This morning we woke up at 8am after five hours sleep. Not surprisingly, I was feeling a little under the weather but there were things to do and places to see so we soldiered on anyway! The morning was thankfully an easy one and it was not until 9.45am that we left the hotel and headed down the street to catch a tour. Soon six of us from our tour were in the minibus and headed towards the Wieliczka Salt Mine. This is one of the oldest salt mines still in operation and is also on the UNESCO list of must see sights.
To reach the salt mines we needed to descend down a shaft with 378 steps – the deepest we were on the whole tour was around 135m. We also walked almost three kilometres but saw only 1% of the whole mine. It was clear from the beginning that our guide was going to be hilarious – he really did make the whole experience something special. He led us past a lot of art carved from the salt rock, three underground lakes and numerous chapels carved by the miners themselves. There was a particularly impressive one with multiple salt crystal chandeliers and art carved on all of the walls. Apparently they have approximately 12 weddings a year down there! My photos of the whole mine unfortunately don’t do it much justice at all, due to lighting issues. It was all very pretty though.
After the mine tour (which lasted around two hours), Hamish, Marissa, Julie and I requested to be dropped off at the Oskar Schindler Museum – it is, after all, the first thing I associate with this place. We stopped quickly for lunch then headed in. The museum is housed in his old pots and pan factory and is in fact more dedicated to World War II in Krakow, rather than Oskar Schindler himself. There was a LOT to read but they did a very good job of setting up the rooms… we wandered down real cobbled streets, through big art installations, into rooms set up like real houses. The information itself is of course difficult material and it took us all an hour and a half to go through it all. Highly recommended for any history buffs out there. Of course, we all left wanting to go watch Schindler’s List again.
After the museum we grabbed a very amusing little tourist cart back into the old town, where we sat in the sunny square and ate apple pie with icecream (much enjoyed). Then it was back to the hotel for a couple of hours to relax before dinner (I won’t lie, there were naps in there too!) At 7.30pm seven of us met for dinner – we were headed to a recommended restaurant that apparently served giant portions of Pork Knuckle, the speciality here. Right after we sat down the waitress didn’t hesitate suggesting a banquet for seven, a selection of the best things on their menu. This sounded pretty good so we said ok – then in came out at it was HUGE. So much meat! It was mostly chicken and pork done in about ten different ways, including a giant pork knuckle in the middle. I am proud to say I ate a portion of every single thing on the plate and it was all very good. Five out of seven of us were also brave enough to try the free horseradish vodka shots the waitress forced into our hands. They were hideous, but least we’ve ticked that off the Polish to do list!
Afterwards back up to our hotel room for two rounds of 500 with Dan and Sarah – Sarah and I did woefully, making it 2-2 now and leaving it open for an epic decider before the tour is ended. Very full and very tired we all headed to bed around 11pm… another big day of travelling tomorrow!
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