With the rain coming down we leave the camp but checked the toilet/water dump from last nite to check for floaters but all ok. It is a 2-3 hour trip so not too far and careful in the rain. We found the camp quite easily which is new and sort of part of the Hotel complex. It was still raining so quickly set up after checking and watching a wedding reception going in for their celebrations. We are pretty much the only ones here. I have checked out the bar so am going to see if polish tv has the rugby on as unfortunately the van reception is nil. I made a green Thai curry but got a bit heavy handed so quite hot which Vicki can’t handle so now I am cooking extra veges and adding coconut milk to ‘cool’ it down. Now we have enough for 3 nites. I walk over to see if the game is on at 6pm but only volleyball but have a beer anyway. Then back to the van for tea and a beer. Then at 9pm back to the bar and see if the other game is on but no luck but what the heck better have another quality Polish beer and had a nice chat to the young bar lady. She is studying Theology so quite fascinating trying to find out what job comes at the end of study. Vicki is still sick so a quiet nite for her.
Next morning the weather was sunny and reasonably warm so started walking the 3ks into Krakow but a little bit down the road we went back and got the bikes as it is much quicker but until you start walking it is hard to judge if biking is feasible. Oh for bikeways like Belgium & Holland where bike is king. However the bike lane here quite quickly went down to the Danube for a picturesque ride into the city. We locked up the bikes, again not bike friendly, very little racks. We wandered the streets but priority was an ATM and a place to get a sim card as our first Polish one only lasted 5 days and it ran out while we were in Czech rep. We had to go to the new shopping plaza which is so out of place in the old town. We got what we wanted and did some exploring of this old town which is similar to the others but has a green park surrounding the whole city which is quite unique. Around 2.30 we sussed out a bar that had the rugby on(you can see a pattern here of my priorities) and though the Wallaby game was on it was the next game we were going to watch. Trouble was it was live streamed so not a great picture. We walked around a bit more and sat in the square in the sun and I had a Polish sausage & beer and Vicki had a hot mulled wine. We started to chat to a Polish lady(her grandmother survived the war as even though she was on the list to go to the camps the grandfather, being a cobbler, persuaded the person to take her off the list in exchange for making shoes for them as of course they were in very short supply. Such a fine line between life & death) and asked her a few questions about what we should see and she recommended Zakopane which is south nestled under the Tatra Mountains and is meant to be very stunning with lots of walks and sightseeing. We were not sure whether to take the van or bus or train for a day trip so had to do some research. We said our goodbyes and made our way back to the bar but did stop on the way to see some very clever young men busking a great break dance and singing routine which was entertaining. We got to the bar but they had moved the game to the back room tv where a bunch of Scots and one pom were watching. The picture was really poor so everybody decided to do to the English Football pub down the road for the second half. We were invited along so went into this amazing underground cellar like catacombs with about 6 rooms for different viewing. We ended up watching the first half again as they couldn’t find the 2nd half live on the telly then found out there was no 2nd half for that channel. What a balls up but we had a great time chatting to the guys. They were over on a bucks nite as one of the guys was marrying a German. The poor pommy was getting hell from the Scots for losing to Wales so of course we were digging in that the Aussies will beat them as well and they will be out of the cup. We could have stayed longer but they were going for pizza and Vicki has a long memory regarding the last time I started drinking with Brits in Riga so prudent that we left. It was getting a bit dark so went home and had an early nite as we had to be up early the next morning to be collected to go to Auschwitz & Birkenau for our tour. Not sure what to expect tomorrow but sort of looking forward to it but how can you ‘look forward’ to something as horrible as this.
We were collected on time, 20 of us in a minibus for the 1/1/2 hour trip to first Auschwitz then a short drive to Birkenau. We had only just got underway when the guy (about 35-40) next to Vicki (they were in the back row) said to the chap next to me one row ahead that he was going to be sick and pass him a bag! The guy next to me who happened to be his dad sort of ignored him so he asked again then took some food and fruit out of a plastic back and proceeded to vomit into the bag, Great way to start the day, needless to say dad was not impressed. I ended up getting the bus driver to stop and the guy ended up sitting with the driver up the front. He blamed it on being bounced around in the back but I get the feeling it was alcohol related from the nite before as dad was not impressed.
We parked at Auschwitz amongst other vans and buses and met our guide. It is all pretty rushed as there are lots of groups all having to follow each other in sequence so they can’t stuff around. Well Murphy’s law stepped in and they wouldn’t let Vicki’s bag through. They do advise you that you can only take a small bag 30x20x10 in but we determined that Vicki’s handbag was no larger than that. The lady on the metal detector (yes they put you through one, although we have absolutely no idea why) took a dislike to Vicki and she had to take her bag back out to the bus driver and get him to lock it back up in the van. Not a good thing as it had our passports and important documents in. They did let my bag in which was actually the same size or slightly bigger – go figure. The tour group hardly waited for Vicki to come back before they had taken off. We all got headphones and a receiver box to hear our guide. He had a hilarious way of talking – a bit like the guy off Believe it or not where he would almost whisper his final word in each sentence. Auschwitz is a sombre and hard to describe place but it was a bit like walking around an old prison with the razor wire and brick buildings. Everything is pretty much unchanged but you only get to see through a few places and not a lot of time as the other groups are behind you all the time. There were rooms with items collected from Jews by the Nazis as they were delivered to the camp. They were told to bring all they could as they were going to be rehoused in other places. Unfortunately the showers were gas chambers and so all their belongings were warehoused and sent to be reused. For example their hair was all shaved off before they were murdered and made into textiles and goods for the war effort. However in one room there was enclosed two ton of hair that hadn’t been used (out of 8 ton still there) just huge mounds of hair. There were also rooms with thousands of children’s shoes and another with thousands of adults shoes. There were Combs and brushes, shoe polish and even suitcases with names still on them. Words can’t describe the feeling looking at them but have a look at the attached pics. There was one area in the basement where 4 people would be put in a 1 x 1m cell with no windows where they had to crawl in through a little hatch and live for weeks or until they died as a punishment. Just unbelievable. And yet these activities took an amazing lot of clever planning and money raising. We saw where they shot people and also where they hung them up by their arms that were tied behind their backs till their shoulders dislocated. There was a reconstructed crematorium that still had the original equipment plus the gas chamber where they dropped the pellets through the roof and could take hours to die. The problem was they couldn’t burn them quick enough. The area was declared a monument in 1947 and has been open to visitors since.
Whereas the enclosed area of Auschwitz is small, Birkenau is around 200 hectares and though a lot of the long huts are gone the remains of a number of the brick buildings are standing but unfortunately they are sinking into the ground due to the high water table but these are being restored. The government own the area but admission is free (but you pay to go on a guided tour) but upkeep is by funding methods. The remains of the two huge crematoriums are still there after the Nazis tried to remove the evidence by burning and blowing them up but they ran out of time. It still amazes me how the Nazis were so dumb to think they could get rid of the evidence. It would have been hard enough to physically remove things but they were fastidious documenters and wrote everything down. However some were clever enough to remove themselves to other countries before the collapse or just after but many were tried and executed.
As you enter the site you can follow the railway line where all the jews and other prisoners were bought in then unloaded and with the whim of one nazi it was to the left if you were old, infirm, disabled, pregnant, a child or unfit to work which meant a walk straight to the gas chambers or to the right if you were fit to work. The hut living quarters were primitive to say the least and I would hate to know what it was like in the winter. This part of the tour wasn’t as depressing as Auschwitz but probably due to the openness and size of Birkenau it is hard to gauge how it must have been. I can see why this has become a pilgrimage for so many to witness the greatest extermination in the known world history. Supposedly it is to make sure it never happens again but what I see in the world today I don’t have much hope. The guide said that Auschwitz was the better camp and it was considered a punishment if you were to be sent to Birkenau. When you see the difference between the two you can understand why. The bunk rooms in Auschwitz were inside brick buildings and the Birkenau bunk rooms were unlined timber with cobbled floors and rooves. Nothing would have been air tight and I can’t begin to imagine what it would have been like in winter. They housed many hundreds of people in each building that should reasonably only hold maybe a hundred at the most. The soldiers looking after the prisoners also had to live in the same conditions the prisoners did at Birkenau.
We got back to camp around midday, had a small nap-Vicki still had a migraine that she just can’t seem to shake- & rolls that we had made in the morning but didn’t have, somehow didn’t feel like eating, and biked into town to have a look around the main feature here the large castle and church that is surrounded by high walls. It is a great view over the Danube over to the new city so after a look around we sat and had a drink and fruit tart at one of the restaurants and enjoyed the vista. Prices are very good here so you feel you are getting value for money. We wandered back into the old town to see if we had missed anything but not really so had a mulled wine in the square, somehow managed to get a free beer yeehaa, then biked back to camp. Altogether quite a busy two days and a bit emotional at times. We will look back at Krakow as a quite a nice place but I think the feeling is that it was too close to us being in Prague and that has spoilt the experience a bit as Prague was awesome on many levels. Plus, for me, I have always thought of Krakow in a negative sort of light because of the camps and war history but really I would say it is well worth the visit especially as we didn’t go to Warsaw.
We have decided not to stay a third day as we thought and we are going to drive south to Zakopane a popular holiday, winter sport and hiking destination. We hope to do a small excursion up the valley and get a hike in but we will be a bit limited to distance as we hear it can be challenging but still want to experience the wild mountain scenery. It is on the way to Slovakia which is on the other side of the Tatra Mountains, which like the Czech Rep, seems to be a friendly & peaceful country that punches above it’s weight and also has beautiful scenery and is small enough to experience a lot in a short time. We are aware of the weather starting to cool and still have Hungary, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein to see before heading to the slightly warmer climes of Greece hopefully seeing a bit of Italy and Croatia on the way.
