If it's November it must be ... Prague!

You know, when you have a long weekend in Poland, the obvious thing is to leave the country! Well, that is when the weekend includes Independence Day! So this year, after experiencing All Saints Day and Independence Day in 2007, we did two things. First, on All Saints Day we went to the biggest cemetery in Krakow. No! We aren't morbid - but it's a very interesting thing to do. You see, families go and lay flowers, and candles at graves - and this particular cemetery also includes the CWGC section, as well as Polish military, Russian and German War Graves. And no-one had been forgotten!

Although all shops were closed, the crowds were enormous. In the cemetery, many people also laid flowers and lights at the late Pope's family grave. Amazing to see. Of course, there were many laid in front of the statue of P-J II!

And after that it was a trip to Prague to try to see more of it than we did in the summer. We went by train. Now... normally this train has a restaurant car so we didn't bother with any food. Result? We had 2 small bottles of water to last us ..... wait for it.... 7hours! Yes - you read right - 7 hours! What on earth possessed them NOT to put on the restaurant car??????????

Despite that we had a great weekend. We stayed in a lovely hotel only 5 minutes from the Metro and trams, and we walked all over as usual. There was a great exhibition on in the Museum Narodny about living in the Czech Republik in 1908, 1928, 1948; there was also an excellent one on Czech Legion in Russia in the First World War and just after.

We avoided the crowds as much as possible although there were far more people than we'd anticipated. Charles Bridge is undergoing repair so is not as attractive as before but no doubt will be safer and last longer.

We went to another cemetary - but this time to see Dvorac's Grave. After all, we also went to a couple of musical recitals in old churches which were very good because of the acoustics.

We also went up the funicular railway to the 'Eiffel Tower' and walked up the steps to the top for a fabulous view of the entire area. Despite a cold day it was at least dry and sunny so we managed to withstand the sway of the tower and NOT fall over the edge - yes here in Europe you are actually still allowed to be responsible for your own actions! And... guess what! We managed to behave and not fall, trip, throw things through the windows that we opened, spit on people below...etc etc.

I found one shop I wanted to go into - because it sold evil looking Santas - choccie ones that is! OK - so I didn't buy a Santa - but I did buy a tin of choccies to eat - sometime........... Plus 6 mini Santas. Prague is definitely good for restaurants - but stay away from the Old Town. Go across the river and you'll find great value for money. And we cannot go further without a mention of Czech beer! I can't start to mention them.

I'm going to stop here for now. We only have a few weeks left and I'll try to put together something with a collage of pics. Then we're off in December for Christmas - to Transylvania!

Warsaw in a weekend and Malbork in a day

A weekend in Warszawa - just what we needed to blow the cobwebs away. After all, there's only so much work a person can do before they need another break! So we left Krakow behind again and had a couple of days in the country's capital.

When you only have that short time, it's really best to decide before you go exactly what you will see. I wanted to make the Warsaw Rising museum my priority as well as walk through the 'old' city. I can't recommend the Museum highly enough. From the entry area with Warsaw's beating heart to the displays and commentary it was a wonderful museum. It's fairly new, and we spent nearly 4 hours there. We lost track of time and it was only because we were hungry that we decided to wander to town to eat - looked at our watches - and 4 hours had gone past!

The displays cover the progress of the Rising in 1944, social commentary, memories and even a film made in 1944, hidden, then re-hidden by the Communists before being put back together again. I did have personal reasons to go here - my Uncle Stefan, his wife and little boy were all murdered in the Rising - and I really wanted to find out more.
Other things to see are Stalin's gift - a truly ugly building the Palace of Culture (??), and the Little Insurgent. This is a little statue to pay tribute to the children of the Rising. It sits just outside the old city walls, is not too easy to find, but is worth searching for.

We finished off our weekend by going to see the cereminail changing of he guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It's held every Sunday at 12 noon and is extremely good.

Of course, you have to have a look at the old city. It is very small and quite remarkable considering it was totally destroyed in the Second War. Thanks to old pictures and paintings, it was possible to reconstruct it - and herein lies another story...

After our weekend in Warszawa, we had another couple of weeks before we were off again - this time a long train journey up to Malbork. For a comprehensive history see the website:

http://www.zamek.malbork.pl/en/index.html

It was fantastic - and lucky to still be here! After the end of the war when the good burghers of Warszawa wanted to rebuild, they looked around for the right sort of bricks - and... they turned their gaze to Malbork. They were going to use all the bricks from that ancient castle to rebuild the capital, but luckily, they were stopped. And so Malbork still stands.

It was and is the largest Gothic castle in Europe - the Teutonic Knights held it, and t was never taken by force - ever. However, it was sold once - a Polish King bargained for it and got it. The tour is well put together - our Guide had wonderful stories to tell and we saw a great deal. this was another marathon - 3 hours this time.

Have to say however, that this is only attraction in the town - luckily we only went there for a couple of nights, and as it takes 7 hours to reach it by train we weren't really short of time.

We enjoyed walking around the castle at night as it is floodlit and you can - and should- cross the bridge to the other side of the river to get a good view and appreciate its size. We stayed in the Zamek Hotel - this was originally in the Lower Castle (there are 3 castles too - in one) and was the infirmary for the lower orders. The rooms were... quaint, not too bad, but they need new beds really. We ate out as the restaurant was silly prices!

The autumnal colours were beautiful and warranted photographs and we enjoyed walking along the river and through the wooded areas. However, any longer and we'd have gone crazy without a car!

Apart from that, we now have a long weekend in Praha coming up in November... not All Saint's weekend which is today; next weekend. Next blog after that!