Traveling around Poland - our photo stories with very personal commentary

In another thread - Poland in Riddles: https://polishforums.com/travel/poland-photo-riddles-25380/37/ I went too personal and was rebuked for that by some posters.



Probably they were right. Riddles are just riddles and personal musings belong to another thread.

How about running a thread where we show a picture/a series of pictures of Poland taken by ourselves and comment on it/them?

Let`s start with my vacation 2011.

For a few years our summer holidays have been organised according to one scheme: a bit of the seaside, lakes, mountains and a big city ( I don`t mean Krakow). The order depends on the weather. This year we started with a big city because the weather was dull at the end of June, so it would be a real waste to travel 700 kilometers to the seaside and have no chance of frolicking in the crystal clear (but cold) waters of the Baltic Sea. :):):)

Before, we had visited Warsaw twice and Poznań, and I was planning to visit Gdańsk this year, but changed my mind because I found a dirt cheap accomodation in Wrocław ( a fellow teacher helped me) and eventually decided to go there.

Going to Wrocław from Krakow is nice and easy because there is a highway between two cities. Mostly two-, sometimes 3-lane.

Those new bridges look great! Poland is modernising quickly. Partly, thanks to European funds. Thank you, EU! :):):)

The traffic on the highway can be quite heavy.

But sometimes you can come across such beauties:

Outskirts of Wrocław.

We had travelled through Wrocław before, e.g., going to Poznań in 2009.

Two things struck me then:

1. Wrocław has the same colour trams as Krakow! Really, what plagiarism!!

2. A lot of roads in and around the centre are still cobblestoned. Amazing!

Wrocław is called the City of 1000 Bridges. Yes, the Odra River runs through Wrocław in many distributaries. Some bridges are great:

What do I think about Wrocław?

Well, I have mixed feelings. Somewhere else I said I wouldn`t like to live there because it reminds me of Krakow too much. And it is not only blue trams. :):):)

Let`s start with pros. What did I like about Wrocław?

Vegetation on buildings. I have never seen so many ivy covered houses or objects as in Wrocław. It seems their obsession. I like it!

TBC

How long does it take from Krakow to Wroclaw and were there any toll booths? if so how much does it cost?


It looks great but it gets in to the mortar between the bricks and destroys the wall.

I've never been to Wroclaw, but it reminds me of Berlin just looking at the pictures (sans the blue trams)

it is very much like east Berlin. that's for sure.

I have been to Krakow but not Wroclaw or Berlin, if they are all the same you have just saved me a boring trip :p

pawian - have you ever been to Germany - you wouldn't be so very enthusiastic about Polish motorways and bridges and stuff

no. they look the same in places, as if the same builders were in town, but there is so much more in berlin and the atmosphere is completely different.

I can add plenty photos of roads not as modern as those you have shown.

Me too. :):):) And I will one day.
But which roads do you mean exactly? Those cobblestone ones in Wrocław or highway roads? :):):):):)


About 3.5 hours. The section from Krakow to Katowice is paid, 16 zlotys. But you can shun it going through Olkusz, a bit longer, but still OK.


Hmm, do you think Vratislavians don`t know it?


This irony hurts. :):)::):):)


I was but long ago and didn`t pay attention to infrastructure at all. :):):):)

But the example of Germany isn`t the right one in case of Poland. How about comparing Belarus or Ukraine to Poland? :):):):) Russia, too?

Something is not adding up here. Berlin is nothing like Krakow. If I had to pick a nicer city it would be Krakow. I guess Wroclaw must be somewhere in between.

I forgot to add the pictures of bridges that I remember from my childhood - more or less like that one in Krakow:

Or in the countryside
Is it a surprise I am enthusiastic about such ones?

On a positive note - the new A1 from just south of Rybnik to Gliwice is fantastic. Three lanes, smooth, wide, empty - it's a dream.

Poland doesn't have *that* much yet - but it's getting there. Compare to Slovakia - which has a whole 20km of motorway (well, expressway!) on the main road between Katowice and Budapest - Poland really isn't doing badly.

my favourite bridge in wroclaw is actually a simple footbridge.

What else? Certainly, the Market Square houses. This old Prussian architecture is really stunning. Krakow hasn`t got such nice ones ( but Poznan and Warsaw have).

The quarter in the middle of the Square is also fantastic - narrow streets, narrow houses.


This one?:

I've made nice you tubwe video about Cracow of my pictures

not that one. i call that the bouncing bridge. it moves a little when folk walk across. before renovation it was worse/more exciting.

it's near the park plaza hotel

my favourite bridge is opposite swiebodzki station. it goes from low ground to high ground, so is not horizontal to the vertical

Not bad. How about a very personal commentary? What do you think about it?

Great thread Pawian, thanks!

not sure what this website is, but it shows my favourite bridge in wroclaw.


geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=2c1dd42f-b0f5-4f2d-b153-2bc7ce84ee8a

It's actually mostly Austrian/Bohemian, while a few newer buildings are indeed Prussian, ... and the town hall is mostly Bohemian/Lusatian. ;)

I can think of at least 350k of motorway in Slovakia - to Trnava, Banka (with a few breaks), Brno, Vienna. Per head its a lot more than the Poles have and it is not always down to one lane like the Polish ones or, nor does it cost 5 euro to do a 100k like I paid a couple of days ago between Konin and Lodz.

Thanks. I hope others will also share their photos and impressions.

So, what else did I like in Wrocław?

I liked all the places related to history (my hobby). All the museums, panoramas, cemeteries. etc. Each place can teach us something new and that is invaluable.

The list and photos of main historical sites which I recommend to visit is in another thread:

Or how certain products are made from insects. So far I read about them in adventure books (e.g., how a Polish corsair looted a captured Spanish ship and seized a transport of cochineal which gives us dye

The insect produces carminic acid that deters predation by other insects. Carminic acid, which occurs as 17-24% of the weight of the dry insects, can be extracted from the insect's body and eggs and mixed with aluminum or calcium salts to make carmine dye (also known as cochineal).[1] Carmine is today primarily used as a food colouring and for cosmetics.

Polish cochineal (Porphyrophora polonica), also known as Polish carmine scales, is a scale insect formerly used to produce a crimson dye of the same name, colloquially known as "Saint John's blood". The larvae of P. polonica are sessile parasites living on the roots of various herbs-especially those of the perennial knawel-growing on the sandy soils of Central Europe and other parts of Eurasia. Before the development of aniline, alizarin, and other synthetic dyes, the insect was of great economic importance, although its use was in decline after the introduction of Mexican cochineal to Europe in the 16th century.

Did you know that shellac is also from insects?

Shellac is a resin secreted by the female lac bug, on trees in the forests of India and Thailand. It is processed and sold as dry flakes (pictured at right), which are dissolved in ethyl alcohol to make liquid shellac, which is used as a brush-on colorant, food glaze and wood finish. Shellac functions as a tough all-natural primer, sanding sealant, tannin-blocker, odour-blocker, stain, and high-gloss varnish. Shellac was once used in electrical applications as it possesses good insulation qualities and it seals out moisture. Phonograph (gramophone) records were also made of it during the pre-1950s, 78-rpm recording era.

Władysław Hasior (May 14, 1928 in Nowy Sącz - July 14, 1999 in Kraków) was one of the leading Polish contemporary sculptors connected with the Podhale region. He was also a painter and theatre set designer. His first individual exhibition was in 1961 at the Jewish Theater in Warsaw. Since then his works have been displayed at over seventy individual exhibitions in Poland and Europe..

What is the message of this controvercial piece? Jesus was crucified by people like us. We can do it again, if we like, at home.

We met this middle-aged man and a young couple. He asked the warden lady to open one restricted corridor and then elaborated on pics there.

And he told the young ones to appreciate the unusual colours of this painting:

Probably I have no artistic soul because the painting looked ordinary to me. :):):)

Also others they admired were normal to me:

In History of Wrocław museum I liked this tiled room
this china
this garden
and many others. The view of a guilotine blade was rather shocking - Germans used it to behead people in the prison in Nazi Wrocław.

I liked the cemetery of Red Army officers. Those tanks and the monument in the center are impressive.

Many old gravestones are broken

But the reconstruction is taking place

An old notice invites people to come to celebrate the mourning mass for those soldiers, with Roman Catholic, Orthodox and Greek Catholic clergy present. The sentence from the notice: We owe these soldiers are prayers!

I enjoyed finding the traces of war on some houses:

I liked the Gothic churches, although when looking at their groin vaults, one might have a difficulty in telling one from another.

However, the rest of decorations were different

TBC

Great pics pawian, they bring back some nice memories from the few years that I lived in wroclaw. I can't wait for the rest.

But I have almost finished the nice part, and the nasty impressions will follow. Are you sure you want it? :):):):)

Poland. The good and the bad.

Bring it on.

Take a look at these broken down graves. They're from the cemetary in Lublin.

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I did. In the Laws of Manu it stipulates that a Brahmin trading in lac loses his Brahmin status and I agree with this law because such commerce is indeed dirty.

Did you also notice that you couldn't find a single German grave in this former German city?

you can - unless you don't count Jews as German - mmw.pl/english/museum/cemetery.php

Well, why do Jews have their own cemeteries? And why do they still exist? ;)