Last few days in Warsaw.

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1.06.18. Walk to the Park



Today we decided to remain outdoors to enjoy the remarkable weather in Warsaw. A parkland walk to the Botanical Garden and Łazienki Park.

We set off from The Old Town past the Royal Castle and the current Presidential Palace as we walked along

Krakowskie Przedmieście.

Just as the pedestrian street metamorphoses into the traffic based Nowy Street where the university buildings abound, we turned left, away from the exhaust fumes. Thus descending towards the river, we passed the Chopin Museum and Chopin Music School, where the windows of the practice rooms were open for air: a cacophony of classical excellence …… scales, melodies and harmonies from pianos, clarinets, flutes and strings.



Then our maps became sketchy: not enough info. for this pair of pedestrians, as we walked south, parallel to the river, through a green corridor of parks. The challenge, on foot, is in gaining an understanding of how to negotiate what gets in the way without constantly retracing one’s footsteps, thus wasting foot leather and energy (in the heat).



Aleje Jerozolimskie, where a major road combines with a railway line then obstructed our leafy path. We found an underpass which ended in a choice whether to go to the high road or to the low road….. we chose to maintain height. But although the leafiness of the route continued we found ourselves unable to exit from the grounds of the National Military Museum, gates in railings all padlocked. So back through tanks, guns, planes and helicopters to the underpass, then to take the low road choice. This took us through a lower corridor of green, very pretty, offering shade and heading in the right direction.

Just past a skate park staged under tarpaulins of Big Top dimensions, we stopped at a café. It was a dour ranch-like hostelry with a welcome akin to the greeting one used to get at the counter of a tool retailer in Newcastle….. where every request made was rebuffed with a monotone technical question, a query unanswerable unless you worked daily in that place, and designed not to lead to an outcome.

The patron begrudgingly found change, gave us a bottle of water and two glasses and went back to sit down with his mates.



Fortified, we passed under a huge motorway viaduct, then, with a castle to our right, walked along a residential street or two, through more parkland and then started to climb to the higher level of the Botanical Garden.

We could see the garden through railings but all gates were padlocked. So we circumnavigated the garden reaching Aleje Ujazdowskie, the main traffic gorged north to south street that we had left an hour or so before.

Kaffe Flora was like an oasis in the heat of desert, situated in the tranquil approach to the Ovgorod Botanicski. Marion ate cold beetroot soup with hard boiled eggs, I tacked an enormous Salad Niçoise bedecked with a jar full of gherkin slices, tomatoes, olives, anchovies, rocket, and hard boiled eggs.



The Botanical Garden has a number of formal rooms on the flat at the top, each one treated in a different way, from a grid of earth paths around specimens, to Italian style formality with wrought iron arches and granite cobbles.

Then a more rambling garden nestles into the hillside profiting from mounds of rock, large trees, open glades and winding pathways.



Delightful.



We took the metro back home. Very clean, smart and efficient.





The Warsaw Uprising Museum



This place was teeming. So much so that a queuing system was in place to regulate the size of the crowd competing for exhibits. It’s difficult to conceive that Warsaw, indeed the whole of Poland, have as many 8 -18 year olds in existence who have filled each and every museum we’ve visited on this trip.



I found the place more confusing than Polin Museum, but the quality of curation can’t be faulted.



The Warsaw Uprising was a major WWll operation in the summer of 1944, by the Polish underground resistance, led by the Home Army to liberate Warsaw rom German occupation. The uprising was timed to coincide with the retreat of the German forces from Poland ahead of the Soviet advance. Despite having few arms and other gear, the Poles exploited their knowledge of the city e.g. the sewer system, and communication systems to successfully gain the Post Office and a substantial section of the city.

But while approaching the eastern suburbs of the city, the Soviet arm temporarily halted combat operations, enabling the Germans to regroup and defeat the Polish resistance. The Uprising was fought for 63 days with little outside support. It was the single largest military effort taken by any European resistance movement in all of the war.

The Home Army were devastated that there was no help from the Allies for their valiant and well organised battle for their town. And the German Army blew up vast swathes of the city in an act of unprecedented reprisal.



After the crush of the museum we decided to head back to the Łazienki Park, but today by metro. We took the opportunity of a Łody Naturalne near the metro station: I opted for Solne Karmel and Czekolada, Marion for Wanilla and Sorbet xxxxx. Guess the flavours! The length of the queue testified to excellence of the ice creams……

On reaching the Orangery in Łazienki we both commented that the garden had a very British mixed perennial look. And, whilst photographing a maroon leafed penstemon, the gardener approached us. ‘It’s good to see what catches visitors’ eye……’ He was keen to chat and explained that the garden had been renovated in 2014 with consultant gardener Niek Roozen providing a new regime. The Orangery garden lies on thick clay with consequent drainage problems: the shaded side of the garden too wet and the sunny side too dry. They had excavated large amounts of clay and replaced it with top soil. The gardener’s excitement and passion was clear and the mix of planting flamboyant, undulating, colourful and effective. Nice chap, we should have asked his name.



Inside the Orangery is the original long growing room. In the recent renovation they discovered the under floor heating system and, furthermore, beneath a bland green Soviet 1960’s emulsion was a frieze depicting pastoral scenes beyond Roman pillars in blues and wheaten ochres. This is now fully restored and a delightful setting for classical marble sculptures formally arranged down the length of the conservatory.

There’s a theatre here as well which was being set up for a performance.

I’ve been reading ‘The Doll’ by Bołeslaw Prus, set in the mid 19C and Wokulski the lead character likes to head to the Łazienki Park (mostly in quest of Izabela who ‘takes air’ there). He talks of a rendezvous or two in the Botanical Garden, the Orangery and the Lake.

So next stop is the Lake, patrolled by an impressive peacock who struts about on the Island Palace. The ancient pile, fronted by a paved terraced facing the lake has an air of Chenonceau, or Ville d’Avray chateaux exploiting the opportunity for reflections and tranquility.

Last Day in Poland



We decided to do less on our last day. Get organised for our homecoming, walk gently in the shade, perhaps visit the Marie Curie Museum which is small and close to hand.



It’s very hot, usually sunny for May and topping 30 degrees by mid morning. And The Old Town is heaving. Bells are ringing at 11am and priests on Church P.A. systems are chanting melodically…….. we work out that today is Corpus Christi, the first Thursday after xxxxx. It’s public holiday with families out on bikes, ice cream consumption at an even higher level than the high Polish norm, ballon sellers have bigger and better helium delights…….. and the Marie Curie Museum is closed.



So we joined the crowds and descended to the multi media fountain on the side of the River Vistula. Obligatory now is the ‘run through fountain’: a sequence of spurts and sprays from fountains set in paving. Children and those of a frolicsome leaning can’t help themselves having a thorough drowning, and today is just the day for it.

There is a further big pond with a central fountain cluster and sweeping line of plumes along its length. The water dance is compelling, even without the music that sometimes plays (at night, most likely, when the lights can play their part).

There are two further rectangular ponds with a straight line of fountains which are said to be able to produce a flat sheet of water that can be projected on to.

Over a dual carriageway of fast cars, the river itself is quiet on the Old Town side, apart from a cycle highway with families out for a ride. It’s a concrete and granite riverbank structure with green reeds crowing the waterside, but on the opposite bank it is sandy and folks are swimming and fishing in the sun.



After a beer and lunch (egg sandwiches with cheese and salad toclear the fridge at the apartment) we set off, on foot, seeking the shade, to cross the Saxon Garden past the Monument of the Unknown Soldier and find the Zacheta Art Gallery.

This is open.

It’s an old classical building with a dome on the top and stone steps up to big oak doors. Internally it is painted pure white throughout.

The ground floor exhibition space house the work of three Polish designer/architects. The first room shows sketches from POW camp by Jerzy Soltan and early studies from Lech Tomaszewski and Andrzej Jan Wroblewski

The second room then exhibits building design and landscaping that evolved from their earlier explorations, also every day object design: hand irons, lamps and a motor scooter.



Upstairs was a children’s art exhibit. Young ones were painting their faces with black pens then seeing themselves as negative images, inspired by ……… there were children sized mouse holes in the skirtings of the rooms to crawl through, blue electrician’s tape to stick on white surfaces, black magnetic squares to pose on a large white grid (with massive dice to throw and invent your own game for coordinates on the grid). Magnetic dinosaurs were available to place on a mural of a Japanese harbour scene.







Impressions of Poland



A proud country with a long history, interrupted by other powers to west and east.

Good ice creams, pastries sold when not fresh. Simple cheap beer.

Goose, duck, dumplings, beetroot, pickled garnishing, steak taratare eating with vodka.

Egalitarian, not much of a class system Evident to me. But some big fast BMWs on the road where there is obvious wealth.

Many old factory chimneys from past history mark out where there are towns and cities.

Black on white profile of city skyline on road sign as you approach a town.

Sudeten housing very like Saxon housing in Romania. Brick built, rendered with gable end to street, as if to a timber house design.

Maccho driving over the speed limit, honking to say I have right off way, or get out of my way……. but universal courtesy at zebra crossings.



Food and drink half the price of UK foods, especially in restaurants. B n B / apartment prices from £30 - £60 a night.





I'd recommend Poland will be going back.

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