Saturday was fantastic. I got up early, but still had to run to catch my bus in the morning. On the way I bought some cheap sunglasses from a street vendor, it was proving to be a very nice looking day and didn't want to be squinting. I was confused at the bus station at first, my ticket read gate D13 and all I could see was section G. If they were alphabetical I was in trouble because I had less than 5 minutes. With the help of a passing Pole who spoke no English I was able to figure out that G meant ground and D meant underground. I flew down 3 flights of stairs and caught my bus just before it left.
The ride out to the museum was very nice. The Polish countryside is beautiful, the old houses and farms and people, it's all very quaint. We passed through several small towns and villages, picking up and dropping off locals at each stop. It was an hour and a half ride, but I didn't mind at all and kept myself busy listening to music on the iPod. I was thinking to myself that it would have been nice to rent a bike and ride out here, but I'd probably get lost.
Once at the museum I broke away from the crowd, got out my Rick Steve's guide book and took a self-guided tour of Auschwitz. The displays were very moving, especially the massive piles of hair, shoes, bags, brushes, and personal effects. The mug-shots of prisoners lining the barrack walls were haunting. Some visitors had left flowers here and there on the frames, presumably an ancestor or loved one. The camp exhibits were very self explanatory and I didn't feel like I was missing the point by not taking a guided tour. I was happy to blow past the large groups and get some time to take pictures and look at the displays alone.
I decided to walk to Birkenau instead of taking the shuttle, and I'm glad I did although I did get lost at one point. I think that's just par for the course for me. Another helpful Pole with no English got me pointed in the right direction again. At one point a local driver stopped to ask me for directions, boy did he find the wrong person to ask. I had to laugh about that. After about a 30 minute walk I could see Birkenau and got a good shot of the old rail tracks into the camp, I would have missed that if I'd been on the bus. Birkenau was huge. I got an overview from the main guard tower at the entrance. The stairs up were tight and narrow and I had to crowd past a herd of students on the way back down. I spent a significant amount of time at the camp, mostly because it is huge and so spread out. I found the rows and rows of lonely chimneys to be very spooky. By far the most moving part of the site are the old crematorium ruins.
I was getting tired, but decided to walk back to Auschwitz anyway. My legs were very sore by the time I got back. On the bus ride home I saw someone else had the same guidebook as me so I sat down next to him and started up a conversation. Don was a really nice guy from Seattle and he was on a 3 month European vacation with his wife, but she opted out of going to Auschwitz. We had a nice chat together all the way back to Krakow and then walked through the main square before parting ways. I took a picture to remember him by and gave him my card. He was off to visit family in Northern Poland and then on his way to Sweden and finally Norway.
I went back to the hotel and was so happy to see that my luggage had arrived safe and sound. I took my bags up to the room and then crashed for a much needed nap. I got up around 20:00, called Marcin, and had some coffee and borsch in the dining room while I waited for my friends to come pick me up.
The guys found me and we started our evening in Old town. There were some firedancers and drummers performing in the main square and I stopped to watch for a bit. It reminded me of Kat, who I am missing dearly. We walked past Marcin's new flat that he has been fixing up and is very proud of, and then we picked up Maciek's girlfriend, Olga, from work. She is a dentist.
Our destination was the Kazimierz district, which has become a very trendy spot. We stopped by Szymon's place, but he would come to join us later. It was a very fun bar crawl, and I took my turn at buying a round for everyone at the Propaganda bar. For a latenight snack we had some cheap but delicious soup and it hit the spot. It seems that beer and politics go well together because that was the main topic of conversation for the evening. My Polish friends shared a lot of stories about what they remember of the communist era.
Marcin and I took a cab back to old town and finished the night at the Jazz Rock Cafe which is one of the places I remembered from my last trip. After that we walked back to my hotel and said goodnight. These guys really take good care of me, I feel pretty special. It was 4:00 in the morning when I got to bed and my legs were so sore from all the walking.
I've slept most of the day away, but I hope to get some more sight-seeing done today. I've uploaded all my new pics now so have fun browsing. Ciao.
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