Back to the (City of) Glory
Place: Krakow, Poland
So I am back to Krakow again. Last time I visited it was in winter, 2 weeks before Christmas. The temperature was low (about minus 3) but the city still beautiful. And its Chrsitmas Market is full of fun. (seehttp://travel.saricie.com/Eurotrip_Winter/Krakow.htm for pictures)
Due to that last visit was short (and the day is even shorter, it turns dark around 3:45 pm in December), I did not travel to some outskirt attraction, like the Wieliczka Salt Mine, or the famous Auschwitz Concentration Camp.
Now this time, summer is in full swing when I arrived (and the sun usually doesn't go down until 9:30pm), so I hoped to see more of this city of glory.
Unlike last time that I stayed in a regular hotel (it cost only 47 US$ in December but cost more than $80 this summer), this time I stay in a youth hostel. Checking on both www.hostelz.com and www.hostelworld.com websites, I found there are dozens of youth hostels in this very touristed city and the number seems to increase every week. Checking on some reviews, I chose a very new hostel called "Good Bye Lenin" (http://www.goodbyelenin.pl/). I chose this place partly because it uses the name of one of my favorite movies.
Also, it is near the Kazimierz, a old Jewish neighborhood recently turning very trendy. Actually, this neighborhood has gone through a huge cultural revival after it was featured in Spielber's "Schindler's List."
Well, the hostel is in a nice single house (unlike many Eastern European hostels are located in an apartment building) and has a courtyard for sitting, drinking, and even barbecue (they did host a barbecue the first night I arrived). Strangely, there are very huge presence of Dutches: some of them got drunk quite often...Okay, I ended up in another party hostel...
Walking past the Main Market Square (Rynek Glowny) several times in my stay. I still remember this is the location where two Veronicas briefly encountered in Kielowski's 1991 masterpiece "The Double Life of Veronica." Krakow looked much quainter in that movie. It was from the time when Krakow wasn't discovered yet by mass tourism. Now Rynek Glowny is swarmed with tourists and most storefronts in the Square have long converted into expensive restaurants, coffeeshops, or souvenir stores.
I planned to stay three days here in Krakow. So two afternoons here I could travel out of town to see other famous sites in the outskirt area (both are UNESCO World Heritage Sites). I went to see Wieliczka Salt Mine (www.kopalnia.pl) on Friday afternoon. Deciding doing it myself, I was able to get there by a suburban train. However, it took awhile for me to find the entrance to the Mine and took me even longer to find a right bus back to Krakow. Charging 65 Zloty (16 Euro) for foreigners, it was not actually cheap to get in. After getting in, it is much cooler than above ground (which was great because there was still heat wave going on in Poland that afternoon). It is a little Disneyland like but at least the Salt Mine Cathedral is impressive. There is a wall cameo of "The Last Supper" and a sculpture of the late Pope John Paul II. And everything is made of salt rocks.
The next afternoon, I paid 99 zloty (and then I found I was overcharged!) to join a tour to get to Auschwitz, to see possibly the most (in)famous Nazi concentration camp in history. The experience definitely is depressing. Strangely, it started to rain midway through our tour. It did not only rain but was pouring. Since few of us actually brought umbrella with us, we had to brave the rain to finish the tour. By the time we finished Auschwitz II-Birkenau, I was soaking wet and felt quite miserable. It was eerie to compare to what people had been through right at this same site.
I also traveled to a suburban district of Krakow, called Nowa Huta ("New Steelwork" in Polish see http://www.nh.pl). It was one of only two full-scale Soviet planned communities ever realized, with blocks of monotonous buildings and large boulevards. It was actually nicer than I expected. The buildings are monotonous but not ugly (compared to those I saw in St. Petersburg, Russia). Also, there is quite a lot of green space around and a nice park. Ironically, the Central Square is renamed "Ronald Reagan Square." Yes, the communism has long dead, even in the heart of a Soviet-style community.
After staying in Krakow for more than 3 days, I thought it is really time for me to continue my trip. I did know the next countries I plan to travel to are more difficult to travel around. They are not as developed as Poland definitely (they are not even in E.U. yet) and somewhat feels a little scary to travel there. But the journey has to go on...
Next stop: Ukraine.
Downloadable "In Your Pocket: Krakow" Guide
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