We’ve spent the past two days in Krakow. It’s somewhere that Grandad had been, and that I wanted to go, so after some gentle pestering, he agreed to make the 400-mile round-trip. There are many benefits to being the eldest (and by default, favourite) grandchild, and one of them is always getting your own way.
We left Jelenia Gora at 6:00 yesterday morning. After a sleepy meander through some hazy villages, and the occasional fumble at a toll booth (change is difficult with biker gloves), we made it to Wieliczka, home of an impossibly huge and labyrinthine salt mine, about 20 kilometres from Krakow.
We duly queued for our one-earphone headsets, and promptly embon our guided tour, along with a couple of enthusiastic Americans, and a delightful German family, whose boisterous children were an absolute pleasure to share a tour with.
We descended into the shaft, the rickety wooden steps resembling the Penrose stairs, showing no sign of ending. Eventually we reached 168 metres below ground, following a series of passages that had been carved out of the block of salt. Occasionally the corridors would burst into cavernous chapels, the splendour of which would have rivalled Moria. The underground lakes lay undisturbed, reflecting the vast ceilings that melted into darkness above our heads, and everywhere the precious salt glistened.
After the tour, we emerged blindly into the glare of the midday sun. And the heat. On returning to the bike, we reluctantly pulled on our heavy jackets and suffocating helmets, scorching ourselves on the seat, as we headed into Krakow to find our apartment. The roadside thermometer showed 34°, as we crossed the river Wisla, the sweat plastering our t-shirts to our backs, and moulding our leathers to our legs.
On reaching the apartment, the first thing I wanted to do was take a shower. However, this desire was obstructed by the impossibility of extracting my legs from my leathers. If anyone’s seen that episode of ‘Friends’, with Ross writhing around a bathroom, frantically applying talcum powder to his beleathered legs, you’ll have a pretty accurate picture of what was going on. After a heroic struggle, the villainous leathers were defeated. Victory is sweet.
We wandered into the centre of the Old Town, taking in the impressive Cloth Hall in the main square, the Barbican, the Florian Gate, the Wawel, and the innumerable other buildings that proudly decorate the city. We watched the sun set in the square with a well-deserved Zywiec and some pierogi, amazed at how much we’d managed to cram in to one day.
Today saw our crash-course in Krakow continue. We explored the Jewish quarter, stumbling across the magnificent Corpus Christi church (no, I don’t know why there was a church in the Jewish quarter), before crossing the river into the old ghetto, and finding Schindler’s factory.
Krakow is one of those places that can surprise you by its contrasts. Its history remains, visible in the chinks of its touristic facade, and you get the sense that there is a sadness behind its outward beauty.
As we headed back to Jelenia Gora this afternoon, the unbearable heat was softened by the storm that had been brooding on the horizon. Thick drops of rain spattered on my visor, bringing with them that glorious scent of freshness, as the earth sighs after quenching it’s thirst. We sped down the motorway towards the mountains, leaving behind a city that refuses to be compromised by the failings of human memory.