So this is the start of another travel! =) This time, we are headed to Krakow, another Polish city. Krakow is known to be pretty and therefore, an extremely touristy place in Poland. We were there to see that for ourselves!
As usual before we set off, things must be neat in the house! And sobs, we left them behind...
Cyclops and Dear, sleeping on the bed without us for about 4 days
This was the train that would bring us to Krakow in 3 hours =) Very cheap wor! 29 zl only when the normal train ticket without this current promotion (only valid from Mon-Thurs) cost about 66zl.
On the train ride there. =) Grafitti is a big thing in Europe. =)
And tada! After 3 long (erm not really long...there are longer train rides out there, and bus rides as well) hours on train which we always sleep through, (the gentle rocking of the train and the warmth in the cabin? lol), we finally reached Krakow!
And the background is actually the 1zl bread that we see streets of people selling and eating. Its not especially interesting - its just bread shaped like a ring which tastes like plain bread. But it makes for a good snack when we get hungry from walking I guess.
See! We got hungry already! Laughs. Actually we wanted to try it because twin heard from PS that this is a must try! Hah. Thinking back, it wasn't so bad cos I had a worse experience in Hungary with bread and sesame =(
On the way to the hostel, we saw this scary exhibit outside a cake shop. =) Actually the rest were not so bad, and most of the other cake shops around did sell cream cakes but not with cream of this proportion. I guess the scary part is self-explanatory. =) I have never seem cake with this amount of cream before! There is a story tied with this cake. Later part wor.
We found our hostel! After a long walk...=) Thankfully, hostelworld had instructions and Krakow had kind English speaking ladies. =) Anyway, this hostel is like that of the one in Hungary, but at least it has a signboard outside =) At first, we rang the doorbell...but no one answered! And we only managed to get in when we called and someone picked up the phone =)
By the way, we stay behind the open door in a 8 bunk room named Communism. It was nice for 2 nights. Then the third night =( Nonetheless it is a nice hostel under renovation - perhaps it is why it is not too expensive. When it is fully renovated, there is no doubt this hostel (AQQ hostel) will become more expensive. They do offer nice basic free breakfast of cereal, break and milk and free hot drinks. =)
After settling down, and meeting Carlin, a girl from the States having an exchange in germany (the poor lady was sick and therefore had to stay in the hostel to rest before she moves on for the rest of the journey), we decided to start our sightseeing =)
First sight of the day - the St Mary's Basilica. It is one of the churches that we saw, and went into later in the travel to pray and not to visit =)
We did not visit our first sighting. Instead, we went to this place named the Cloth Hall! Haha but unlike what the name suggests, we do not see any cloth here. Instead, we find here filled with souvenir shops instead, especially those selling amber accessories...We shall go Gdansk and pick free amber (we heard that there was lots in the beaches in Gdansk)!
One of the souvenir shops in Cloth Hall selling chess sets. It fascinated twin cos she wanted to learn how to play chess. Any teachers?
Continuing the exploration, and seeing a street busker with the xylophone =) Its nice to walk in the streets and hear music and he was good =)
The Krakow streets...Random picture...But you see the Kebab sign? Like our place, Krakow has a lot of kebab stores =) And this was also our dinner place. The main highlight of this picture however, is the church in the background with the beautifully designed white structure! Its really elaborate.
And this is us with the church in the background. We did go into the church later that night and saw a night service, but left soon after before it ended to catch our concert. =)
Another church that we passed by looking for the concert venue so we can go buy tickets for the performance. We thought this was the place instead cos it had the music concert poster but haha, on the poster, there was an arrow marked and distance 200m written on the poster!
We found the concert venue! =) But how to go in wor? Can you see the door? Hehe, no its not in this picture...its the side of the church.
Haha! We found the door! And twin managed to open it. (Later realized all I needed to do was to push down the handle a lot harder) after 2 tries, upon which she triumphantly declared that only good people get to open the door and enter the place! Grr!
We found that ticket sales only starts 7 pm. Sigh. Went to the streets again for a walk =)
A pretty shop window that caught twin's fancy! The statue of the slim woman playing the flute looks really graceful.
Passed by this church which we could enter! =) Something caught our attention!
Highlight of the church - see the interesting design on the door?
After walking for the whole day, we were hungry. Since we had time on our hands, we decided to eat dinner too! =) This is rice with turkey and salad...the salad had a banana taste but we cannot understand why - there is NO banana in the salad. Overall the meal is like your expensive Singaporean cai fan but to do it justice, its really very nice.
And then it was time for the concert!
Happy us get to listen to a concert with Bach pieces!
The musicians! They were really good! We thoroughly enjoyed the performance.
The right paper shows the repertoire for the night. =)
End of the concert...We had to leave =( Took a last photo of the place and ventured into the COLD windy streets back to our hostel =( Well at least the hostel had hot chocolate..
Haha, our pretty new hostel that is still undergoing renovations =)
And then we went to sleep.
Additional mention - Carlin very kindly told us a lot of things about Krakow =) Thanks Carlin! And have a fun time in Berlin =)
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