After my week in Italy I was back home for the weekend a a couple of days at the office, but then it was time to go on the road (or rather, take to the skies) again. I was invited to participate in a conference in a resort village called Cedzyna, near the city of Kielce, on Thursday and Friday, and then I spent the weekend with my sister in Wrocław before flying home from there the following morning.
Kielce is about 130 km from Kraków, the nearest city connected to Alicante with a direct flight. So I flew to Kraków Wednesday evening, spent the night there and travelled by train to Kielce the following morning. Therefore, this week’s blog covers three Polish cities: Kraków, Kielce and its suburbs, and Wrocław, my birthplace and the city where my sister lives.
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I arrived in Kraków late on Wednesday evening, too late to find a proper dinner, but I had seen that 500 meters from my hotel there was a bar with the promising name House of Beer, so after checking in at my hotel close to the train station, I walked to that oasis, and indeed it looked very promising:
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Inside the bar, I found a great selection of Belgian beer, a friendly lady behind the bar, and interesting fellow guests:
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Afterwards, I walked back to the hotel along dark, empty streets like this:
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The square across the street from my hotel with the train station and a large shopping centre:
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I took the train to Kielce Thursday morning and a taxi to the conference in Cedzyna. During the afternoon, I had some free time and went for a long walk in the surrounding countryside. The neighbouring village was called Leszczyny, and this was its main street:
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Poland is the most Catholic country in Europe (even if, as elsewhere, the church is losing ground), and displays like this are common in the Polish countryside:
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The area around Kielce is agricultural, as evidenced by this place advertising animal feed:
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Some villagers had a drink the night before:
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Very much false advertising. The sign says “bad dog” (meaning “dangerous dog”):
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Kielce is several hundred km from the Baltic coast, so the local beach is this artificial beach on a lake near the hotel where I stayed:
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This is not a wealthy part of Poland, but there were some seriously nice houses in the wooded areas around the lake:
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The conference ended at lunchtime on Friday, and my train to Wrocław was departing around 7 p.m. The weather was nice, so I decided to leave my luggage at the train station and spend a few hours walking around Kielce, a city I had only visited once before, in 2022. I liked the modern bus station:
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I passed a nice park with a pond where people were enjoying the sunshine:
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Like in other Polish cities, there is a lot of art in public spaces in Kielce, like this 1973 sculpture called “The Oath of Love”:
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I passed a museum of modern sacral art and decided to have a look inside. An exhibition was being prepared for a vernissage that evening, and I had a chat with the artist:
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I walked up to a hill overlooking the city, housing the cathedral and various other church buildings. A couple were having their wedding pictures taken in the beautiful surroundings:
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Back down in the centre, couple enjoying the sunshine in different ways:
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Then evening arrived, I took my 3-hour train ride to Wrocław, and enjoyed seeing my sister and brother-in-law again. On Saturday morning, as always, I enjoyed the view of the Reagan Circle from her 11th floor balcony:
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I went for a morning walk along the Odra river, particular to see the aftermath of the previous weeks floods. The river definitely looked bigger than usual:
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Wrocław experiences occasional flooding when the Odra, swelled by rainfall upstream, exceeds its banks. There was an especially bad flood in 1997 when much of the centre of this city of 700,000 people was flooded. So in anticipation of the flood wave, there were sandbags everywhere:
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The riverside promenade was still closed:
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Windows of a local museum, with precautions having been taken:
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As always, when I walk around a city, I was on the lookout for funny details:
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A bizarre juxtaposition:
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Wrocław has a long tradition of scientific research, and also the city has historically been a mix of Poles, Germans, Czechs, Jews and others:
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At mid-day, I went for another walk, this time towards Ostrów Tumski, an island containing the cathedral and various church buildings. I walked along the river, first passing the office of the regional administration, with a large banner celebrating the 20th anniversary of Poland’s accession to the EU, a milestone in 2004 that marked the country’s return to its rightful place as an integral part of Europe:
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The couple were looking at the swollen river, the dog did not care:
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Along the river, people enjoying the sunshine while still surrounded by sandbags:
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I stopped for a beer at a riverside bar:
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Well-dressed canine:
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On Saturday night, we went out for dinner at one of Wrocław’s best restaurants, Maddalena, an early celebration of my sister’s birthday in October:
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We ate on a terrace with fantastic view of the University of Wrocław:
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One of the many bridges across the river, Most Pomorski:
More pictures from my one night and morning in Kraków are here, and there is also a full Kielce gallery. And a large gallery of Wrocław photos is here.