Mátraháza
- Kékes Summit and the TV Tower
- Descent via the Ski Slope
- Trip Map
The idea to climb Kékes was born during our summer trip to Slovenia. What if, for a change, we returned to Poland not through Austria, but through Hungary and central Slovakia? No sooner said than done. We begin the day at a campsite by the highway in eastern Slovenia. In the morning, we visit Maribor, and then cross the Hungarian border. Our next stop is the resort town of Siófok, where we have the chance to swim for a while in the “Magyar sea” – Lake Balaton.
The Mátra range is located 100 km northeast of Budapest. We exit the highway into the town of Gyöngyös, mostly built up with somber apartment blocks. At the intersection by the Orlen station, we take road No. 24, which, after 15 kilometers of climbing, leads us to the tourist village of Mátraháza. For Hungarians, this is an important place: many holiday homes and restaurants, a dense network of hiking trails, and a ski resort. However, there aren’t many people here today: we leave the car in a practically empty parking lot at an altitude of approx. 680 m a.s.l.
From the parking lot, we choose the blue trail. After about 300 meters, we enter a dense forest and stay in it until the very summit. Our chosen variant for ascending Kékes involves overcoming 340 meters of elevation gain over a distance of 3.5 kilometers. The trail sign estimates an hour for this route, but we manage to do it in just over 30 minutes. A low-demand walk in slightly sloping terrain. Interestingly, after returning to Poland, it turns out that we walked a fragment of the National Blue Trail (Országos Kéktúra), the most important Hungarian long-distance trail, measuring as much as 1,128 kilometers in length. Will I ever come back here and walk it in its entirety? I have my doubts, but it’s never worth excluding anything in life (especially since a week ago I didn’t even know I would be climbing Kékes).
A moment before reaching the highest point, the blue trail crosses the asphalt road running to Kékes from Mátraháza. There is even a bus stop at the summit! The road was built in the 1930s to allow comfortable access to the sanatorium built on the mountain. The summit of Kékes (1,014 m a.s.l.) is forested and, consequently, devoid of any views. At the highest point stands a monument topped with a stone painted in Hungarian colors. Besides that, we have a row of souvenir stalls, a small snack bar, a playground, a cross, and some historical memorabilia.
By the way, the tourist discovery of Mátra occurred at a time when Hungarians still had much higher mountains within their borders. In 1888, the Mátra branch of the Hungarian Carpathian Society built a wooden observation tower here. The facility served tourists until 1938, when it was demolished due to its terrible technical condition. Today, a massive TV tower stands here, available to visitors as an observation platform. It is open daily from 9 AM to 4 PM (until 5 PM on summer weekends); entry tickets apply. Since we arrive at the summit at 5:15 PM, we won’t see any views today. On the ground floor of the tower, there is a small restaurant – also already closed. Well, nothing more for us to do here!
To descend from Kékes, we choose the ski route, leading almost directly from the summit to the village of Mátraháza. As befits a “mighty” mountain, the return trip takes at most a few dozen minutes. The descent is relatively steep, which means it must be really pleasant to ski down here in the winter. Additionally, a view of the surrounding hills of the Mátra range timidly appears before us.
We return to the car around 6:00 PM and set a course for Poland. Climbing Kékes was, on one hand, a nice curiosity, and on the other – another addition to my personal collection of peaks from the Crown of Europe. The Hungarian mountain enters the list as the sixth, right after the highest points of Poland, Czechia, Andorra, Norway, and Slovenia. Leaving the Mátra range behind, I think to myself that this whole Crown of Europe provides a lot of fun, but is slightly nonsensical. The significance given to the highlighted peaks is not due to their geographical features, but rather to the borders artificially drawn by humans. On the other hand – if not for the existence of the Crown, would I have ever learned about the existence of such a mountain as Kékes? I will allow myself to leave this question unanswered.
Date of the trip: August 14, 2025
Trip statistics: 6.3 km; 340 meters of elevation gain
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