Krakow

On Wednesday evening we each packed up a bag and headed to the train station in Gdansk. We got on a train to Krakow at 7:30 p.m. We had a room that was in a sleeper car. The trip to Krakow from Gdansk on that train was 11 hours. They are about 450 miles apart so I think we were on a slower train. Gdansk is in the far north of Poland and Krakow is in the far south. Our "sleeper" was about 6'x6'. There were three bunk beds on each side and not much room for anything else! On one side, Natalie was on top, Ben was in the middle

and I was on the bottom. On the other side Abbie was on the top,

Trey was in the middle and Myles was on the bottom. The trip was surprisingly not bad. We turned off the lights at 10:00 p.m. and hoped to sleep. Everyone slept...not as well as we would have in our beds, but everyone did get a good amount of sleep.

So the train pulls into Krakow at 6:30 a.m. We all lumber off the train and we follow Myles. He is very good at deciphering the transportation system and figuring out where we are and where we need to go. He had checked online for places for us to stay. It is very common in Europe for people to have apartments that they rent out short term. This is not tourist season so he was able to get a very cheap rate for a two bedroom apartment for us. The couch in the living room pulls out into another double bed so everyone has a comfortable place to sleep. But we were not going to be able to get in until 8:00 a.m. So we took a tram (streetcar) to the neighborhood of where we are staying and found a big bakery where we killed some time having breakfast.

We got settled, changed and headed out to the Wawel Castle and the Cathedral of Krakow.

The Wawel Castle is where Polish Royalty lived for centuries and sits right on the Vistula River. As we were walking up the hill, we saw a statue of Tadeusz Kosiuszko on a horse. There is a street near our house in Gdansk named for him as well. Myles asked some people who he was and they were appalled that Americans would not know. Turns out that he was a general in the American Revolution. He worked with George Washington and was a close friend of Thomas Jefferson. He was a war hero for our war and we had never heard of him!

As we researched, we learned that there is a house in Philadelphia that he lived in. His engineering skills were crucial to the fortification of many battle sites and he was instrumental in American success in the Revolution.

There is a legend in Poland that once a dragon lived under the castle in a cave. It was a menace and liked to eat young women. Many knights tried to slay the dragon but failed. A poor shoemaker decided to poison the dragon. It worked and the shoemaker was given the king's daughter's hand in marriage. We went down about a million steps into the cave and saw where the dragon lived according to the legend. Right outside the cave is a statue of the dragon and every two minutes it shoots fire out of it's mouth!

We toured the huge complex and saw the many tapestries, paintings, elaborate ceilings, furniture, etc. We had an English speaking tour guide but she was very hard to understand so the kids lost interest after a while.

Trey's favorite part of that part of the day was chasing the pigeons in the courtyard. That was pretty funny!

Many of the Polish monarchs are buried in the Cathedral which is in the same complex. This Cathedral is the head of the Archdiocese of Krakow and where John Paul II was the Bishop of Krakow and the Cardinal before he was elected Pope.

We did not have a tour guide for the cathedral and just walked through. We also went to the John Paul II Museum that is there on the grounds. We saw vestments that he wore when he was a cardinal as well as many artifacts from bishops before him.

Thursday evening we had dinner with some other American Fulbright recipients who are in different parts of the country. One is a lady from New York who is assigned here in Krakow to teach American Art. She is an artist and was so fun to talk to (in English!). The other one we met is a man from central Illinois who is in a town a couple of hours away from Krakow. He is here with his wife and two children (almost five and 17 months). Trey had a ball playing with their little boy.

We went to Auschwitz yesterday. That was a full day and I will update on that in a bit. We have a laid back day of shopping and wandering ahead today!