Krakow - Last 3 Days

Day 154 – June 3

Thursday morning we went to the Wieliczka salt mine. There we saw gnomes and ghosts and discovered that, yes, the walls of a salt mine are salty. We also learned that at least one of the reasons that Poles love Hungarians is that the Hungarians gave them salt, and then salt gave them wealth. Or so the legend says.

The mine was a long way down

Copernicus, made of salt

Blurrrry

Salt

Friendly gnomes who greeted us

Underground church made of salt

On the way to the zoo (a suggestion made not by me, believe it or not), Andrzej recalled that there was an old fort-turned-restaurant on the hill with great views over Krakow, so we changed plans and went there instead. It was a good decision, though about halfway through we evacuated inside for fear of rain. And for being a relatively fancy restaurant, it was cheaper than any chain like Cheesecake Factory. Yeah, Poland and I could get along…





Julia and I ventured back into the city center for a while (once we discovered that the rain was only teasing us and decided not to actually come down until it could gather together and pour down in torrents in the night), wandering the streets while Julia tried to recall the points of interest of the walking tour she had taken. Though we missed the Corpus Christi procession, we did see remnants of it – altars created for the day and children in special outfits, as well as crowds of people with a free day roaming about.



Inside St. Mary's Basilica





Day 155 – June 4

It had rained heavily the night before and had a chance of continued rain that morning, so we amended our Friday plans to go to the Tetra mountains, going to one of Poland’s national parks instead. The trees and hills reminded me of the Pacific Northwest, and it was a nice hike through the forest.

Julia navigating the GPS, practicing for her trip this summer to Mongolia



Once our shoes were initially coated with mud, we found the more groomed path that took us to a cave where a Polish king had hidden for several years. Andrzej acted as translator for us as the tour was only in Polish, but with a vocabulary smaller than a small child, I would get excited when I understood words like “black”, “white”, and numbers.

Krakow Gate stones

Castle on a hill

We had a lunch of local foods – a meat pancake fried and breaded, and beet soup. It was curious – I never thought of the idea of making a soup from beets…it was also served in a mug, and you drank it, rather than sipping it with a spoon. If you don’t like beets, it’s not for you, but I thank Mom for raising me on the inseparable Kraft Mac ‘n Cheese and beets, thus giving beets good connotations to my taste buds.

Other food goodies – Andrzej’s family provided us with plenty of juice bottles. My favorite flavor was a strawberry-carrot-orange-lemon-lime combination that reminded me curiously of Squeeze-its. Who knew? Then, when we returned from our hike, we had homemade pierogies, even though it was not the Kądzielawa family’s traditional pierogi night. Have I mentioned how much I love pierogies? Because I do…a lot.

In the evening, we had a search for Harry Potter in Polish, but to no avail. Children’s Day had wiped all the bookstores clean of Book One. But I did not mind – it simply means kids are still reading it!

An evening snack of chocolate fondue in honor of our resident Swiss was followed by a trip to the communist district. Conrad expressed concern that I would be kidnapped by communists, but I can happily say that I was delivered safely out by my decisively-not communist friends.





And then, if we hadn’t had enough food, Andrzej treated us to “non-optional” ice cream. When in Poland, eat as the Poles do…?


Day 156 – June 5

Julia and I had a nice trek to the zoo Saturday morning. The zoo is located on a hill in the forest, about a forty minute walk from Andrzej’s home. The weather was warm (bordering on hot – what a concept!). The zoo is small, but very nice. And they have wolves! Basically, if a zoo has wolves, it’s automatically in my favorite zoo list…except the Alaska zoo, where you would think it would be easy for them to make a natural wolf enclosure, they instead stuffed way too many in one, concrete area. Anyway, this zoo had a sand cat, which looked like a hilarious fat cat and which I now want, and these hilarious pygmy-somethings that are nocturnal and have really good grips on all four limbs and can climb ridiculously well. Julia and I watched them for quite a bit, because they were highly amusing – including when one pushed the other out of the way in trying to climb out the glass.

This is a żółw. This is a poor, stuck żółw.

Our walk back took us through the forest. Krakow has a really well-marked set of trails, which is extremely helpful for someone like me who has no sense of direction. After seeing city after city, and planning to see many more cities, a few days in the “wilderness” were very refreshing.



There's a legend that says these stones were once nuns

We had a huge last dinner. The starter was bright pink soup. It’s a cold beet soup with sour cream, celery and chives, and looks like this:

I have been trained to hot soup so well, that unconsciously, I would blow on the spoon to cool it down. And my easily amused self was very occupied by the color.

As a last tribute to their hospitality, Andrzej’s parents presented us with gift bags before we left with even more chocolate. Apparently, Poles don’t believe that anyone would actually enjoy Poland, so they have to bribe us…completely unnecessary, because even if Andrzej or his dad do not believe me, I had a fantastic time, and have a long list of things to come back for.