Struggled to get up today. I felt very tired and stressed for some reason. I had a weird dream where I was asking a woman why she was smoking. She wrapped her tobacco in this large sheet of newspaper and lit it by going around the circles the end of the rolled newspaper produced. Another women who was smoking told me she can’t quit. She knows she should and how to but can’t.
I took it easy and made my breakfast and dinner for tonight. Then set off late-ish, around 930am, to the Wawel Castle. The line didn’t take that long..45 mins or so. I got tix only for the State Rooms as the Royal Private Apartments are with a guide only and the next tour time was 1405 but I was going to Auschwitz then. Luckily they take travel debit card here. Note free days: I think it was Monday and Sunday for some of the exhibitions – Check the website! Also free wifi on site on the grounds of the park.
Very dark art and simple dark palate of colours. Not fancy ceilings and nice but modest carvings into archways and staircases. It seemed very serious. Lots of tapestries in shades of green, brown, beige and white. Cool gutter-like hold carved into the wall so you can use it like a banister! The tournament room upstairs introduced more colour like red, gold, pink. Numerous concave squares in the ceiling were adorned with fancy gold decoration and the top 1/3 of the wall all around the room was painted with jousting and fighting scenes, like a banner all around. In the throne room, the coffered ceilings had wooden heads affixed, looking down on you. Weird heads of white men and women gazing down… Really creepy frankly. The bird room has painted ceilings and the construction of the ceiling made it look like each photo was framed. Rooms now more opulent. Walls covered with cordovan, same framed painting style for the ceilings, more art. The lighting is interesting where candles were placed in front of large decorative metal plates, for reflecting more light I presume. Nice visit and only for 25 zloty/~6€.
After leaving the Wawel castle, I make my way back towards the square and St. Mary’s Basilica and stumble onto a book fair 🙂 Numerous stalls of old, pre-loved books.
Pondering if I should pop into the St. Mary’s Basilica and decided it would be too rushed to go get money exchanged, pay for tickets and then plow through the Basilica. Instead, I opted to take the longer route through the park, so I can have more time at lunch and at home to get ready. Made it to Pierożki u Vincenta, ie: Pierogi Mr. Vincent. It’s a cute Pierogi cafe with lots of Vincent van Gogh art. Apparently their dumplings here are very good as per that Visit Krakow list of food and drink. The wine here is 3€/12 zloty (their red option today is a semi-dry from Spain) so pretty cheap but lots of nice shops and restos on this street, Bozego Ciala, including a cute cafe & bar with a good 2€/8 zloty happy hour til 1800 called KuKu. Worth more of a wander if you have time and it’s not far at all from the Wawel castle… 15 min walk at most. Back at Pierogi Mr. Vincent, walls are yellow like the Van Gogh sunflower painting and the ceiling is a nod to Starry night 🙂 Wine arrived and it’s ok. I’ve had better for same price but maybe it’ll be better with the Pierogis! I got the cabbage & mushroom pierogis and they were alright. Very good dough but just tasted too sauerkraut-y for me. I think maybe a beef+onion may have been better but still good 🙂 I’d come here to try other pierogis again! They have borscht & croquettes too which is apparently a very Polish dish…
I darted home, grabbed my pre-made sandwich for dinner, sunscreen and battery pack and dashed off on a fast walk to the meeting spot for the GetYourGuide tour to Auschwitz. It was a good deal overall for transport (my airbnb host offered to drop off & pick up for ~100€!!), ticket to get into Auschwitz and the 2.5 hours tour… all for ~44€. I have been very much wanted to see this for a long time, and even more after my trip to Caen to the WWII memorial there.
It was a smooth ride there. I was seated right up front, shotgun. Meant I was last on, first off. I fell asleep and that was good cuz I needed the rest for all the walking to be done. We had a very good guide who knew lots of details and facts. It really added colour to the number of prisoners, workers, days and deaths there. The barracks were so grim, conditions were appalling and seeing it first-hand… and imagining what happened 80 years ago; It’s very, very confronting. Scary really, to think of what’s happening now in the States, UK, France and Australia too, to some extent with many parties and bills being so right-wing.
In the Auschwitz part, the first part of the tour, it did ease you in, as noted in the post I also read on the Visit Krakow page for visiting Auschwitz. By the time you get to the Auschwitz-Birkenau section, it was so confronting. There was a massive space you can see called “Canada 1” (there was also a “Canada II”) where prisoners belongings were taken away and sorted to be reused by the Germans. It was absolutely MASSIVE and the chilling thought was how it was all purpose-built. The first part was when Germans just reused and built some more buildings around the old spaces used by the Polish army. This… Auschwitz-Birkenau was premeditated, fully sanctioned with the absolute intention to fully extinguish other races and human life. Incredibly bone-chilling.
I didn’t take any photos. I felt it was inappropriate. I just wanted to be there and listen to the history. I wish I was a bit more organised and did the 6-hour one-day study tour instead but maybe next time. I’m glad I still got to do this as the tickets available online were all sold out. So getting the tour meant I could still go.
I was trying to get to use the washroom before we left and it looked like the staff member just let 2 people through so I tried to ask nicely. Turns out their money got stuck so he let them in. However, a nice man paid for my toilet use as well as him. Very kind.
Driving back and there is so, so much grass in front of houses (in the country). Not as much in the city but nice park and grassland space too. I remember the poor puppies in Lisbon trying to scratch the earth but it’s all just mainly volcanic stone sidewalks there.
Then I went to the Galeria Krakowska mall (your standard mall with grocery shop, fashion stores, etc.) to try to get to a Kantor Exchange to change some money, as I read that this is the best place to do so. However, the nice lady told me she’d have to change my USD to PFL and then that to HUF. So that would cost me. So, the advice was to wait til Hungary and that’s what I’ll do! Got to the Carrefour to buy more chamomile tea and then, it was home, blog, bed.
Antics & Adventures 