Thankfully, I joined a day-tour with AB Poland Travel, which means... I still have the itinerary handy to help me out. 

Krakow is the second largest and one of the oldest city in Poland. Compared to Warsaw, Krakow was much more vibrant and there's literally people everywhere. There were also much more historical sites being one of Poland's oldest city and most importantly, they are more than just museums.

Before entering the Main Market Square at Old Town Krakow, we past through a little castle, or what I thought was a little castle. Apparently, this was the Krakow Barbican, which is a fortified outpost once connected to the city walls. This is a historic gateway which led into the Old Town of KRakow and the picture below is one of the few remaining relics of this complex fortification and defensive barriers that once encircled the royal city.

During the tour, my friends and I had a chance to first visit the Main Market Square. This is the biggest Medical old town square in Europe. Here, people enjoy the unique atmosphere with lots of bars and restaurants, historical buildings and horse-driven carriages... and there were of course, lots of pigeons too.

Sukiennice

Directly across the Main Market Square at Old Town, was the St. Mary Bascilica. This place is also called the Church of Our Lady Assumed into Heaven and it is a Gothic church built in the 14th century. This church is perhaps one of the best examples of Polish Gothic architecture. On every hour, a trumpet signal is played from the top of the taller of St. Mary's two towers. The tune of this trumpet signal actually has an abrupt ending, as if it was unfinished, to commemorate the famous 13th century trumpeter, who was shot in the throat while sounding the alarm before the Mongol attacked the city. Legends also say that if the trumpeter waves at you at the end, you will have good luck. And if the trumpeter waves at you with his trumpet you will have more than just good luck. Not sure what that means, but the trumpeter did both on the day I was there, so maybe I got double good lucks?

Before heading off to the Wawel Hill where the monarchs used to live, many many years ago, I also happened to stop by the University of Krakow. Only briefly though, where I learned that this is the oldest university in Poland and the second oldest university in Central Europe. And believe it or not, this university is one of the oldest surviving universities in the world. Many notable alumni are from this chool including mathematician and astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish king John III Sobieski, Pope John Paul II, and Nobel laureates Ivo Andric and Wislawa Szymborska. Their coat of arm is found in the courtyard of this school.

Next stop was the Wawel Hill where the Castle, the Cathedral and the Royal Castle is located. It is said that the Cathedral and the Royal Castle is the most picturesque and important sight in Krakow.

Wawel Castle
Wawel Castle is the castle residency in central Krakow. Built at the behest of King Casimir 3 the Great, this castle consist a number of buildings around an Italian-styled courtyard. I unfortunately did not get to tour around this whole castle, but there are two truths to this. One, this castle is one of the biggest in Poland representing nearly all European Architectural styles of the medieval, renaissance, and baroque periods. 

I did not had a chance to go to this cathedral either, due to the tight timeframe of the tour. But this Cathedral is a Roman Catholic church with over 900 years of history. It is the Polish national sanctuary and traditionally has served as coronation site of the Polish monarchs as well as the Cathedral of the Archdioces of Krakow.

This is a Gothic cathedral and it's the third one on this site. The first two were destroyed in the 11th century and 1305 by a fire.

To the peak of this trip was to visit this place, Auschwitz. The primary symbol of the Holocaust where a network of concentration and extermination camps were built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by the Nazi Germany during World War II. Going through this well-preserved place and the collections of museums was just merely a glimpse of what cruel terror and unimaginable genocide occurred in this very place.

During this tour, I also visited the the Birkenau camp, a short ride from Auschwitz. This camp functioned as a war camp, extermination camp and a place from which people were sent to labour in the Nazi Germany. 

The tour guide told us that one of the better jobs at this camp was cleaning out the toilets. These toilets have no plumbing system and the people who cleaned the toilets have to use their hands to scoop everything out. Why was this a better job, you may ask. It's because these workers reeked so much that the Nazi German soldiers will stay away from them, and it is these workers that avoid the other cruelty treatment some other people may have at this camp, Birkenau.

And before we know it, the tour ended as we left Birkenau. Unfortunately, most that were brought here during World War II never left.

Finally, to the highlight of the trip was the visit to the Royal Castle of Warsaw. Note: did you know that this castle has free admission on Sundays?! My friends and I somehow miraculously decided to go on Sunday and found free admission as we were about to purchase the ticket! Free things are the best things! :)


The Royal Castle in Warsaw is a castle residency that formerly served throughout the centuries as the official residence of the Polish monarchs. It is located in the Castle Square, at the entrance to the Warsaw Old Town. The monarchs stayed here from the 16th century until the Partitions of Poland.

This Royal History has a long standing history but was repeatedly destroyed by the Swedish, Brandenburgian, Prussians and the Tsarist armies. Many passing hands of this building and it was burned down and looted by the Nazi Germans following the Invasion of Poland in 1939 and it was completely destroyed in 1944 after the failed Warsaw Uprising. The castle that stood here today was reconstructed between 1971 - 1984.

Therefore most of what was seen today in this museum was part of the reconstruction, and the original artifacts was probably burned down or stolen... Here are some of the main rooms and artifacts that I found pretty and interesting.

The first would be the chandelier of this entrance hall/ball room. I always had a thing for really pretty lights. I recall when I was studying interior design in high school, I would collect a lot of pictures of light fixtures. So seeing this stunning fixture in this grand ball room.... yeah I was wow-ed.


So what's so special about this old gloomy old man with a globe on his back? If I recall my facts correctly, this is actually a clock. The band around the globe stopped at 11:14, which marks a significant time of when the castle was invaded by the Nazi Germans. I was trying to validate this on Google, but I couldn't find it anywhere! So please correct me if I am wrong! But according to what I've heard from the audio guide, this was a significant time that was found with all the clocks that were stopped in this castle.


Found this in one of the rooms of the castle. Look at that map though, this was Poland!


This was the only picture I got on my camera and phone where no one was in it. This was the Royal Bedroom. The bed is soooo tiny! People back then was tiny!


Always intrigue with where all these castle hallways led. This was one of them. No one is in this picture either because this area was zoned off :P


This was found near the end of the tour, this was probably an alter of some sort. I love the details here though. The mixture of colors and materials to build this, you don't see this in modern interior design nowadays.


And of course... there is a Throne Room in this castle! Did you think I was going to forget?

Other Things

In addition to the aforementioned attractions, my friends and I also spent the Sunday afternoon by the Vistula River where there are tons of activities going on, family and pet friendly, truly reflecting the laid back culture of Europe.

Here's a photo of me trying to balance on this thing by the river side. It probably lasted for two seconds, but hey... this picture made me look like a pro :)

Side Streets

To truly explore a city means you need to get lost in the city. Additionally to the 3 iconic places mentioned above, some other grounds that I walked on while in Warsaw were:

1) Downtown district 

My thought about this city: since Warsaw was occupied by various groups during the course of the history, I found that it was very difficult to find "Warsaw"-style buildings or things. Buildings had the influence of Russia and Northern Europe. And food was very similar to other parts of Europe. It was tremendously difficult to find souvenirs that resembles Poland. I felt that half the souvenirs looked like those of Holland, and the other half... was just vodka which resembles more of Russia, since this was my layover to Russia.

None-the-less, this city is full of history and worthwhile to go. Until my next post on another city in Poland... can you guess what it may be?