Saturday, July 21
No, that’s not a typo – that’s how you spell Warsaw in Polish. It’s pronounced “VAR-shav-a”. We took the morning train from Krakow for the 2.5 hour trip. If you discount the unruly children it was a short and pleasant ride. We took a cab from the train station to our new residence but in our excitement forgot to inquire about the cost before getting into the cab. You guessed it, we got ripped off. We paid almost $25.00 for the ten minute ride to the house. Nine months of traveling can make you complacent. Lesson learned.
Our host met us promptly and showed us around the apartment. Our plan was to go out and do some exploring before meeting the free tour in the Old Town Square at 4:00 pm. We are only going to be in Warsaw for six days and need to make the most of our opportunities.
Like Dresden, Warsaw was virtually destroyed during World War II. The entire city has been rebuilt. The reconstruction of Old Town was actually based on some paintings that were done in the 19th century. Today it looks almost exactly as it did before the destruction. The area is charming with a royal palace, many churches and several large squares. One of the streets, named the Royal Road, stretches all the way from Krakow to Warsaw. Like most of Old Town it’s lined with shops, restaurants and tourist attractions.
The tour started at the column of King Sigismund III Vasa. He was the king that moved the capital from Krakow to Warsaw in 1596. Even today he is reviled by the people of Krakow and revered by the people of Warsaw. The two cities have a friendly rivalry over just about everything. We were told about the history of several of the larger churches before we entered the palace grounds to get a good look at the famous clock tower. Once a day, at noon, a trumpeter plays a tune to announce the time. If you recall a trumpeter announced the time hourly in Krakow – the guide said that this wasn’t necessary in Warsaw because the people had better watches.
(Old Town Square)
The tour continued through the town where we saw a bridge that crossed the Vistula River and several market squares that were important places of commerce in the Middle Ages. Finally he recommended several restaurants that served authentic Polish cuisine at reasonable prices. It was a great way to learn about the city and get our bearings in our new surroundings.
After the tour we headed to a restaurant that was outside the old city walls. It was one of the places that the guide had recommended. We ordered a plate of pierogi, sour rye soup and a potato pancake. Everything was homemade. The pierogi was served with sour cream and were very good. The sour rye soup, a Polish specially, was rather bland and did not have a strong rye flavor. It tasted mainly from bacon. The potato pancake, however, was unbelievably good. It was thin and crispy and made with a lot of onions (it was probably fried in lard). It was served with sour cream and horseradish sauce. It turns out that horseradish sauce on potato pancakes is awesome.
Nearby we found a chocolate shop called, “Wedel”. It’s a Polish chocolate made in a factory in Warsaw. We bought a 1/2 pound milk chocolate bar for less than $4.00. The chocolate itself was nothing special. The shop gave us a number of coupons for some of their other products. We intend to try some of them including their European style Hot Chocolate.
Distance walked: 8.4 miles
Sunday, July 22
We got an early start and headed over to the All Saints Church where we would be meeting a group for the free tour of the Jewish Quarter. The Jewish Quarter in Warsaw was huge. Before World War II there were over 350,000 Jews in the city. This tour was scheduled to be 2.5 hours long and was to cover several miles.
We sat on the front steps of the church while our guide gave us a general overview of the history of the Jewish population in Warsaw. In the late Middle Ages Warsaw was an unremarkable town with an agrarian economy. The King saw that other cities were getting rich from trade and so invited Jews to the city to help stimulate the economy. He promised them freedom of religion, that they could have any lands that they settled and empowered them to lend money. For many years things worked out well for Warsaw and the Jews and everyone prospered. When word got out that good things were happening in Warsaw even more Jews migrated to the city. Later, in 1795, when Poland was divided between Russia, Prussia and Austria many more Russian Jews migrated to Warsaw to escape persecution.
The tour moved over to one of the few remaining synagogues in the city. It had survived WWII because the German’s used it as a stable. We continued along and found one of the few remaining pieces of the ghetto wall. That part of the wall had been part of a stone fence around a brewery. Several ruined apartment buildings that had stood inside the ghetto were across the street. Today there are markers embedded in the sidewalks all around Town where the ghetto walls used to stand.
Eventually we talked about the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising from 1943. After the uprising was quelled the Germans sealed the remaining Jews in the ghetto and set fire to the area. All of the buildings were turned to ashes and all of the people died. The tour ended by POLIN (The Museum of the History of Polish Jews). There are some beautiful sculptures out front commemorating the uprising.
(Plaques Indicating the Ghetto Wall)
For lunch we went to a Milk Bar. Milk Bars were started in 1896 but came to prominence during the Communist period. They were originally intended as an inexpensive place where people could get a nourishing meal. They went bankrupt after the fall of Communism but have been re-instituted by the government to support poorer members of society. Today, they are popular with tourists and often serve meat as well as dairy products.
The problem with milk bars is that the menu is only in Polish and the attendants rarely speak any English. Somehow we managed to order a plate of meat pierogi, a plate of blueberry pierogi (these were supposed to be cheese) and a bowl of cabbage soup (we were trying for Lithuanian borscht). The food wasn’t what you’d call high quality. The total cost was about $4.00.
Fully fortified we set out to see some of the museums that were free on Sunday. First we went to the Chopin Museum. Frédéric Chopin was born in Warsaw. He completed his education there before moving to Paris at the age of 20. He never visited Poland again. Many of his works were inspired by Polish folk music. He was friends with many of the most famous musicians of his time including Liszt and Schumann. He was in poor health most of his life and died at the age of 39. After his death his sister brought his heart back to Warsaw where it rests in a bottle of brandy at the Church of the Holy Cross (we had been under the impression that it was in Krakow).
(Chopin’s Piano)
The museum is housed in a former mansion. It contains information and artifacts about his life. Several of his pianos were on display as well as personal correspondence. It’s a very modern facility with touch screens, interactive exhibits and places where you can listen to recordings of all of his music.
Then we were off to the Warsaw Uprising Museum. Not to be confused with the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943 this museum was about the uprising of 1944 where the Poles revolted against their German occupiers. The Poles had been planning a revolt for some time and were looking for a good opportunity to spring into action. In August, 1944 the war was going badly for the Germans and the Soviet army had arrived in Warsaw on the Eastern side of the Vistula River. The Poles thought that if they engaged the Germans that the Soviets would come to their aid. The unsuccessful uprising lasted 63 days. No help from the Soviets or any other source materialized. In retaliation the Germans deported the entire population of the city to concentration camps and destroyed the city. Upwards of 90% of the portions to the West of the river were blown up. About 20% of the Praga district on the East side of the river was leveled.
The museum, which is a very popular site here in Town, was full of information on the conditions leading up to the uprising. The heroic deeds of many of the participants were recounted and there were films narrated by some of the survivors. A large cache of uniforms, weapons and medals were on display. All exhibits were labeled in Polish and in English.
Distance walked: 12.7 miles