Winter in Poland - but no skiing

Folks - I'd appreciate any suggestions.

I'm off to Krakow with my wife for a wedding just after Christmas and staying until just after the new year. We'd planned to combine it with a skiing trip, but now I'm injured and we won't be able to ski.

Any suggestions for what we might do with the time instead? We already know Krakow really well, having spent a lot of weeks and weekends there over the last couple of years, so I'd like to get out of the city, but from previous experience I know it's going to be pretty cold and dark early every day. I'm also not sure what the state of the roads will be like for driving in the snow off the main routes.

The options that I was thinking of were:

1. A trip into the mountains/countryside to a lodge - perhaps to the Bieszczady? (Not Zakopane though, it's like Piccadilly Circus in rush hour.)

2. Catching the train to Lwow for a couple of days - always fancied going there.
3. Perhaps heading up to Bialystock - I've heard that the national park around there is beautiful in the snow - although it's not really anywhere near Krakow.

Any thoughts on these or other suggestions?

-Joe

just wait a few minutes and one of the next posts will be from my dear friend seanbm with his link about recomendations for zakopane. hes like an open book to me (;

Recommendations for Zakopane

How could I refuse :)

Thanks guys - but any suggestions not in Zakopane - the place does my head in (with apologies to SeanBM)

Try using the search function at the top of the page.

Appreciate it, but I'm actually looking for something to do in the winter that's not skiiing - we were meant to have been skiiing, but I've managed to injure meself so that's not on the cards anymore.

Ski resorts can be a pretty miserable if you're not actually able to get out on the slopes, so I don't really want to hang around a resort. I also already know Krakow inside out and back to front, so don't want to spend all our time there.

My question was rather: what would you recommend is worth doing in southern Poland in the winter that's not skiiing and not Krakow?

Would a trip to the Bieszczady or to Lwow be worth doing as an alternative? Or something else?

The search function isn't really that much help with this kind of thing, I'm afraid.

I live in Kraków - I once visited Lwow and absolutely hated it. The city smelled terrible, the infrastructure was crumbling, and there was precious little English to be had (even in the train station). Upon my return, Kraków seemed as cosmopolitan as San Francisco by comparison!

If you have some time and don't mind leaving Poland, I would actually recommend Budapest - it is a 10-hour bus ride from Kraków, but the trip is inexpensive (55 PLN one-way if I remember correctly) and the bus is very comfortable. Plus, the scenery through the mountains is quite nice.

If you like European capitals, Budapest will not disappoint (Kraków seems like a small village by comparison). And an added bonus - you won't have to deal with the Ukrainian border patrol!!!

I wouldnt recommend skiing in Poland in the first place, its not the best area to ski/snowboard, in Zakopane the cues are an absolute nightmare and most of the other resorts can be done from top to bottom in about 30 seconds.

If i were you id look for a nice peacefull log cabin out in the woods preferably near a lake, take entertainment with you and stoke up that fire. Winter walks and fishing in the day and in the evenings cosy nights in around the fire with a bottle of wine. Cities are boring as hell in my opinion they are all the same.