Eastern Europe: Krakow

Fourth city! We arrived in Krakow after a very civilized short train ride from Warsaw, dropped our bags off at our AirBNB, and headed out to the Old Town to see the sights before bed. More so than any other city we visited, Krakow’s Old Town is tiny and very compact, making it very easy to wander around.

We were in luck, because there was a farmer’s market or craft fair still happening when we arrived at 9 pm. The main market square looked like Disneyland, all lit up and beautiful in the warm fall evening weather. There were long lines of horses with carriages in front of many of the buildings, only adding to this feeling. We found a Christmas ornament to represent Krakow (we did this for every destination; this one was a horseshoe that was inscribed by the smith in front of us), bought some gifts and had a drink before we turned in for the night.

The next morning, we had what may be our worst "lost in translation" moment at our breakfast place. Universal signage exists for a reason!

We stood there wondering for ... way too many minutes, before the server finally told us which one was for the men and for the women

We then headed back to the Old Town and joined up with our usual walking tour.

Krakow has a long and rich history, even by European standards. It was founded somewhere between the 600's and 800's AD, and was the capital of Poland for almost 750 years before the capital was moved to Warsaw. The map below shows the Old Town surrounded by a continuous green space. This used to be a huge moat encircling the city, backed by a tall wall with dozens of defensive towers. This was a necessity as it was a major trading city, and had been destroyed several times by Mongols and raiders. In more recent times, the moat has been filled in and converted to public parkland surrounding the old town.

Credit: http://biega.com/cracowtour1.html

We started at point B in the above map; Krakow’s own Barbican, the forward defensive position on the city walls. It was built in the late 1400's, and is the best preserved Barbican left in Europe. Our tour guide told us that the gate at the Barbican (St. Florian's) was never breached… but that qualifier is important, since other gates were breached multiple times.

These were some seriously thick walls!

We saw a couple of funny/neat things as we were walking towards our next stop.

The Polish translation for alcohol is 'alkohol', so this is a pretty good pun. I don't think it's aimed at English speakers either - Poland had the fewest number of people conversant in English of nearly any country we visited this year. Which is fine, they're not under any obligation to learn my language - just keep that in mind if you're planning on visiting! Have your Google Translate app ready!

This was an old American police cruiser (it still had the English writing on the doors) being driven by someone that certainly didn't appear to be a police officer. I guess they don't have to be repainted here?

I really liked seeing the different ambulances and emergency vehicles from different countries

I love this type of graffiti!

The main square of Krakow (at C on the map) is one of the largest medieval market squares in Europe, and has several important buildings in it. The one in the center, the Cloth Hall, may be the oldest indoor shopping mall in the world, dating back to the 1500's. When we had a sudden downpour (one of only two on our whole trip) we ducked briefly in here. Not much to see these days beyond your usual souvenir market, but it was neat to be there nevertheless.

 

On the other side of the square (just visible at the right of the picture above) is St. Mary's Basilica. The towers of this church were originally built very tall so they could be used as watchtowers, and according to our guide there is a reason why they are asymmetrical. They were said to be designed and built by two brothers; the less talented brother was jealous of his brother’s tower, so he murdered him and then built his tower taller. (Family!) The interior is in Gothic style, which is not my personal cup of tea, but that's okay.

 

 

Saint Mary’s claim to fame is the Veit Stoss Altar, which is renowned as the largest Gothic altar in the world. It was built in the 1470's. To make the massive scale of the altar work, the human figures at the top are carved to be 12 feet tall! The Altar, a national treasure, was taken apart and hidden in different Polish cities at the outset of World War II to hide it from the Nazis - however they ended up finding all of the crates and taking it back to Nuremburg. Somehow it survived intact, and was returned to Krakow after the war. It has had several restorations, the most recent in 1999, and it is pretty spectacular.

 

Another building in the main square is the Town Hall Tower. The rest of Town Hall is gone, as the city demolished it to open up the square, but the tower remains. Our guide told us there was a well-known torture chamber in the basement of the tower, and in the next room was a 'break room' of sorts for the city guards, so one can imagine their card games and conversation interrupted by the screams of prisoners. Our guide had a dark imagination, I like it!

 

We then passed some buildings that were pretty, but didn't have memorable stories like the last few.

Where's Tin Man?

Foreshadowing the more famous Astronomical Clock that we later saw in Prague, we headed over to the Jagiellonian University to see the hourly 'show' in the inner courtyard. This is one of the world’s oldest universities, founded in the 1360’s. Their two most famous graduates are Copernicus (see the Warsaw post) and Pope John Paul II.

If you'd like to see a better video of this clock and its hourly fanfare than the crummy video we took (holy camera shakes, Batman!), there is a good one (with a view of the university's courtyard) at this link:

Clock of Collegium Maius, Jagiellonian University, Krakow

For lunch, we headed down to Kazimierz (the Jewish Quarter) and Plac Nowy, which looks like a transit hub but actually used to be a chicken slaughterhouse and marketplace. These days it is famous for serving zapiekanka, a kind of a cross between a panini and a flatbread. The circular building is divided into 8 or 10 different businesses, all serving their own version of zapiekanka.

Yum!

 

 

I do love DIY translations. 'Champignon' is probably not helpful for English speakers who aren’t Canadian/bilingual. Also ‘1/2 zapiekanki = the half of zapiekanka’ is funnier than it was probably meant to be.

With bonus lollipop for dessert!

We then headed to the southwestern edge of the Old Town (A on the map) to Wawel Castle, the former home of the Kings and Queens of Poland. It was built right against the river on a tall hill, and surrounded by its own set of walls. According to our tour guide, the one projecting wing in the first picture below was built because one of the kings was obsessed with alchemy, and kept burning down parts of the palace - this gave him an area to work where fire could be fought more easily! It was interesting throughout Europe hearing of so many of these enormous palaces, full of servants and occupied by powerful rulers, burning to the ground from kitchen fires (and sorcery).

Entering the castle fortifications - I love the mix of old and new here!

We passed through the gate in the picture above, and turned to the right around this tower. Lovely ivy!

Here's an overview of the walled castle complex. The bottom left of the model didn't make it into the picture, but local legend tells of a dragon that once lived in a cave under the hill there, who terrorized the townsfolk until a prince slew the dragon and built his castle over the cave. The dragon is the symbol or mascot of the city of Krakow.

Wawel Cathedral straight ahead, with the palace to the right

The side of the cathedral that faces the river (and the left side of the above picture), and its main entrance

The entrance has a ‘dragon bone’ hanging above the door (on the upper left), which scientists now agree is the rib of a whale. The guy in the bottom left is glaring at me because you’re supposed to pay to enter, and I’m standing outside taking a picture of his whale bone.

We didn't tour the palace, but we did go into the central courtyard. Similar to the Jagiellonian University courtyard, there were several floors, and the roof line had water spouts shaped like dragons. One of the kings had this courtyard redesigned in an Italian Renaissance style after one of the times the castle burned to the ground, and it stays that way today.

Dragons!

For our second night in Krakow, we had a nice dinner out. Since our AirBNB was so close to the Old Town, I got to go home and change and wear a dress instead of my all-day travelling clothes - I got very used to having dinner in nice restaurants wearing hiking boots this year, so this was a lovely change!

After dinner, we packed up and headed back to the main station to catch another overnight train. This time, we were NIGHT TRAIN EXPERTS, and had stowed away our baggage and showered before the train even left the station. I switched with Justin to take the lower bunk (since the last train driver was crazy and I felt like I was going to be thrown out of bed!) and had a great night’s sleep.

Our luxurious train compartment. Travel and sleep for the price of one!