running path

Along the Vistula (Wisła in Polish) river is a nice path for running, biking, walking, etc.  I live very close to the river, thus it’s a very convenient location for me to run along.  When I am interested in distance, I can run 15km along the river to the Tyniec monestary (thus making for 30km round trip).  When the weather is good it also includes some very nice views.  Yesterday the weather was quite nice, so I decided to go for a bike ride along the same route so that I could take my camera.

Approaching the castle, I see a hotel building with a fantastic location on the river, which is now just a billboard.  I don’t know if the building is structurally unsound, or if the owners simply failed to make a profit.  I’ve heard it said that today it is the largest billboard in Poland.

I cross a bridge, and am then given a very good view of Wawel castle as I continue by.

I am still taken back that I live less than 3km from what was the capitol of Poland until 1596.  Perhaps that’s just my American upbringing, and the fact that we don’t have castles, nor do we have history dating back that far.

What I particularly enjoy about this particular path is that after I have passed through the city, I quickly find myself in the country.

Soon enough I have left the road and traffic behind, and there is only the running / bike path.  But it is a paved, well-maintained path.  It is generally quiet, but little time goes by before I am passed by a biker.

The path may not follow the river precisely, but it never deviates too far.

When I reach Tyniec, the path becomes much thinner, and no longer so fit for a casual bike ride, but if I have desire to continue going further than 15km from home (I must be honest, even when training for the 42km run that is a marathon, I quite rarely find myself running more than 30km in a day), the train is adequate for running.

From there, I turned around, and approached Tyniec.

Once at the top, I saw something new going on since the last time I’d been this way.  Apparently students from Jagiellonian University were working on an archaeological dig, presumably working towards restoring some recently discovered remains.

Of course, from the top of the hill on which Tyniec resides, one has an excellent view of the river below.

That’s about it.  I then exited the monastery, and headed back down the hill.

And I resumed my ride along the river path, this time heading back home.

Vilnius – continued

After running the half-marathon, and going on the tour of the city, it was necessary to find some dinner.  I started with a beer and an order of Lithuanian style garlic bread.

That’s a dark bread, fried, and served with lots and lots of garlic on top.  This is probably the sort of appetizer one would share with others at the table, but I was eating alone, and I’d just run 21km, and walked quite a bit.  And were it not for all that exercise, I probably wouldn’t have been able to handle the potato pancakes that followed.

What you can’t see in the photo is that they are filled with meat.  Delicious, but quite rich.  Lithuanian food was good for the hard working farmers, who spent all day doing manual labor, and had to consume lots of calories to keep going.  I quite enjoyed the Lithuanian food I sampled, but I don’t think I could eat like that on a regular basis.  Fortunately, there are plenty of other non-Lithuanian options (though I didn’t try them, seeing as how I was there for such a short time.)

On the subject of food, on my last day, I enjoyed a delicious meal of sauerkraut and sausage soup, kugelis, and homemade kvass (or gira in Lithuanian).

Prior to visiting Europe, the only Lithuanian dish I’ve eaten before was kugelis.  It’s basically a big pie or cake made out of grated potatoes, plus some bacon, and probably extra bacon grease as well.  The one I had here seemed a bit more elaborate than what I’ve had at home, but it was indeed quite good.  Have you noticed a theme?  Lithuanian food seems to be heavily based on meat and potatoes.  It was all quite good, but it was a very good thing that I was quite hungry before each meal, otherwise finishing would be quite a challenge.

I had another night bus going back to Poland on Monday night.  So, I checked out of the hotel late Monday morning, and basically wandered around town all day.

I climbed the hill to the Upper Castle.  Only a single tower remains from the castle today, but it provides an excellent view of the city below.

I continued walking around.  I saw some of the places I’d visited on the previous day’s tour in greater detail.  I also went through the more modern part of the city.  I even found a few skyscrapers in this city of 500,000.

Though, they are not without their contrast.  Just a block or two away, one can find plenty of less towering structures.

I think this gives the city a nice character.  It’s a modern enough place to have some nicely designed tall buildings, but is not overpowering, and feels more real.

I’ll end with one tradition I noticed in my walking.  Just about every bridge has more than a few locks attached to it.  This is a common practice with couples.  I’m not certain if it’s just marriage, or if it’s the equivalent of carving a heart in a tree trunk.  On Saturday, there seemed to be a huge number of wedding parties, all posing for pictures in various parts of the city.  I even noticed one attaching a lock to a bridge.

Overall, it was a great weekend.  I went to a country, knowing full well I didn’t speak a single word of the language.  And I got by without having to learn either.  I’m not sure I should be proud of this fact, but at least it is a good indication of how welcoming the Lithuanians are of foreigners.  The only difficulty I had was talking to the bus driver, when I was still in Poland (he spoke neither English nor Polish).  He was looking for some specific part of my ticket (which I thought was just my receipt), to affix a sticker for my baggage claim.  Fortunately, there were some Lithuanians in line behind me who spoke English quite fluently.  We talked briefly, and they told me I had nothing to worry about in Lithuania with languages.  They complained how difficult it was for them in Poland, which I can certainly understand.  I imagine being a small country, Lithuanians have no choice but to become multi-lingual.  At one of the restaurants I ate, I noticed my waitress switched between Lithuanian, English and Polish with no troubles at all.  I wouldn’t be surprised if she spoke more than those three.

I’m glad I finally made it to one of the Baltic states.  Hopefully I’ll manage to see more in the future.

I probably took too many pictures, but if you’d care to view them, take a look at my smugmug page.

Vilnius

I spent the weekend in Lithuania.  I made the decision to go on Friday, taking a night-bus (I couldn’t find one that runs during the day) from Warsaw, and arriving in Vilnius early Saturday morning.  I managed to find my way to the hotel where I’d made reservations.  Being more than a few hours early (it was before 8:00am, and check-in is listed as starting at 2:00pm), I asked if they could store my luggage while I explored the town.  Instead, I was told that my room was available, and I could take my luggage there.  Thus, I managed a few hours of sleep – not enough to make up for the long sleepless bus ride, but a significant improvement over my previously incredibly-tired state.  The weather on Saturday was a sort of drizzly rain, which, fortunately was never heavy enough to truly require an umbrella.  The following days remained cloudy, but without rain.  So compared with recent times in Poland, I’d say the weather was fantastic!

After waking up, I walked around a bit, exploring the buildings and monuments in the old town.

Here is Grand Duke Gediminas.  He founded Vilnius, and moved Lithuania’s capitol there.  I thought he looked a bit like some kind of royal zombie in this pose, but I’ve been told he’s actually welcoming people into the city of Vilnius.  He is holding his sword out, by the blade as a gesture of peace.

After a bit of walking, I registered to run the half-marathon that was taking place on Sunday.

That was part of my motivation in going to Vilnius.  My blood is 50% Lithuanian, so since coming to Europe, Lithuania has been on my list of countries to see, but I’ve somehow never managed to get there.  So the marathon was a good final push.  There were both full, and half marathons being run.  I chose the half for two reasons.  First, I hadn’t been seriously training, and am not at all confident that I’d have been able to manage 42km, but 21km is a much more reasonable distance.  Also, the course was somewhat uninteresting – a repetition of four laps for the full marathon.  Two laps for the half wasn’t bad, but four laps would seem to defeat the purpose of seeing some interesting place by running.

I did my best to take it easy on Saturday, and not tire myself out.  Sunday morning, I ran, finishing after an hour and 54 minutes.  It was a good race.  I didn’t push myself too hard, but neither did I have to slow down at any point.  For perhaps the last 100 meters, I was running about the same pace as one other guy.  Thus, we speed up to see who could finish first.  By the finish line, we were both running at top speed.  I think I beat him by a few centimeters, but it’s hard to say.  The important thing is it was fun.

After the race, I had an hour free time, during which I walked back to my hotel and took a shower.  Then I walked back to the city center in time to pick up a 2 hour walking tour of Vilnius.  I learned a little more about the city, and saw lots of churches and other landmarks.  Actually, I’d already seen quite a lot from randomly walking the previous day.  Most important buildings have plaques printed nearby (in Lithuanian and English) describing what the place is, and perhaps its historical significance.

I also learned about the stebuklas (miracle) tile, located in front of the cathedral.

It is said, if you stand on the tile, and spin around clockwise three times, your wish will be granted.  I imagine were the WJF were ever to come to Vilnius, they could make surely use of it.

As I said, I saw some impressive churches.  For example, St. Anne’s.

Also, there was the Russian Orthodox Church of the Holy Spirit.

And The Church of St. Casimir, which interestingly enough, during communist times was converted into a Museum of Atheism.  In 1991, it was returned to the Jesuits.

I think that’s enough for now.  I’ll write another post to mention a few more things, and also to show off the Lithuanian food I ate.

Family visit – part 6

On our final day, we first took a look at Gdynia.

And while it may seem strange to have the seaports of Gdansk and Gdynia sitting side by side in Poland, on the Baltic Sea, there is an important reason both exist.  For a time, Gdansk was not part of Poland at all.  Gdansk has spent time as part of Germany, and also as a free city.  Thus, Poland could not always rely on their ability to make use of Gdansk as a sea port.  Gdynia was built much more recently than Gdansk.  Today, both remain important parts of Poland.

I forgot to mention in one of the previous posts that we took a trip on a pirate ship.  Well, just a pirate-themed cruise boat.  We went from the pier at Sopot, and got to see the coast of Gdynia, before returning to Sopot.

We had hoped to take a ship to Gdansk or somewhere nearby, but as the official tourist season had just come to an end, our options were much fewer.

After Gdynia, we decided to go to Hel.

I have been told by Poles that I should go to Hel – they have often said what a nice place it is, so I’m glad we had a chance to see it.  Hel is a peninsula, not far from where we were.  While in Hel, if conditions are good, you can just see the coast of Gdynia in the distance.

As this was our last day, we didn’t want to stay out too long.  But we managed to stop and visit the Seal Sanctuary in Hel before returning to the hotel.

We just happened to arrive around feeding time, so the seals were anxious to come out of the water to see the trainers.

I suppose that’s a bit anticlimactic, but this marks the end of the trip.  My parents and Grandmother had a flight out of Gdansk at 5:00am the following morning.  Grace and I slept in at the hotel, and caught a train back home to Krakow in the late morning.  We managed to arrive home before the rest, but only by a few hours.

I’m glad to have been able to show my family some places near where I currently live.  I’m disappointed that the weather had other plans.  But that’s the way things go.  With my grandmother along, we weren’t able to travel particularly quickly anyway, so its really just as well that the rain often kept us in, and doing things slowly.  We may not have visited every place I’d have liked to, but I think we ate enough excellent food to forget about such details.  It’s a shame that living so far away visiting the family, or having them visit me is not a simple task, so I’m definitely glad we had this trip together.

Family visit – part 5

I suppose I should have mentioned how the tri-cities of Gdańsk, Sopot and Gdynia are situated. They really blend together, almost as if one larger city, rather than three separate ones.

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We stayed in Sopot, which is mostly known for being a resort center, but is then surrounded by Gdansk and Gdynia.

Considering our hotel was right on the water, visiting the Baltic Sea was no problem at all.

Unfortunately, the weather was such that one did not have much desire to go swimming. It tended to stay on the cool side, and of course, we saw our share of rain. It rained just as heavily as it did while we were in Krakow, but fortunately, not as often. We did actually have more good weather than bad while in the Gdansk region.

Sopot is the place Poles visit on summer vacation (and so do visitors). Thus, there are plenty of hotels, restaurants, and things of interest to vacationers. There are also some nice artistic items. I particularly liked this statue of a person on a slackline.

I imagine the secret was to design the fish in his net to be very heavy, with the rest of the state quite light, so as to stay balanced. When the wind was blowing, the statue would rock a bit. And right nearby was the Krzywy Domek (crooked house).

The crooked look did not continue inside the building, but it is a fascinating design nonetheless. I imagine it must be a challenge finding replacements should any of the window panes break.

I will mention that one of the places inside the Krzywy Domek was a fantastic restaurant, called Rucola. It was a combination of seafood, with a few Polish choices, but also heavy Indian influences. I had tandori salmon with nan, and it may just have been the best meal I ate on the entire trip.

Of course, seafood is very popular in this region. As such, it is common to find many dishes that may not seem like traditional Polish food. Perhaps my family was a little disappointed to not be eating so many Pierogi and Gołąbki as in Krakow, but Grace and I ate seafood at every opportunity.

Family visit – part 4

The breakfast buffet at the Grand Hotel was excellent.

After breakfast on the first day, we went to Gdansk, on an invitation to meet a relative.  She’s my grandmother’s cousin’s daughter.  So, one can certainly say we are more distant relations.  But she remembers that her father and my grandmother used to write to each other.  She also has met my grandmother’s siblings when they visited Poland about 30 years ago.  She and her husband gave us a nice tour of the center of Gdansk.

I’d been to Gdansk before, but it was nice to see some items with an insider’s point of view.

We also went on to visit a variety of places in Gdansk, including the Solidarity Monument

and the cathedral in Oliwa, famous for its massive pipe organ.

Family visit – part 3

After seeing the rain in Krakow, it was time to see how the weather would treat us in Gdansk.  A fast train will take about 9 hours, but flying is definitely the more comfortable option.

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We had a ride reserved to take us from the hotel to the airport.  It was to pick us up at 11:00 am.  By 11:10am, we decided to call and find out why there was no ride yet.  Apparently, the driver had simply forgotten us.  Our name was on his list; he just missed it.  We made it to the airport a bit later than expected, but still with plenty of time to spare.  As we went to check into our flight, we discovered the second problem of the day.

They had no record of Grace or me being on the flight.  There was nothing they could do.  We tried calling the number from the travel agent confirmation sheet (which listed all of our names, and “paid in full” on the top, before listing the travel details below), but since that was in New York, it wasn’t open yet.  There was a number listed in Warsaw, but on calling, a recording indicated the number was not valid.

So my dad bought tickets for Grace and me with his credit card.  I trust the travel agent will reimburse him for this difficulty.

Polish airlines does not fly direct from Krakow to Gdansk.  Instead, we had to make a stop at Warsaw.  Each flight is less than an hour in duration, and we had about an hour layover in Warsaw.  Overall, not too bad.  The flight to Warsaw happened without incident.  But at Warsaw, we discovered the third problem.  Flying from Warsaw to Gdansk, my mother had a later flight than the rest of us.  Fortunately, hers was just an hour later, but it was still rather inconvenient.

Our flight was one time.  Her flight was about a half hour late.  Thus, we spent about an hour and a half waiting for her at the Gdansk airport.  Things could have been worse, but I was beginning to wonder what benefit booking through a travel agent could possibly provide with difficulties like this.  Also, while waiting, I noticed that there is, in fact, a non-stop flight from Krakow to Gdansk – it just isn’t with Polish airlines, but rather JetAir – again, it’s a shame the travel agent didn’t provide this information.

We made it to our hotel a bit later than expected, but considering the problems we faced, I think it worked out quite well.  We were staying at the Grand Hotel in Sopot.  The name Grand is definitely apt.

This hotel was built in 1924, and is on the Baltic Sea.  It is one of, if not the classiest hotel around.  I’ve recently learned quite a few famous guests have stayed at this hotel, including Charles de Gaulle, Fidel Castro, and Adolph Hitler… hmm, that does make for an interesting guest list.

Family visit – part 2

Rain continued on the following day.  I had planned to take the water tram (ie: a small boat that runs on the Wisła river to various destinations within Krakow) from the hotel to my apartment.  It would be a good way to see some notable sites (Wawel Castle, for example), and would be easy enough to transport the wheelchair on board.  And most importantly, the boats have a roof, so the rain wouldn’t be such a horrible thing.  At least that’s what I thought.

Getting to the dock from which the water tram is launched would have required some swimming.  The bike / pedestrian path alongside the river was now completely underwater.  Also, the water level was now high enough that only the smallest of boats could fit under most of the bridges.  Needless to say, we did not take the water tram.  Nor did we end up taking the cruise to Tyniec, the Benedictine monastery I had planned for the following day.

But it wasn’t raining so badly as the day before.  So we decided to go for a walk instead.  It’s about a mile and a half from the hotel to my apartment.  But I’d forgotten to take into account the heavy construction of the tram line in the exact direction we were going.  (How silly of me to forget this… were it not for the construction, we could have taken the tram on the previous day, instead of taking a taxi…. and likewise, were it not for the construction, we could have taken the tram right to my apartment.)

So we took a nice walk through the rain, this time, not directly through the old town, but not far from it.  We played cards for a bit, before eating at a Jewish restaurant in the Kazimerz district, followed by tea with Grace’s family.

Some of the interaction was amusing.  My grandmother grew up speaking English and Polish as native languages.  But today, she knows very few people who speak very much Polish, and is thus quite out of practice.  (And though I must say she does quite well, at 90 years, she is not quite as sharp as she used to be.)  She would occasionally forget that Grace’s father does not speak any English.  Or she would speak Polish, but well mixed with English words like because, you know, and a number of other interjections.

The next day we managed to visit the museum which occupies the building that was once Oscar Schindler’s factory.  After that, we saw the Ethnographic Museum, which shows many scenes from Poland of the past (and thus, an illustration of the land my great-grandparents lived in).

We finished the day with dinner at U Babci Maliny‘s for some more good traditional Polish food.

We didn’t stay out too late, as the following day we would be flying to Gdansk.

Family visit – part 1

About two weeks ago, my parents and grandmother arrived in Krakow.  They came to see Grace and me, and to visit the cities of Krakow and Gdansk.  They had made their plans months ago, and thus weren’t particularly able to have predicted the large quantity of rain we would see during their week and a half in Poland.

On their arrival, I met them at the airport in Krakow, bringing a few Polish pastries as welcome.  We then went to their hotel, where they checked in, and Grace later arrived with some take-out food from U Babci Maliny.  We enjoyed a good variety of Polish food, before leaving, and allowing everyone to retire after a long day of travel.  The next morning, we had plans to tour Collegium Maius, the oldest of Jagiellonian University’s buildings (the oldest university in Poland, and second-oldest in Europe).  We agreed to meet at the hotel lobby at 10am the following morning.

Grace and I were on the bus, transporting the wheelchair we’d rented for my grandmother to the hotel.  (Mind you, at 90 years old, she can still walk without significant difficulty – just not as quickly, or far as we would be doing on this trip.)  It was then that I got a call from my dad.  Apparently, everyone had managed to oversleep, and would not be ready for our morning tour of the university.  As Grace and I were already on the bus, we continued to the hotel.  We arrived with a thoroughly soaked wheelchair, thanks to the heavy rain that had started early in the morning.

The hotel staff were helpful enough to reschedule out tour of Collegium Maius for 1pm, allowing the late risers to enjoy breakfast, and to plan for a short tour of the old section of Krakow.

We took a taxi towards the city center.  In retrospect, we could have walked faster.  But it was raining, and we weren’t sure how comfortable the mile and a half would be for my grandmother.  We located the small electric cars parked in the city center that offer pre-recorded tours in the language of your choice, and booked a half hour ride.  With the heavy rain showing no signs of letting up, this seemed the best possible way to see the city.  With 50 minutes before the start of our Collegium Maius tour, we opted for a 30 minute ride through the city.  At least, it would have been 30 minutes were the traffic not so heavy.  We didn’t return to the starting point (where we had left the wheelchair) until about ten minutes past one.

Grace didn’t join us on the tour, as she had some errands to run, but she had planned to meet us at Collegium Maius.  That ended up working out well, as she was able to negotiate for us to join a later tour, when it would clear we would miss the 1:00 one.

Apparently, the third time was the charm, and at 1:40, we finally toured Collegium Maius.  Really, we were only able to see a small portion of the whole place, but what we did see was impressive enough.  Like so many old buildings here, the details are impressive, from the decorations on the walls, to the woodwork of the doors.

And of course, there were many items used in education from years past.  There is a globe of the world, from around the same time Copernicus was a student, which is the oldest surviving globe to contain the American continents (through the shape and proportions are far from accurate) – which of course, was well guarded, with glass and distance preventing any decent photos.  There was also an anatomic model carving of the human body, which would have been used in medicine.

I am glad we managed to visit Collegium Maius… it’s a shame I hadn’t managed to visit it myself earlier in all my time in Krakow.  I suppose that’s how site seeing often goes – one tends not to see such things until someone comes to visit.

Following the tour, we at what ended up being a gigantic meal at Chłopskie Jadło restaurant.  We ordered a sort of sampler platter.  The photo does not do justice to just how much food there was.  The five of us managed to eat about half of what was given.  I still have leftovers in my freezer.

By the time we finished dinner, it was getting late.  My family was still adjusting to the time change, and were understandably tired.  We walked again through the rain, through the old town once again, before they returned to the hotel.

To my knowledge, there was no point during the day that it was not heavily raining.

How much is the train ticket?

I spent the weekend in Ostróda.  From there, I returned home to Krakow.  It is a seemingly simple matter of taking a train from one city to another.  Sometimes, the schedules can be a little strange, but they generally work out.  Here were the two trains that best met our schedule:

and it’s even cheaper if you’re a student and under 26

The first option is to take train TLK53100 from Ostróda to Warszawa, and then change to IR13124 to Kraków.  A second class ticket for this option costs 85PLN.

The second option is to take train TLK53100 from Ostróda to Kraków, without making any changes.  A second class ticket costs 60PLN.

The strange part is both options involve taking TLK53100.  The strange thing is that if we change in Warszawa, we can get to Kraków faster.  Well, I guess the route that TLK53100 takes from Warszawa to Kraków is different (and longer, though hard to say for sure since both options are listed as being 559km) than the route IR13124 takes.  And it’s reasonable that the faster route is more expensive than the slower one.  (It may have the inconvenience of changing trains, but it means arriving home 2 hours earlier.)

So armed with a ticket for the first option – the one that involves changing trains, we departed from Ostróda.  But along the way, there was a small problem.  As often happens, the train was late.  We were supposed to arrive in Warszawa at 17:58.  Instead, we arrived at 18:06.  Since our connection was scheduled to depart Warszawa at 17:58, it didn’t make any sense to try and catch it – we were 8 minutes too late.  So we stayed on our train, secure in the knowledge that we’d still arrive in Kraków, though 2 hours later than we had hoped for.

Eventually, ticket control came through, and we figured it would be a relatively simple matter of getting our tickets re-negotiated.  (If you haven’t traveled by train, be aware it is generally acceptable to buy your tickets on the train – it costs slightly more than at the station, but it’s still quite reasonable, and a common enough thing to do.)  The ticket controller, however, had absolutely no sympathy for our situation.

She immediately began by asking us why we didn’t change trains in Warszawa.  We explained that we arrived at Warszawa too late to make the train.  She told us the second train was held late to allow for our late arrival, in a tone that made it sound like it was common knowledge, and we were idiots for not knowing.

We asked how we were supposed to know.  She said we should have asked her.  We explained that we were waiting at the train door for 10 minutes prior to our scheduled arrival in Warszawa.  The corridor was completely full of people, and it would have been impossible for us to find a ticket controller (and that’s making the assumption we knew where to look).

As much as we tried, she would hear nothing of it.  It was clearly our fault we didn’t catch our connection.  We were clearly stupid for assuming it would leave Warszawa at the scheduled time.

We had to buy new tickets for our ride from Warszawa to Kraków.  (We could later return to the train station and have the IR13124 tickets we did not use refunded.)

The new ticket cost 60PLN.  (Technically 53PLN, with a 7PLN charge for purchasing onboard instead of in advance at the station.)  We would later be refunded 40PLN for the unused IR13124 ticket.  Thus, for being late, we were changed 20PLN extra.

Let me illustrate those numbers again.  At the station, we bought the tickets that would get us to Kraków fastest for 85PLN.  Due to problems with the connection in Warszawa, we had to pay 60PLN, but were later refunded 40PLN.  Thus our total ticket cost was 85+60-20=105PLN.  This 105PLN allowed us to take the slower train to Kraków.  At the station, the slower train would have cost 85-60=25PLN less than the faster one.  But for us, the slower train cost us 105-85=20PLN more than the faster train!

I suppose that’s par for the course.  The above photo shows what the train station signs generally look like.  They are usually updated with actual information about the train’s destination, and how late it is when the train arrives.  Even if the train is late, this sign may remain blank until the train gets there… in the mean time, you just have to hope you’re standing at the correct platform, and that your train will eventually arrive.  (Delays are announced over the loudspeaker, but the echo is usually so bad even native Polish speakers have difficulty understanding.)

On the bright side, travel by train is quite cheap.  I’m not aware of anywhere in the US where you can travel 350 miles for less than $20.