Trip Around Poland (Gdańsk, Sopot, Gdynia, Hel(l), Toruń, Poznań, and Wrocław)

The original plan was to go with everyone in the program to Saint Petersburg, Russia. A lot of people were scared to go once they heard that there had been metro bombings in Moscow, Russia earlier in the year, but still enough people were planning to go to make the trip possible. To get to Russia we were going to fly to Finland and then take a bus to Russia, but the plane was canceled and the other option was to use the train which was too expensive. The next plan was to go to Ukraine, but that too fell through. The last option was to go on a trip around Poland, but that just left me and another girl, Aniela, who was a really great travel buddy. We went and saw almost every major city in Poland including Gdańsk, Sopot, Gdynia, Hel(l), Toruń, Poznań, and Wrocław. To start our journey, we took an eleven hour night train to Gdańsk with a full car. Aniela and I were both on the upper most bunks, while there three older ladies and a young guy took the lower bunks.

After a short delay, we made it to Gdańsk Głowny (the train station). We checked into our room at the hostel which was very clean. Then we made to it the main section of Gdańsk called Długi Targ which is a long street with tons of Flemish Renaissance (tall skinny type) buildings and various gates which include the Green gate where Lech Wałęsa has an office. I especially liked the fountain of Neptune on the street that has smaller statues of mermaids and seahorses all around it. We were hungry so we had lunch in a Beatles themed restaurant and I had some fried pstrąg (trout). Afterwards, we went to the gothic Bazylika Mariacki (St. Mary’s Basilica) in Gdańsk. It had a really tall square tower that had spiral staircases and then stairs spiraling around the inside of the tower. There were so many stairs I didn’t expect to have to climb, but the top of the tower had a great view of the whole city.

Next we made it to the shipyard section which played a major role in ending communism through Solidarność (Solidarity Movement). First we went to Solidarity Museum and saw the Roads to Freedom exhibit which showed what life was like during times of communism and during the uprisings. They had an exhibit of what a grocery store looked like with a woman standing in it with a string of toilet paper around her neck. It showed how bare stores used to be, too. Our tickets even looked like the ration tickets that people used to get flour, sugar, and other everyday items. I also liked seeing all the other exhibits about that time like a model underground printing work shop that was popular all over Poland. Next, we went to the Solidarity monument right outside of the shipyard which consisted of three tall crosses with heavy metal anchors attached at the top. It was very substantial and detailed with tons of inscriptions and plaques. For dinner, we followed our guide book to a restaurant serving traditional Polish food. In the north, I guess Tyskie is the beer of choice out of the Polish beers.

The next day we made it to the Malbork Castle a little to the south. It is the biggest brick castle in the world and was built by the Teutonic knights. It was very impressive, but a little confusing. At first we didn’t know where to go exactly, but eventually we just started to follow the audio guide tour numbers (without the audio guide, of course). I liked seeing the outside of the castle the most with the various courtyards with interesting tombs stones in the gardens. There was even ivy growing on the outsides of the building which really made it look old. One section of the castle was the latrine tower which was an offset tower with a long bridge to it so that the castle members wouldn’t have to smell the wastes. The amber museum was interesting to see but got boring fast. Our walk back to the train station was a little rushed because we were afraid that we would miss our train, but we still made it.

Our last day in northern Poland was spent going to Sopot, Gdynia, and the Hel peninsula. Transportation was really easy and we were able to take a regional train to the cities. Sopot was the first town and I think it is best known as a place with beach resorts. When we got there, we were met with crowds of  people celebrating Corpus Christi and walking down the streets. At the end of the street leading from the main square was the molo which is a long pier that goes off into the water. We had to pay to walk down the thing, but it was worth it and we got a good glimpse of the coastline. At the end of the molo was an crafty, old man selling postcards. Aniela bought a couple of them, but then the guy took out another card like he was going to give it to her for free. He was writing a message to her in Polish and saying she was a pretty girl, but in the end he wanted twice the price for the card. Tricky, tricky. The rest of the time in Sopot was just spent sitting on the beach and enjoying the Polish sunshine.

The afternoon was spent in Gdynia, which was a newer city and much more spread out. We searched out for a Mexican restaurant to eat at, but of course it was not as good as a Mexican restaurant in America. As soon as they started us off with a thimble full of salsa and a few stale tortilla chips, it was obvious that the meal would not be that good. After lunch, we walked around in search of different uprising monuments. The first one we found was on a big hill and was a big cement cross that lit up at night. The parks around Gdynia were also very beautiful and full of flowers. I guess it was appropriate then that we saw a small monument to bee keepers while we were there. Next, we made it to the beach which was really big and way too crowded to stop and sit. We were also on our way to take a ferry to Hel(l) peninsula. We got there just in time and boarded for our hour long ride.

As soon as we docked, we got to see a beautiful nautical scene of beach, barriers, and small shops set up for tourists. There was even a Newfoundland dog walking around in a red rescue vest. The most touristy spots on the peninsula were the grey seal sanctuary, the fishing museum, the light house, and the beach on the Baltic side. The grey seal sanctuary had signs describing all the different ecological challenges the peninsula is facing. I liked them so much that I tried to take pictures of the most interesting ones. The actual sanctuary was too crowded so we skipped it. We did, however, make fun of the Polish word for seal which is foka (which sounds like a naughty word). Not until later did I come to realize that saying young seal (młoda foka) in Polish sounds like an even naughtier word. We wanted to see the fishing museum after that, but it closed around 4 which we had just missed. Next it was off to the light house and luckily we were one of the last people to get in. There were a bunch of older guys behind us who were struggling to make it up the stairs. At the top, we saw the huge light that was used and had a great view of most of the island.

After a bit of a hike we made it to the beach on the Baltic. It was a bright sunny day, and the beaches were nice and smooth. It was nice to just sit there and take a few moments lying down. We tried to walk in the water and half-heartedly looked for amber. The water was way too cold and our feet would get numb if we stayed in for more than a few seconds. I kept trying to grab the red pebbles to check if they were amber, but I’d be forced to hop out too often to make the amber worth it. Eventually, we made our way back to the street with all the restaurants. We settled on an Italian restaurant and got some pizza with tomato soup. Since we were cold, we choose to sit inside, but there was a small party going on. Those guys were pretty loud and I think they were able to kill a bottle or two of vodka over their dinner. When dinner was over, we boarded the ferry again and were gearing up to go on more hunting for uprising monuments. The next one was going to be a long search, and after getting in touch with Aniela’s boyfriend we had gotten the address to look for.

We walked back through the streets of Gdynia. After getting past the tourist parts and nice shops, we walked through some seedy residential areas. Next we walked along a small highway and past the shipyards of Gdynia. Once we made it to a busy intersection in the highway, we knew we must be close. We were right and got to see a really nice monument that seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. Maybe the monument is meant more for the shipyard workers than the people visiting the city. It is four huge numbers spelling 1970. The cool part about it was that the number 7 was actually a beaten up worker who looked like he was being supported by his two buddies 9 and 0. The three slash marks on the figure’s back and names of people who had been killed were especially moving. All there was left was to take the train back to Gdynia and prepare for the city of Toruń during the day and Poznań for the night.

Once we made it to Toruń, we weren’t sure how far the city was from the train station, s we walked it. It was a pretty long hike, but we didn’t have to lug our bags around since we had locked them up at the train station. We also got a nice view of the city while we were crossing the Wisła river. The most striking building was the slanted tower which someone told us was the leaning tower of Pisa for Poland. I guess they did a bad job of building the outside of the building, but apparently the floors were nice and level. The city square was really nice with tons of Renaissance architecture. We had lunch on an outside porch at a restaurant serving Polish food. I got something called baked pierogies which I was not sure what they would be. They ended up being like mini calzones filled with cheese and bacon. While were eating, a gypsy girl was going around begging people for money. The waitress had to yell at her telling her not to harass the diners, but the little girl just smiled like she does this all the time. After lunch, we climbed the town hall tower, which was not a good idea on a full tummy. Then we searched out the house of Nicolas Copernicus, which was pretty boring. Then we wanted to go the ginger bread museum because Toruń is famous for it. At the museum we came in after a group of German high school age kids which I guess we looked enough like since they ushered us in with them. The people there kept telling us to go sit and watch the demonstration which would be in German. I guess we could have stayed and made gingerbread with the Germans, but the instructions would have been in German and they would know we hadn’t paid as soon as they asked us something in German. Finally, we asked to get out of the museum.

The last few things we did in Toruń were to walk around the previous castle the Teutonic Knights had built before Malbork. All that was left of the castles was the latrine tower. We made it to the Poznań a little early since we ran out of things to do in the small city of Toruń. In Poznań, we checked into our really awesome hostel called the Melody hostel. We were in the hip hop themed room which consisted of bunk beds with pink sheets, vinyl disks on the walls, and one poster of Eminem. I think the Eminem poster was the piece that was supposed to make it hip hop. Don’t get me wrong, the hostel was nice and clean and had free water and tea at all times for us. At night, all we had time to do was have dinner and walk around the city for a little bit.

Our first full day in Poznań, started off with a hearty breakfast of toast, cereal, and yogurt from the hostel. It was a good time that we went when we did because it was a special weekend where many restaurants participated in half price meals and on Saturday admissions to many museums were free. We spent our day going to the town hall which had a great museum, a museum with everyday objects from all art eras, and finally we made it to the national museum of Poznań. In the town hall, mechanical goats came out of the tower at noon and butted heads twelve times. Of course, I got the event on film. I really liked the national museum because they had an exhibit with more modern and famous Polish artists. My favorite paintings were by Chelmoński who painted a peasant girl laying in a field playing with the spider webs that baby spiders send out to ride on the wind. By the night time, we had diner at a restaurant participating in the half price deal. For drinks, we made it to a brewery (browar in Polish). I really liked the honey beer I got there because it was a nice change from the plain beers I had been having in Poland. The next day we prepared for our last leg of the journey going to Wrocław.

We made it to Wrocław and again we decided to walk, but this time to out hostel. On the map the old city didn’t seem that far away and we thought we would walk by some theaters and check out times. It ended up being a pretty long walk and it didn’t help that it was hard to find the hostel hidden in some courtyard. After that we made it to the main square which looked huge, which made me and Aniela find it hard to believe that the Krakow’s was the biggest. The other aspect we also noticed was that there were small gnome statues all around doing various activities like golfing and playing a trumpet made out of a flower. There was a pretty cool university we also visited that was open for tours and had a baroque decorated great hall. At the top they had a straight line in the floor made of stone that was along the same line of latitude that the Vatican is on. We walked all over Wrocław, and decided to save many places for our second day.

That second day, we started off by having breakfast at a American west themed restaurant where we got scrambled eggs and tea/coffee for a cheap price. We really liked it. Then we went down to the botanical gardens. It was very vast and this time I got to go into the green houses (when I went to the Krakow botanical gardens the green houses were closed on Fridays). I really liked the house that showed various aquatic plants. The irises there were also beautiful and they must have had tons of varieties. The gardens were so beautiful that a whole class of art students were there sketching. Next we wandered over to the panoramic painting by Jan Styka and Wojciech Kossak called the Battle of Racławice which was in a special building made specifically for the painting. When we went inside we had to fight through crowds of indifferent school children. There was a whole show that was spoken in Polish and we needed to hold black boxes to our ears so that we could understand it in English. Afterwards we just wandered around and prepared to return to Krakow after a long trip all around Poland.

Our trip back started with breakfast again at the American place. We were begged by gypsies and just dealt with them by trying to ignore them. I was so glad that gypsies did not bother people dining in Krakow. The train ride was pretty long and I think that it kept breaking down and was almost an hour late back to Krakow. I was very glad to be back to my home in Poland, but I was very glad I got to really get a good look at Poland during this trip.