Went and met the Topdeckers last night and we had a fab time on our pub crawl. I even scored a free dinner beforehand due to some of the others missing dinner for a Metallica concert - bonus!!! We went to a few fools bars. Tried some polish vodka which was DISGUSTING and tasted like metho. Yuck yuck yuck. Got home about 1.30am and woke at 4.30 for the train to Krakow. Needless to say I was feeling a bit rough and tired today!!! But that's the thing about travel - no time for rest days. So I got over it, pushed through, and even though I felt like the living dead for most of the day I still had a great day and saw lots of krakow.
Our train ride was great, I napped the entire journey. We arrived in krakow about 9.30 and walked to our apartment which once again is in an amazing location! Krakow's old town is bigger than Warsaw's but in terms of tourist attractions the city is smaller and less spread out.
We went to the old town, but due to it being rainy decided we would pick things to do today that were indoors. Apparently it's going to be sunny the next couple of days so we've saved some outdoor things for then. So we had a look around old town square. It's the largest square of its kind in Europe at 200m x 200m. We walked through the cloth hall which has many shops (three guesses what I bought.....a magnet!) and enjoyed the view of our surroundings. The square is huge!!
Next we went into St Mary's Church to see the Veit Stoss altarpiece which was taken by the nazis but is now back in its rightful place. It was huge!! I loved the stained glass windows inside the church as well. I think I'm up to 20 churches now!
Then we went to Hipolit House, an old house set up as it would have been in the 16th century with furniture from the time. There was a man in here with the strongest aftershave I had ever smelled, I think he must have bathed in it. This reeeeeally did not help how unwell I was feeling at this point. It was not good! So I avoided him haha.
Next we walked to the Florian Gate, the only on of eight original gates into the old town still standing. We went into the Barbican which stands behind the gate, a small fortification surrounded by what used to be a moat. We enjoyed walking up the various levels through passageways, and laughing at people below playing medieval games. The funniest one was when people put blindfolds on and had to try and hit each other with a sack attached to a stick. Sounds strange but it was hilarious watching them stumble around after being spun around!
After this we caught the number 3 tram South of the Vistula River to the Podgorze area, where the Krakow ghetto was. We will be back in this area tmro but decided that due to the weather we should do another museum with our spare time. The tram stopped in Plac Bohaterow Getta, or square of the ghetto heroes. There is a monument here consisting of 70 chairs being spread throughout the square to symbolise the furniture left behind by Jewish people when the ghetto was liquidated in 1943. Reading about all this stuff gives me goosebumps. It's so hard to imagine all of this happening right where I'm standing.
We made our way to Schindler's Factory. Oskar Schindler hired Jewish people to work in his enamel factory so they would be exempt from being sent to concentration camps. It started off as him doing it for his own benefit as it was cheap labour, but over time he actually got to know the Jews who worked for him and began to form friendships with them. The movie 'Schindler's List' is based on this story. The factory is now set up as a museum about the nazi occupation of Krakow from 1939-1945. It was absolutely fantastic and so well set up. The museum started off about the nazis invading Poland and went all the way through to when the soviets took over instead. I've come to realise that Poland is definitely the most harrowing of countries I've been to in relation to the holocaust. This country went through so much during WWII and I've started to become quite angry about it all. I can't believe these things happened. I can't even imagine this sort of a world where things like that CAN happen. Of course I've always known about the concentration camps and everything, but reading individual stories and all the nitty gritty details of goings on during these times really shocks you.
It was here that I also realised I lost my favourite cardigan last night. I was doing so well up until now and hadn't lost anything! But I had tied it to my bag and it must have fallen off. It happened a few times in Cambodia but luckily then I always realised and picked it up off the ground. Never mind. In the scheme of things with reading all about WWII and the holocaust, if losing a cardigan is my biggest problem in life I'm going pretty well.
We walked back to the tram stop and headed back into town. Had a bit of a rest and the had a quick takeaway dinner at the canteen place downstairs. Then we headed to the Rynek Underground exhibit that we had prebooked tickets for. From 2005 to 2010 they dug up the old town square and it underwent significant excavation. Lots of pathways and artefacts from medieval times were discovered and are now on display in this exhibit. So you get to walk through the pathways underneath what is today old town square and the cloth hall. It was really interesting!!
Will be listening to the start of the footy tmro morning before we head off. Would really appreciate text score updates please Ian :) GO PIES!!!!! Next time we play after tmro I'll be there with you all!
Now I finally get to go to sleep. I'm so excited for bed!!!!
Love to all
Claire
Xoxox
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