Day 72 2 June 2015 Krakow

Today was a late start in Krakow, so at 10 AM we left on a walking tour of the Royal Wavew Castle and the market square.  The city was relatively unscathed during World War 2.  It’s 26 degrees today so summer is here as there are a for all the talk of declining births in Poland with the migration

The cathedral of St Stanislaw, although we couldn’t take photos, was as beautiful as anything we have seen. The market square was lovely and so open.  We were having a snack of apple pie and an “ice cream sundae” –often it’s a surprise when you place an order - at an outside café when we were hit by a rainstorm.  Quickly eating our food we sheltered in a foyer.

There are school kids everywhere. Here it is the end of the school year so they are heaps of school kids of all ages on excursions – the fun alternative to learning. We visited the Wieliczka salt mines outside of Krakow the city and they were amazing. Used for centuries the salt is green-blue crystals and is suitable to consume in its unrefined form.   It often had the appearance of granite, certainly not white salt It was quite amazing as the mines are very extensive, had about 40 chapels and one huge underground church which was spectacular.  I have included some photos taken by someone else.

Even without the visit to the salt mines, Krakow has been exceptionally beautiful, perhaps part of the appeal has been that it hasn’t been super crowded (except for the school kids).  This has been an unexpected highlight. You can of courses in every city or at least it seemed, has carriage rides.

Above is an uninteresting photo of the castle that only had a small amount of the original brickwork left having been destroyed in WW2.  Not that you can tell this from the photo.

We had a dinner of veal shanks (Hoping it’s not Shank’s pony) that melted in your mouth and we were entertained by Polish musicians and dancers in national costume.  There was also a presentation to our tour guide than.king him (with an envelope of money).  He seem humbled but he reminded us of a Chinese saying “Don’t praise the son until the sunset”.