On to another city- Kraków, Poland!

Week 8: Class trip to Kraków, Poland

Another country has been added to the list! This weekend we made a class trip to the great city of Kraków, Poland. Although we had a very shot time there, I enjoyed every minute. It was fun to dive into another culture and explore new places. While we were there, we noticed that their language is very similar to Czech, which I found very interesting. However, like in most cities, everyone can speak English so we never really ran into any communication problems. When we first arrived we visited the amazing salt mines. Our trip to Krakow also included seeing the beautiful city center, markets, churches, and the castle of Kraków. We also were able to check out the popular nightlife there, and lastly we ended the weekend with a trip to Schindler's Factory. 

The Wieliczka Salt Mine was such a sight to see! After waking down 800+ steps we made it to the cool mines. We were told that as tall as the Eiffel Tower is, that is how far deep we were under the ground. The tour was so fascinating as we explored many chambers and tunnels of this enormous mine. It felt like we were walking around everywhere and that we had covered the entire size of the mine, until we were told that we had only covered 1% of the entire mine. Crazy! The chambers were enormous! On the tourist route there was many status and exhibits that were massive and extravagant- and of course all of it was made out of salt! One of the big chambers also included a sanctuary, which was so beautiful!! Every Sunday a mass is held there and there are also many weddings there too. The carvings on the walls looked like paintings and the chandlers were all made out of salt crystals. Our guide was told us about all of the different salts and of course we all licked the walls to try the salt! It was a blast at the salt mines! 

Inside the salt mine

Some carvings in the walls of the salt mines.

That night we checked into our hostel and had an amazing Polish dinner and then we decided to go on a pub-crawl. Kraków is pretty famous for their nightlife and for their special Zubrowka vodka. It was fun to go and hang out with our whole Nebraska group! The next day we made our way to the treasury and castle. Both were very beautiful! Then we were set free to explore the city on our own. We tried many different foods from the stands and also wandered through all of the great markets. Poland is very cheap!! So it was nice to look at all of their jewelry, pottery, and handcrafted items at these markets, and also to get some souvenirs. We also made our way to the vintage markets in the Jewish ghetto! 

Delicious Polish Pierogies!

Along the way we stopped inside many grand churches and were in awe of their beauty. Another cultural difference from the Czech Republic is their religion here. In Poland they are very devote Catholics and about 90% of their population is Catholic. This is very different from the Czech Republic since it is one of the least religious countries in the entire world. So when stopping in these amazing churches, we found them packed full of people praying. Many times when we visit churches in the Czech Republic they are either practically empty or there are tourist just coming inside to look at the beauty and history of the church. It was a nice and refreshing scene to see churches in Poland actually being used for its purpose by so many people.

Inside St. Mary's Basilica 

The last day we were in Kraków, we made our way to Schindler's Factory. What a powerful place. Oskar Schindler was a Nazi solider who saved over 1,200 lives by having Jews work for him in a factory. He protected his workers by convincing commanders to have these people work in his factory rather than being sent to death camps and concentration camps. At the factory, our guide did an amazing job of making us feel as though we were being taken back in time to relieve the history, and looking at WWII in different perspective than I have ever imagined it before. Similar to Auschwitz, it is hard to find the right words to fully explain it. I could never imagine living though something like that. It is so important to be able to learn about such terrible times in history so that they will not repeat themselves. It was a great experience to be able see and learn about such a historical event.

Inside Schindler's Factory. These are pots that were made by the Jews that worked at this factory. 

All of the names of the people who Schindler saved. 

Kraków, Poland made for a good weekend! It was full of fun times, great people, amazing food, nice sights, cheap prices, and important history.