Krakow, medieval city and modern history

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I will spend a total of 5 days in Krakow, and it's easy to fill up five days of things to do. Krakow is a beautiful city worth walking and wandering for hours and days, as well as time spent going into various buildings, churches and other tourist sights. I took a very hot and crowded train from Warsaw sharing a compartment with five Poles. An older gentleman was keen on talking, and did so in Polish with a younger man, but also with me in good English about a variety of subjects - health care, travels, Russia, the war and the destruction of Poland. This latter topic cannot be escaped in Poland, it's everywhere. Poland suffered more in the war than any other country, losing fully one third of its population and many cities completely destroyed.

I arrived in Krakow without anywhere to stay. This has been one of my goals on this trip: to buy my train tickets on the day and just show up in a city and find a place to stay. I walked to the old town square, and straight into the Cracow Hostel, which had a bed for me. My room is on the top floor with a small round window that looks out onto the main old town square, the best view on my trip so far. But the room is hot, without much circulation of air and the sun shines in at 5am. But it's a cheap bed in a wonderful town. I estimate that I am spending a total of $40 per day on average here in Poland for a bed, food and my daily activities. It will not be long before the crowds that swamp Prague will move east to Krakow; and perhaps they already have.

My first complete day in Krakow was to the Wieliczka Salt Mine. I took the local bus to the mine on the outskirts of the city, along with the rest of the population it seems. Only in Poland have I travelled that every mode of public transportation is overcrowded. One would think that the authorities could double the number of buses and still have crowded transport. I got to the mine, and there were lots of people wandering about and confused as I was. For a while I was standing in the wrong queue - I was in line for the Polish tour and without a ticket. Eventually I figured out what was going on and purchased a ticket and waited in line for the English tour. Even many Poles were not sure where to stand for which tour. There were about 40 of us in our group, and we started at 11:30 am by descending 60 m into the Earth down a square staircase, down and down and down. It was a comfortable 13 degrees Celsius down there, a relief to the 35 degrees Celsius above. We need a tour because there are hundreds of miles of tunnels, chambers and even a couple of large chapels. The guide was rather funny and explained everything well. People have been mining salt here for 5000 years. We were down in the mine a long time, and there were hundreds, possibly thousands of other tourists all with different leaders. We ascended in a three tiered lift 80 m to the surface at 2:30 pm. (The tour was three hours, not the lift journey which took only seconds.)

The next day, I toured a most imfamous place. I had thought carefully about whether or not to visit, but in the end, I convinced myself that this place needs to be remembered and reflected upon. Auschwitz and Birkenau is a place of horrific crimes, but we can't simply ignore the past because it is painful. There is a plaque with a phrase by Elie Wiesel "Forgetting them means letting them die again" The minibus takes 1 hour 15 minutes to reach Auschwitz, and a shuttle bus transports us another five minutes to Auschwitz II also known as Birkenau. Auschwitz I was the first camp, and the buildings remain each now containing a small museum dedicated to various topics: evidence of crimes, camp conditions, the extermination, and buildings for each of the countries affected by the Holocaust: Poland, Austria, Hungry, Czechoslavakia, Austria, etc. The building that explains the evidence of crimes contains piles of suitcases, shoes, glasses, prosthetic limbs, pots and pans. I had a difficult time in the room dedicated to the child victims, I left quickly. And I didn't watch the film that was shot by the Soviet Army in the days after the liberation of the camp in January 1945. I knew I couldn't watch that film, so I didn't. Then I took the shuttle to Birkenau, five minutes away. This second camp was built because the first was simply not large enough. And that's the most overwhelming thought as I entered Birkenau - the size of the camp, it's 1.3 square kilometers. I walked for a long time past intact buildings and the remains of others. In their rush to abandon the place the Nazis tried to destroy the camp. Over one million people were killed at this place, it's both maddening and mystifying that the Holocaust happened.

I listened to some wonderful accordian players last night in the town square busking. Together they played Bach's Toccata and Fugue, Vivaldi's Summer, Mozart, and some Piazolla. I listened for perhaps 30 minutes until they stopped their show for the evening. All this under the setting sun next to the St Mary's Church with starlings swiftly flying high above. I am less impressed with other buskers in the square, including a soloist who vocalises some classical songs with a falsetto voice - no words, just with a high voice. And nearby is the puppet show where this man moves a Michael Jackson and others to their own songs. And the boys doing their break dancing. I thought the accordian players were the best.

This morning I went to the Jewish Quarter, Kazimierz, and visited Krakow's oldest Synagogue. I had no idea that Schindler's factory was in Krakow, and Steven Spielberg came here to film. I even had lunch in the same restaurant he did. Back in the old town, I later went to a museum to see Da Vinci's Lady with the Ermine. This painting was stolen by the Nazis and took many years after the war to be recovered and placed back in the museum. And on the other wall is a print of a Rafael which was lost in the war and has never been found. This museum also had some ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman vases, statues and other items. Also I wandered through the other rooms, one of which was one of Chopin's pianos.

There is so much to do here in Krakow, easily enough to fill five days. This was only fours days of events, I still have tomorrow to occupy my time. And I haven't even mentioned John Paul II. Krakow was miraculously spared during the war, many of the buildings, churches, synagogues and the castle are all original. And that's part of the charm of Krakow. But to consider that all this lies 50 km from the most imfamous place of genocide gives one pause for reflection. A city of remarkable and profound contrasts.

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Photos

Kazimierz Cafe
Where Steven Spielberg and I ate, but not at the same time

Comments

[Susan Walter]

Very enjoyable blog
Chris, I am enjoying your travel blog very much. I learn such a lot by reading your prose, and look forward to you including more historical facts. The trip to Auschwitz and Birkenau must have been extremely hard to do, but I am so glad you went. I will be asking you lots of questions about this when you return. Thank you for all you have written. Keep it up! Jeff and I will be thinking of you as you explore new places and experience Europe.