I originally wrote most of this on the 11th, but then I got sick so I'm only just posting it. I just got back
from a lovely week in Poland and thought I would share what's great about it. It might not be your
first thought when choosing a place to visit but it has more to offer than you might think. Not all of these
photos are from the past week, it's a mix of every visit starting in 2016.
Lodz has a lot of commissioned street art.Some of them are quite big.Fun fact: "Lodz" means "Boat" but the city has no rivers or lakes and is not
near the sea.
Surindustrialle is my favourite tea room in Lodz. This was taken outside its
old premises. They have a lot of handmade things inside and out, have helpful staff, tasty tea, games, and
is LGBT-friendly (which unfortunately is not always the case in Poland)
Taken in Herbst Palace, Lodz.On a less cheery note, Lodz's central location made it important for the Nazis
in WWII and Radegast
train station was used to transport holocaust victims around the country. The train car you see there is one
such used and you can stand inside it. The only difference is when you stand inside it you have room to move
and breathe, the victims not so much.Taken in Arkadia, a park near Lodz. I really liked it here, lots of good
photography opportunities.Nieborow Palace, close by to Arkadia. I don't have a picture but the inside is
tiled.. everywhere. Tile crazy.Taken in the garden of Nieborow palaceAnother from the palace gardensTaken from a reconstructed traditional Polish village which showed life in the
early 1900s, pre-war. These houses are divided into two rooms, one on each side. During the war German
soldiers would occupy half and the family would take the other half.
Taken from the same village, a traditional church.Taken November 11th, 2018 in Lodz. Lights were projected down the street
celebrating 100 years of
Polish independence.Torun is famous for the teutonic knights, this was a festival with knights
marching down the
streets.The teutonic knights' castle. And a tree.Oscypek, a traditional smoked cheese with cranberry sauce.Warsaw was basically flattened during the war, so the old town was rebuilt
using as much of the original material as they could.
Janusz Korczak was a Jewish teacher & author at an orphanage during the
holocaust. He was offered sanctuary on the "Aryan side" of the city but refused to abandon the children.
Instead, when the German soldiers came to take the children to an extermination camp he went with them.
Poznan, a beautiful city with this multi-coloured town square.This is a monument to the victims of the 1956 Poznan protests who were killed
protesting the communist regime. The other years you see are 1968, 1970, 1976, 1980 and 1981 which refer to
other years with protests/riots.Bunnies! Poznan zoo. I don't have a picture of it, but also in this zoo a duck
was laid down looking very uncomfortable, which concerned us. Then it did a massive projectile shit, got up,
and walked away.
Poland has a wonderful culture, amazing food, a rich history, and is quite affordable. I also found the public
transport in cities to be incredible, far better than what the UK offers. An approximately 100km train journey
cost us £6 per person so it's really easy to visit multiple cities in one trip. We also got a day ticket
(literally 24 hours) in Warsaw which worked on the trams, buses, and underground metro, and was a whopping £3
per person. I don't think we ever had to wait longer than 5 minutes at a stop because they run so regularly.
Oh, and on a final note - Poland has the best kebabs. That's just a fact.
