Krakow: You Thieven’ Bastards
Having left Zakopane early Sunday morning, we arrived in Krakow, a few hours north, around lunch time. After the standard ten or fifteen minutes of trying to work out where we were on our map, we were still struggling to work out which way we had to go. Turns out the bus station had moved recently, and moved far enough away from the town centre that we weren’t even on our map, which makes things just that little bit more challenging. Or difficult, depending on what sort of mood you’re in. Eventually, Bec and I found a tram stop that we were confident would serve our purposes, and waited for the number 10 tram to come and take us to the door of the hostel we wanted to stay in. After about 40 minutes of waiting, and seeing every other tram number drive past, we realised that the number 10 didn’t run on Sundays, and we were faced with a 45 minute walk. What is it about public transport with the number 10, and causing Bec and I grief? What did we ever do to the number 10?
Sweating quite heavily under the hazy sun, and with shoulders ready to shear away from our torsos, we made it to the hostel around 3pm. We checked in and trudged to our 10 bed dorm room to find the curtains drawn and someone asleep in one of the beds. Keeping as quiet as we could, we grabbed a backpack and drink bottle, I threw my fleece up onto my new top bunk, and we left to go and explore the city for a few hours.
Krakow is a visually beautiful city. Small enough to be navigated on foot, but diverse enough to keep you interested, Krakow has an extremely pedestrian-friendly old town, with the largest city square in all of Europe, and makes for a great stroll. Enclosing the old town on all sides is a strip of green parkland, The Planty, with a maze of pathways and Autumn colours of yellow and orange and brown floating all around.
So after a pleasant few hours of wnadering aimlessly, we returned to the hostel with weary legs, and went back to our room for a lie down. I grabbed my fleece off my bed. Well, at least what I thought was my fleece. What I held in my hands instead was a shitty, dirty, black jumper with a zip-up neck; a top that I reckon would struggle to keep you warm in a heat wave, let alone during a Polish winter. Some bastard had stolen my fleece, and replaced it with this piece of cloth. I sighed.
It was a low point, yes. But it didn’t last long. Hell, it could’ve been a lot worse. The hostel was generally a friendly place, and had a great cavernous bar downstairs. One slight hitch though – the bar had no beer. No wine either. In fact, no alcohol whatsoever. Is there a more cruel irony than the bar with no beer, and a bar at a backpackers’ hostel no less? Mercifully, they allowed patrons to bring their own beer, and store it behind the bar. It at least gave the barman something to do I suppose. The bar more than made up for this though, by providing a free pool table. I was in heaven. I haven’t played that much pool since I was at uni skipping classes. I played a few games with Ryan, a friendly American guy from up Seattle way, one night. We began some time around 11pm, most others had gone out, so it was just the two of us. I think it was about 4.15am when we were kicked out of the bar and forced to retire to bed.
Krakow has a nightlife of some reputation, however Bec and I didn’t really hit the clubs. As well as the fact that clubbing isn’t exactly our scene, Bec’s body wasn’t cooperating entirely after a few hectic weeks of travel, so most nights were fairly quiet, but that was fine with us. After a taking a day trip to Auschwitz (previous entry) one doesn’t exactly feel like boozing on.
Tags: Krakow, Poland, Travel
Dave
November 1st, 2005 at 3:12 pm
Don’t panic mate, it could have been worse, they could have stolen your passport or something like that. Thought I better drop you a line so you know we’re still reading your stuff. I found the Auschwitz entry really interesting. I wasn’t sure how you would handle it and was curious as to what you might write. I’ll leave it at that, as it might be a discussion that is needed in person over a few beers. I’ll send you a direct email to update you things here at home, but Makybe Diva won her third straight Melb cup yesterday. Amazing race and amazing scenes afterwards. I bloody missed the trifecta by a bee’s dick. Had 1st, 2nd (a 70-1 chance) and 4th! and it paid almost $5,000. And not only that, but if stupid fourth horse had of run third, I would have got the trifecta twice! Ah, the punter’s lament.