June 25
Warsaw
The day spent in Warsaw was amazing. For a quick background on the city, it is the capital of Poland, the largest city in Poland, and the most modern that I've seen so far. The Nazis destroyed 85 percent of the city during WWII, so many amazing things were lost, but they've done an incredible job rebuilding and restoring it to its pre-war state. I'm not sure what the names are of a lot of things I saw, but I'll do my best.
We started the day at Lazienki Park, a park created a few hundred years ago by the then king of Poland. There's a beautiful palace situated between two ponds that we got to tour. They make you put "slippers" over your shoes so as not to damage/mark up the floor. At the end of the tour, I almost killed myself going down the stairs when my feet slipped out from under me. Other than a bruise to my ego, I was unharmed. Next up was the city center built inside the remains of a castle. The center was beautiful with unique architecture, statues, churches, and tons of people. A statue of a mermaid warrior is supposed to have special significance for Warsaw. We spent hours looking for it, and we're still convinced we hadn't found it until after we got home and looked for photos of it on the internet. What we had thought was much too small to be the mermaid statue about 5 feet tall), was in fact the mermaid statue. The city of Warsaw was very impressive, especially considering it was almost completely destroyed. I like Krakow more, but Warsaw is definitely worth visiting. The architecture is very impressive and the area is definitely tourist friendly.
The worst part of the trip was the drive to and from Warsaw. Somehow, the best/only direct route to Warsaw from Lodz, two very large cities about 70ish miles apart, is a two lane highway/road passing through small villages. Kind of pretty but very slow going, lots of construction, and very stupid planning. The civil engineers in Poland either lacked funding or foresight (probably the former), but that is what happens when your country is ran by communists for decades. Stupid Russia…
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| Lazienki Palace |
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| Stupid shoe covers that made me slip... |
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| Lazienki Palace |
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| Part of the castle that wasn't destroyed |
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| Mermaid Warrior statue |
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| Tallest building in Poland: The Palace of Culture... built by the stupid Russians |
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