Saturday in Krakow

On Saturday in Krakow, we had no agenda except to walk around and fall in love with this old city.  So we did!  Our pal Rick Steves has a pretty good self-guided walking tour of the old part of the city so we stuck to that for the morning.  The two "touristy" parts of Krakow are divided into two parts: the Old Town, surrounded by the Planty park where the old castles, towers, and churches are located; and Kazimierz, the old Jewish quarter named after the famous Polish king.  The city is entirely walkable (if you're sticking to these two areas) so we explored the Old Town throughout the day and headed to Kazimierz for a Solomon pub crawl and dinner.

Krakow has an enormous, bustling town square, reminiscent of Prague, with a couple of churches, a huge tower, and a large "market hall" that's been around for centuries.  Not to mention a gazillion restaurants and outdoor patios for having bevs and light bites for tourists.  

St. Mary's Church in the Main Market Square.  Not the original church built 800 years ago, but the same foundation.  The smaller tower belongs to the church and the bigger tower is a "municipal watchtower" where a bugler plays his bugle every hour.  According to legend, during a Tatar invaion, the watchman saw the enemy approaching and played his bugle - but before he could finish, he was shot.  So even to this day the bugler stops halfway through!

                                                   

The Cloth Hall, which has been around since the Middle Ages when people had to sell their stuff in the stalls inside.  The famous Kazimierz the Great turned it into a permanent fixture in the 14th century.  It's still a functioning market with lots of vendors selling stereotypical Polish goods inside - including lots of amber jewelry, which I guess they're known for.

More of the square with plenty of seating for tourists!

SPOTTED: a good looking guy in front of St. Mary's.

Town Hall Tower - all that remains of the town hall building in the 14th century.

A gigantic, hollow head that looks like it's been wrapped in cloth.  It was made by Igor Mitoraj for the train station but somehow ended up here.  Kinda weird in the middle of the square but...interesting.

Up next: St. Francis' Basilica - Pope John Paul II's home church when he was the archbishop here.  We accidently entered the wrong door and wound up in the desserted hall filled with old religious paintings.  It was dark and quiet and creepy and then Drew left and I was alone and I was unsettled with Jesus and Mary and the Pope all looking at me.

There was a lot of cool stained glass inside, including this God the Father Let It Be window.  The colors change from yellows and oranges to blues depending on the light.  The artist was inspired by ol' Michelangelo's vision of God in the Sistine Chapel.  I think this is probably what God looks like though.

At the pew in the back, under this God the Father window, is Pope JPII's favorite place to pray, marked with a little plaque.

Across the street from the church is the Archbishop's Place,  JPII's residence when he was here.  He also stayed here when he was in town on official Pope duties.  His picture is above the door and evidently this place was PACKED right after he died.

The Church of Saints Peter and Paul.  The statues feature JC and Mary and all his cronies, minus Judas who doesn't deserve a mention.

St. Andrew's Church.
Did I mention Krakow is also called Little Rome because of it's ridiculous amount of churches per capita?

At the end of Rick Steves' walking tour, Wawel Hill towers above the old town.  It's evidently a symbol of Polish royalty and independence, "sacred" to every Polish person.  A/the castle has stood there since the beginning of Polish recorded history and it's the most visited sight in the country!

Drew and Pope JPII.  Because he's here too.  He's EVERYWHERE!

The "National Cathedral" of Poland is here too - it holds the tombs of nearly all of Poland's important rulers and figures.  And it's also really unique cause there were all these additions added on the outside in different time periods, representing Gothic, Romanesque, Baroque, Renaissance, and Neoclassical architecture!

All these little chapels on the outside don't match!  But still look cool.

Pic with the cathedral, overlooking the Vistula River.

There's also this Renaissance style inner courtyard inspired by Florence!  Cooool.  It used to have private apartments for the king.  And then a Nazi governor of Poland, Hans Frank, used to live here.  Bastard.

The Planty, the gorgeous tree-filled park running around the old part of town.

Hungry for lunch?  Ok!  Lody (ice cream in Polish) it is!!

Me too me too.

Oh, and some jelly-filled donuts cause they're known for these!

Help me Ronda.

The last stop on our tour was the Jagiellonian University Museum - the second oldest university in Central Europe (1364), with famous grads like Copernicus and Mr. Pope.  Profs used to be like monks and lived and ate and slept here and devoted their lives to study.  The offer a short tour and you get to see some cool old artifacts and tributes to their famous alums.

I liked blue sky ceiling.

Copernicus there in the middle.

The Treasury!

This is Andrzej Wajda's Oscar.  Some filmmaker that I don't know.  But seeing a real life Oscar was neat!

Some astronomical instruments.

The assembly hall?  With a huge pic of the Pope again.

Dining hall with cool spiraly staircase.

After a long day of touring the city, we jetted over to the Jewish Quarter for some beers and fun bars and food.  Woohoo!

I can't pronounce it.  But it was refreshing and delish at Alchemia.
Other bar recommendations in this cool area: Singer (where all the tables are Singer sewing machines) and Mleskana!

Bars bars bars.

Late night: Endzior pizzas that are evidently famous here.  We didn't know what the hell we were ordering so we just pointed at something and hoped it was good.  It was.

This is just a pic of the Soviet-era tram system that still runs around town.

Busy day!  And after rereading everything, this might officially be the most boring blog post I've posted.  Sorry for all the history.  I'm mostly doing it for my parents and brother but I guess it's not a bad thing to soak up some of it too!  Anyway...goodnight!