Thursday May 21….Drive to KRAKOW ….written on Friday morning.

We were packed and were on the way by 8:15. Today is a holiday in Berlin (Ascension Day) so the traffic was light. To our surprise the highway was new most of the way to Krakow, so David was able to drive fast…97 on cruise control. However, as soon as we reached the Polish border at 9:30, things changed. We bumped along on very rough roads for an hour but as I said, surprisingly the roads were new the rest of the day. Along the way Jeff entertained us with more Fun Facts and included a Polish language lesson. We did not do very well. We came up with Jac Samash…for “how are you”.

We encountered our first Polish joke, just 12 miles outside of our lunch stop, Wroclaw….”How do you set up a Polish Construction Project”? Well, first you squeeze all the traffic to one lane on the left which brings you to a complete stop, then you allow the traffic to flow in two lanes for about 10 meters, and then you squeeze all the traffic to the right which of course causes another complete stop. This costs us about 45 minutes but we laughed over their ingenuity.

We thought Wroclaw was beautiful. Fortunately we were able to park in the luxurious Sofitel hotel (French) parking garage, use their facilities (which were free…most places we pay $.50) and only walk a short distance to the very large square. There were a lot of restaurants around the square but we did notice there were very few souvenir shops, much to Joy’s chagrin. We picked the Town Hall restaurant and fortunately we had looked at pictures of Polish food in our guide book that morning so we had some idea what to order and the menu was in English. David had Zurek soup in a bread bowl, which had mushrooms, white sausage and hard boiled eggs in it along with a huge order of fries! They are big on hard boiled eggs, I’ve noticed. Jeff braved the goulash and had a Bigos…not sure what that was…cabbage, meat, and mushrooms all mixed together. Joy choose the Pierogi that was delicious. It was ravioli stuffed with meat (who knows what kind) sauerkraut and mushrooms. We were shocked that we got ice with our drinks without even asking. Naturally, Mary had a large grilled salad with lots of vegetables.

After lunch, we walked around the Old Town Square admiring the Dutch Golden Age architectural style buildings. We stopped to go inside two of the churches (now we are in Catholic territory), the church of Mary Magdalene and church of Saint Elizabeth, which had a bust of the pope as he had spoken here. Took lots of pictures and returned to the car for our 2 ½ hr. trip to Krakow. This was a toll road, paid to get on, and paid to get off, and because of more construction we did not arrive at our hotel until after 6PM. This was the one hotel choice which David was nervous about as the town is full of tourists and he had trouble even getting us a hotel. And nervous he was when he saw the small room, small double bed and small everything that he and Jeff were to share! Mary and I made out fine, except that the bed is almost on the floor…but quaint it is and typical Polish located in a residual neighborhood and a 10 minute walk to the square.

Poland is a very poor country, being under Communists rule for so long they are still struggling to repair the country. With only 10 yrs of Capitalism experience they are still learning “:how to do”. The legal age to drink in Poland is 16, 18 to drive and fight in the war and 14 for sex…interesting, don’t you think?

We picked a restaurant where David had been before that had good ole American food that he yearned for after driving all day. It was like a TGI Fridays. We enjoyed sitting outside and people watching as it took forever to get our food etc. There are so many young people around and not many white hairs. The meal was wonderful and because David does not speak any Polish, we ended up with 8 orders of French Fries when we only ordered 1...that was a hoot! The Polish money is called Zolty and fortunately David pays, and Jeff keeps the accounting. Mary and I just trust. When we returned to our hotel it was close to midnight and we fell into our little bed. Happily we discovered they offer free internet, however the signal is so weak in our room we hope to send this from the lobby downstairs. I am still in the dark as to who won American Idol and it is driving me nuts! Off to tour the city today on foot after hopefully sending this to you. Free breakfast in the hotel restaurant….

The pictures of us are in Warclaw, having lunch, David in front of ING bank, where he works in Amsterdam, Mary in the square with flowers, and the Days in the square in Wroclaw.

The other two pictures of the buildings alone were taken in the square in Krakow.