As a natural stop after exploring Thailand and Laos, I flew directly to Poland. Wait…you haven’t heard of the popular Thailand-Laos-Poland tourist route? So many people were doing it that they even have a Bangkok to Warsaw express flight! (This is all a lie, unless you consider a 20+ hour sojourn, via Dubai and Warsaw, an express flight. And, no bother to me, it’s not like my time is a huge commodity these days!)
Anyways, once I had resigned myself to the epic journey, it was all good and I even added three hours onto my travel time by voluntarily being bumped from the last leg for 250 euros (and given to me in cash money at the gate!). With lounge access via Priority Pass, three hours didn’t seem that long to wait and I even got to see a beautiful sunset from the lounge. Proof positive for going with the moment!
So, let’s back it up, why exactly was I headed to Poland you may be wondering….let me tell you! My most wonderful Dad (also known as Mark) retired last year and had been wanting to do some traveling. With the world as his oyster, and out of all the beautiful (and warm!) places in the world to explore during the month of November…Mark chose Poland. Course he did. Maybe not my first choice but he’s a bit of a history nerd and has a thing for eastern Europe. And, as timing would have it, I could “swing by” on my way back to the U.S. and join him for the second part of his trip. Who doesn’t love a good father-daughter junket in eastern Europe?
Mark had been to Krakow solo and we were meeting in Warsaw, the second stop on his itinerary. I was a little bummed to miss Krakow as I heard great things about it from my Dad and others. It amazingly was spared from the horrible bombing the country has endured over the years so it’s the only remaining old city in the country. And, touring Auschwitz would be incredibly powerful to see. Here’s a few of Mark’s pics of what I missed:
Alas, Krakow was not in the cards this time around (I know, I know, nobody feels bad for me, had to miss Krakow for Laos). After finally landing in Warsaw I met my Dad at our accommodations, the H12 Boutique Hotel. So, my dad had initially booked another hotel but switched after this hotel offered me a nice discount to stay there, because I’m such a big-time blogger and all (far from true but I have been getting more traction with the whole Teha’s Travels thing). I’m not a fan of blogger’s getting free stuff as I feel like I never know if I can trust what they’re saying. And I know some bloggers will directly accept free stuff in exchange for a positive review. That just seems wrong and I’ve declined any offers of this nature. In this case, however, the hotel explicitly said as part of their policy they don’t ask anything in exchange for the discount and they hoped I had a nice stay. Well, how could I say no to that? I told Mark, who of course wanted in on the deal. Somehow I didn’t think his 41 Instagram followers would warrant any type of a hotel discount, so I responded to the offer and asked if my dad could have it too, and he would need it for two more nights than me…and they said yes!
We both got these amazing upgraded suites and I’m pretty sure mine was bigger than my apartment. My unbiased review is that this place is incredible and I highly recommend it. [Although with the significant caveat I don’t know what the price would have been for the suites we had and a room within my budget may have been very different. Just want to be completely transparent on this!] The hotel is modern, bright, spacious, and it has character (as well as a delicious breakfast). Our suites also had a huge bathroom and even a kitchen area (get this, Mark had TWO bathrooms in his suite, although he didn’t discover the second one until the third day! Hahaha!).
Mark and me spent two days exploring Warsaw together (it was unclear what Mark was doing for two days in the city before I arrived but based on what I saw my guess is lots of wandering around looking at a paper map). We kicked things off with a free walking tour of the Old Town area and I won’t bore you with the full story of how we found the starting point of the tour (CliffsNotes version: Mark said he knew exactly how to get there. “I was just in that square yesterday!” He did not, it turns out know how to get there. Cue the first of many times Google Maps saves the day in Poland!). So, the Old Town is inside of the ancient City Walls and was meticulously rebuilt after complete devastation during WWII. It’s very quaint and features a huge square that was just starting to be decorated for the holidays- I wish I’d seen it in it’s full holiday regalia. So, I admit not being in full form during this initial walking tour…the jet lag was in full effect following my never-ending journey to get there.
I do recall it was a beautiful city and that the guide gave us our lunch recommendation for that day, a Milk Bar. In fact not just ANY Milk Bar, the very FIRST Milk Bar in the country, established in 1896. (Later we also learned that the Dali Lama himself has eaten there! Practically one degree of separation there). We’d never heard of them before but apparently Milk Bars are common in Poland. They were started post WWI when Poland was working to regain it’s independence and they were popular as cheap (and government subsidized) eating establishments and they gained prominence during the economic depression of the 1930s. Most of the old Milk Bars have transitioned to regular restaurants over time but a few remain, as relics of the welfare state and to support the poor. And while they do serve milk, they are not, in fact, bars that serves alcohol. Apparently we were the only members of the tour group who heeded the recommendation from the tour guide (I can see why other’s didn’t, he didn’t exactly sell it with his description…especially the part where he said they don’t speak ANY English). Alas, Mark and me (Note to my grandmother, Nan- I know “Mark and me” is grammatically incorrect, I just like the ring to it) were not deterred. And it turns out that our guide was not exaggerating. There just a few locals inside and we walked to the counter, staring blankly at the menu on the wall….completely in Polish. No pictures, no translations. Mark took the easy way out and ordered pierogies, the dish our guide had specifically mentioned as an offering. (He totally cheated). I somehow translated what soup was and as I tried to order I felt a twinge of empathy for Elaine in the Soup Nazi episode of Seinfeld. This lady was all business, not dealing with any type of question or hesitation, and barking responses in what sounded like a hybrid of Polish and Russian. I honestly had no idea what I’d ordered but it was tomato soup with a few noodles, kind of like Chef Boyardee. I enjoyed our inaugural milk bar experience and as we left Mark had the hankering to take a photo of me with the Oh-so-kind lady at the register. I advised him that this likely would not go well, but he was not deterred. I was glad I thought to film the request, though, as watching the “NIET!” reaction to the request and my dad push it and eventually scamper away is something I haven’t gotten sick of watching.
That afternoon we explored the streets and spent a while in the Warsaw City museum, which is built into five townhouses on the main square. We started by weaving through the many rooms and meticulously stopping at each numbered item to hear the corresponding audio narrative on our headsets. Neither of us realized that there are multiple floors to the museum, however, and thought we must be just about done as we concluded the first floor…only to see there were 4 more to go. That kind of overwhelmed me and I glanced at a few more displays before heading directly to the highest level, which had beautiful views of the square.
So, one of the reasons Mark and me make such a crack travel team is that we’re on the same page about things like this. We both thought the museum was interesting but, more the 90-minutes kind of interesting, not the 5-floor kind of interesting. We made our way back to the H12 (cue Google maps, although Mark liked to take his paper map out for effect and act like he had some clue where we were), stopping to snap a few nighttime pics along the way.
We took a nap/tea/email break from each other in our respective ginormous hotel rooms before meeting up for dinner. I was the self-proclaimed VP of Food & Beverage in our operation and this arrangement worked out quite well, and especially as Mark frequently footed the bill for the meal (it was the least he could do, if left to his own devices who know where he could have ended up!). That evening we arrived at the place I selected and were told they were full. This turned out to be the first of several times the place I chose was busy and required reservations and we had not made one (reservation booking is not within the job description of the VP Food & Bev, btw). Yet, as Mark & me luck would have it, each time the restaurant managed to find a perfect table for us! We had some fabulous culinary experiences, and to think I had gone in with some low-ish expectations for the food in Poland (especially coming from yummy Thai food!).
We made the most of our final half-day in Warsaw by museum hopping, first hitting the hitting up the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, which had come recommended. It had won the award for the best museum in Europe, which I thought was maybe a puff award but the museum was reeally good! I highly recommend if you’re in Warsaw. We had a train to catch and only had 90 minutes in the museum, but this time I would have loved the extra time. I had naively not understood the magnitude of the devastation to the Jewish population in Poland in WWII was horrified to learn that 90% of Polish Jews were driven out or killed. It’s just unimaginable.
Not a lot of down-time in our agenda and we grabbed our bags and headed to the train station to grab a quick lunch before our train to Gdansk. In reflecting on our time in Warsaw we both agreed we could have done with another day or two (still unclear what Mark was doing there for two days before I arrived). I like to leave a city wanting more and was quite happy boarding the train that would take us to the coastal city of Gdansk.
Now, I’ve ridden a lot of different trains in my travels and have learned that in Europe they are usually pretty good. And that in most cases the additional cost for First Class accommodations doesn’t bring a lot of added value. Well, Mark had booked these train tickets and, in uncharacteristic baller fashion, had mentioned several times that we would be going “First Class.” I didn’t expect much of a difference from Coach but it turned out the Polish train system has a different idea of First class. We had our own little car, with two sets of three seats, facing each other. It was like a capsule and had a light you could turn on or off (Mark liked it off) and with a black curtain you could pull if you wanted privacy (we left the curtain open). Mark was happy as a clam with this “private car” (as he called it) whereas I had the opposite reaction and found it a little odd to be in a dark capsule within the train. And the curtains freaked me out…I couldn’t help wondering why people would need complete privacy during a two hour train ride? What were they doing in there??) Here’s Mark doing baller things in his “private car.”
Despite our different First Class experience, we made it to Gdansk and took in our first glimpses of the beautiful city at night.
We kicked things off in true Poland style with a free walking tour (love myself a good free walking tour and the company we used in both Warsaw and Gdansk was great!) This one was deemed the “Solidarity tour,” which Mark & me rebranded it as the Commie tour. Turns out that Gdansk (which is the fifth largest city in Poland) was critical in the fall of communism and the tour picked up after WWII, which left the city in complete ruins and with a completely replaced population. Cue the new communist Poland, overseen by good ole Russia and I hadn’t realized that this lasted well into the 80’s. And Gdansk was important because of it’s critical role in the ship-building program and was also known for being a hot-bed of protests against communist oppression. In 1970, 46 shipyard workers were killed a week before Christmas, in response to their protests against unfair (the really bad kinda unfair) working conditions. Protests escalated again in 1980, following years of oppression and rising food prices, and by now the movement was more coordinated with 17,000 workers banding together in protest. The result was the and successful formation of the Solidarity union. The Russians didn’t like this too much and enforced a system of martial law for a few years, which sounded like it was pretty horrible. The Solidarity union quickly turned into a movement with 1/3 of Poland’s residents joining and after years of conflict, in 1989 was successful in pressuring the government into talks which led to the end of communism in the country.
It blew my mind that this was happening as late as 1989…I don’t think it even had time to make it into my history books at school. It was also clearly a difficult topic for people to talk about, as it was so recent, and our guide showed glimpses of emotion as she recounted the conditions.
After saving for years, she recalled when her father had scraped together enough money for a Fiat, but then had to wait four years for one to be available, with no idea what the timeline would be. There was no choice on color and they were relieved when he came home with blue and not pink.
We delved deeper into the history of Gdansk during another tour, this one of the Main Town area and we learned that Nazi Germany’s attack on Gdansk in 1939 officially marked the start of WWII. And then the beautiful, previously thriving port city was bombed into oblivion by the Germans and Russians, like complete oblivion. Here’s the aftermath-
Talk about a resilient city to have come back the way they have following the WWII stuff AND the Commie stuff. When it rains it pours indeed. The city was rebuilt in the 1960s and while they wanted to restore the old beauty they did NOT want to show any German influence so they went for a Dutch look instead. And since they didn’t have any original brick to use in the rebuilding they went to a nearby city and helped themselves to their bricks…. That’s right, they just took apart a city and stole their bricks! The guide didn’t seem to feel too bad about it and said something along the lines of “they rebuilt eventually so all’s well that ends well!” And they did a nice job rebuilding so maybe she’s right.
[Not sure what Mark is doing in that last one but it was the only one of the bunch where his head isn’t totally blocking the beautiful sunset I was trying to capture.]
So, I actually didn’t get to participate in the entire Main Town tour, as there was a disruption that resulted in my losing the tour group for a period of time. That disruption is named Mark. As our tour group made our way up one of the remaining historic cobblestone streets of Gdansk listening to the guide, Mark got distracted by a shopkeeper with a display case of amber jewelry on the sidewalk. He had mentioned wanting to get my mom an amber piece, which was very thoughtful of him. However, it would have been more thoughtful if he had chosen to do this AFTER the walking tour. Not DURING the walking tour.
I tried (very hard) to ignore him but he was standing so close to the group that the guide had to speak over his conversation (which was very focused on the nuances of the amber stone…trust me I could hear it all). I had a feeling the conversation would end with him asking me to help him and I tried to burrow myself out of sight in the middle of the group. No dice…he spotted me. I looked sheepish as I slinked away from the group to participate in the distraction. As I “helped” Mark choose a necklace for my mother, the group meandered up the street, continuing the tour. A few minutes later I scampered after them while Mark was paying for the necklace….except which way did they go? It was a good thirty minutes before I tracked them down and there was Mark, listening intently to the guide explain the old post office landmark. Somehow he had linked up with the group right away and barely missed any of the tour. Still unclear if he would have noticed I was even missing if I hadn’t texted him.
Over a Milk Bar lunch with a fellow walking tour friend we learned of other things to do around Gdansk and one day we headed north to the town of Gdynia where we hiked along the cliffs overlooking the Baltic Sea.
We were very proud of ourselves for somehow figuring out the train system to get there and back. Although if we’d been relying only on Mark’s map for this expedition, we would have been in big trouble. Google Maps even helped me figure out the hiking trail! We also enjoyed some great meals in Gdansk and enjoyed competing in a daily “breakfast challenge” via my Instagram story (@tehastravels). Although I think my friends liked to vote for Mark’s breakfast just to give me a hard time. I mean, crepe, syrup and herring all together on a plate?? There is just no way.
I honestly wasn’t sure what I’d think of Poland and I really loved it. I found the country rich with history, beauty, and culture, in addition to oozing with character and having a refreshing “real-ness” about it. And, as I was there World War II came alive for me in a way it hadn’t before, in a way you can’t really convey in a history book or even a movie. All in all, I have to say that Mark & Me was a fantastic adventure and I have to give Mark credit for choosing Poland. [Let it be noted that I still refuse to compliment his breakfast selections, navigational skills, or amber shopping timing.]