Travelling to Poland (mostly Szczecin area) in a week! Tips and attractions?

Hi guys! First post on the boards!

My girlfriend, her parents, and I, are coming to Europe in about a week to go visit the rest of her family. We'll be doing a little touring around germany, switzerland and austria, but a large amount of the trip will be spent in Szczecin where she grew up. I've been living in Perth Australia, and this will be my first trip to a non-english speaking country. I've been doing my best to learn some Polish, so I have a real rough basic understanding on the language :D

I'm looking for some tips or suggestions on what to do whilst in Szczecin and the surrounding regions (although we won't have a car, I'm not opposed to taking public transport, even for longer journeys).

I'm really mostly interested in seeing historical (especially medieval) stuff like castles and old armor/weapons - but I'm also looking forwards to visiting any national parks and gardens that are around the place (I live in Australia - i'm very excited at the prospect of green leaves and actual rivers/lakes, and in summer to boot!* :P)

I know theres meant to be a whole bunch of Viking/medieval type stuff up North, in Wolin - how hard is it to get there via public transport, and how long would you think it'd take to get there?

Outside of history/nature, I've read about a few jazz bars/lounges in the area, and that sounds alright, but in general I'm not much of a club/bar type person (though I do like to drink, and read about some Starka distillery in the area that runs tours. That sounds fun)

Any advice would be much appreciated!
-Nathan

*Ooh and mountains. We don't get many of those round my part of the world

Gday sport...welcome to the forum....Don,t know a whole lot about Szczecin , but i do know there is a castle there which you could have a look around , not sure about any museum , but somebody on here may know of one...

I do know there is a very interesting military museum in Kolobrzeg , just up the coast from Szczecin where they have lots of arms and armour from the knights of old right up to Russian tanks and missiles from the 60s... I have been to this museum , and its very interesting...

I am not sure where the nearest national park is to Szczecin , but north of the city is the Puszcza wkrzanska which is very green and pretty , fraid you won,t find any mountains though , you have to go a long way south in Poland to find the Tatra mountains , very pretty , and maybe worth the trip....

I don,t know how hard it is to get to Wolin by public transport , but somebody on here will for sure , i see on my map there is a rail line to it , so probably easy enough and there is a national park there too , so you could have a look at that ...

Hang around mate , i am sure there will be a Szczecin local along soon that will help you better than i can....have a nice stay in Poland....

Hi,

It's good to hear that others are travelling to Szczecin. I am going in October and didn't really know what to expect. Would love to hear from anyone living there about any attractions, although that castle and museum sound really good.

I'm in Melbourne and although we have some rain (a bit more than Perth anyhow!) it will be nice to go somewhere without water restrictions!!

Are you kidding..! its been raining for the last few weeks , which i have to say is not normal for summer here , but the weather is going to be nice soon.....and we have plenty of water....

Yay!! That makes the trip even better, knowing that I have more than 4 minutes to wash my hair and teeth every day. I might even get crazy and wash a car on the front lawn!

I'm hoping the weather is nice while I'm there. Rain is great, but not really on holiday.

My Polish friends assure me that summer is about to begin....

Wildrover that military museum sounds awesome. I will definitely be on the lookout for that!

I know the castle in Szczecin - my girlfriend used to live across the road from it when she was little (so we'll be definitely visiting that too)

Hey Dancingmartha - I found it quite hard to find much travel information on the web about Szczecin or anything in its region (but to be fair I wasn't googling in Polish). Most websites seem to entirely focus on Krakov or Warszava (sif thats the only place in all of Poland). I did, however, come across the wikitravel site for Szczecin

->wikitravel.org/en/Szczecin (polishforums won't let me post a hyperlink because i'm too new)
Pretty good information

4 minutes for hair and teeth?! Wow - you guys are living in luxury over there ;P

Well i spent a good few hours there... They have lots of suits of armour and weapons from the tuetonic knights era ,second world war stuff , both Polish and german , and outside Russian aircraft , tanks and armoured vehicles...

The museum is in the centre of town , and not far from it i found an outside market where i bought an German iron cross for not so much money...

While you are in Ko£obrzeg you can have a pleasure cruise on the baltic , and enjoy all the usual stuff of a seaside holiday resort...

I recommend you buy yourself a book called rough guide to Poland , you can look up whatever town you are in and see what attractions are there , as well as seeing where all the local resteraunts , pubs and nightclubs are , its also got lots about Poland generally , and includes lots about the culture and such things..

Can agree Rough Guide to Poland is good - I thiink there's a regualr train up towards Wolin & we're thinking of a day visit in early September before going down coast - so any advice much appreciated.

Hi,
I'm English and have lived in Szczecin for the last 3 years. Let me know what information you need and I will try and help

Incidentally, one of my friends in Szczecin comes from Oz !