Poland Day 6 - Krakow First Impressions

A leisurely start in Kielce today. Breakfast, car rental return and hotel checkout all done by 10:00am, then off to the train station to catch the 11:06 train to Krakow.

We arrived at the city centre station by 12:40 and with nothing on our tour scheduled until 4:30, we decide to walk the 1.5 klm to our hotel, the Radisson Blu. The walk takes us through the "old town" and so far I'm impressed. This city with a population of about 800,000 is buzzing with life in the city centre and seems clean and welcoming.

Arriving at the hotel, we find it's far nicer than the Best Western in Kielce and sits right across the street from a park and walkway system that surrounds the old town.

Apparently if you walk the full length of the path (corner forefront in the photo below), you will find yourself back at your starting point in about 45 minutes. I am impressed with the cleanliness of the city and am surprised by how green everything is already. 

After check in, we set off to explore a little and find some lunch before meeting with our tour director at 4:30. There seems to be a lot to see and do here.

It doesn't take long at all to find a nice patio where we enjoy a piwo along side a few pierogi ruskie and some really tasty bigos.

After meeting with the tour director, he guides us on a short tour of the old town and focuses on the University of Krakow (or Jagiellonian University), which was established in 1364 and is one of the oldest universities in the world. It's an impressive property and boasts some well known alumni, like Copernicus and Karol Wojtila (aka Pope John Paul II), among many others. Apparently Marie Curie was originally denied a research position at the university because she was a woman, but in 1924 received and honorary doctorate from the institution.

The hall of the university in the shot below, is significant for an infamous meeting which took place after the German invasion in 1939. 

Krakow being virtually defenceless at the time, had been taken over without major battle or resistance.  Now being under German control, Gestapo chief Bruno Muller invited 184 of the areas brightest minds to a "meeting" at this hall. They willingly arrived for the meeting thinking they would be asked to be valued contributors to the new governing regime. Instead they, along with the president (the city leader we know as "mayor") of Krakow, were all arrested and ultimately sent to the Dachau concentration camp where most of them perished. This was apparently the beginning of the "purging" of Krakow.

The following shot is of the tower of Saint Mary's Church. Legend has it that in 1241, the city was saved from a Mongol invasion by a sentry stationed atop the tower. He played an anthem called the Hejnal to warn the population of the advancing armies. He apparently became the only casualty of the attack, having been struck in the throat by an arrow, before he could complete the anthem. 

Now, every hour of every day the sentry's performance is re-enacted, but the anthem stops abruptly mid stanza, representing the sentry's demise.

     All in all, today was an interesting day and I am looking forward to seeing more of the area. Tomorrow we'll visit the Wieliczka Salt Mine and Oscar Schindler's factory, in addition to exploring more of this beautiful city.