Krakow: Day 3

The last and final day in Krakow was spent seeing a few of the major tourist things we didn't catch on our first day in Krakow. We began the day a little slow, because after Auschwitz we wanted to have a lot of fun to get our moods up. We ended up meeting one of Tete's friends from AIESEC the previous night. I have Polish friends from Fordham, and one of them recommended to me a few places to go at night, so we met there and ended up going to a few places afterwards. It was a long night, but a lot of fun. We headed first to the Wawel Castle. When we arrived, we were met with a large line and a blinking red sign that said the tickets to the Royal State Rooms were sold out. We decided to wait in line for the Dragon's Den and other castle tickets. The tickets were time stamped and so we were forced to wait until 1 PM to begin our tour of the inside rooms. This was a terrible time because it was already 11:30 AM, which meant we didn't have enough time to eat, but couldn't really leave the castle grounds either. We walked around and found that the Wawel Cathedral tickets were not included in our tickets we bought for the castle, so we bought tickets and walked around the cathedral.

I hate doing things without a tour guide anymore because it's extremely hard to figure out the significance of everything I'm seeing when all the signs are in another language or even if they are translated, it just says what it is and not why it's important. The inside of the cathedral was beautiful though and there were many things to see inside. It was founded in 1650 and holds the tombs to many important people, including Frederick Chopin. Sigismund's Chapel was amazing, and according to Wikipedia, "is one of the most notable pieces of architecture in Krakow and perhaps, 'the purist example of Renaissance architecture outside Italy.'" Also, Pope John Paul II offered his first mass as a priest in this cathedral in 1946. Wawel Cathedral also has two bell towers, with eight smaller bells and five larger bells. The most famous of these bells is Sigismund Bell. This bell, created in 1520, has the following inscription on it, "FOR GOD, THE BEST, THE GREATEST, FOR THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD AND FOR HIS PATRON SAINTS, THE ILLUSTRIOUS KING ZYGMUNT OF POLAND HAD THIS BELL MADE TO BE WORTHY OF THE GREATNESS OF HIS MIND AND DEEDS IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1520." The total weight of the bell is 12,600 kg and it is 242 cm wide and 241 cm tall! It's a huge bell.

After ascending and descending the bell towers, we continued to the crypts to see the burial sites of many royal Polish people and of course Frederick Chopin and moved along to the rest of the castle grounds. The Wawel Castle served as the royal residence for 500 years and is small, but beautiful. The inside wasn't as immaculate as other places, but we still enjoyed our tour around. When we were finished, we were tired, hungry and in need of some new energy. We still had to see the final thing, the Dragon's Den of Wawel Castle. The Wawel Dragon is a famous dragon of Polish folklore. He was said to live in the cave underneath the Wawel Castle. The dragon would pillage and destroy the village every day and would only be appeased if he was given a young maiden once a month as sacrifice outside his cave. All the kings and all the king's men couldn't stop this perilous dragon, and so out of desperation, the king offered his daughter's hand in marriage to anyone who could defeat the dragon. The only one to outsmart the dragon was a young cobbler's son, who placed a sheep, stuffed with sulfur, outside the dragon's lair. The dragon ate the poison, and couldn't quench his thirst. The dragon was said to explode after drinking half the Vistula River and the cobbler's son married the king. The Dragon's Den was a totally pointless and stupid thing, but for $1, we didn't feel cheated.

After eating, we decided that almost our entire day was wasted at the castle and we still wanted to go to the famous salt mine about 30-40 minutes outside of Krakow. We decided to take our chances and try and see the mine before our train to Berlin left at 8 PM. We arrived at the salt mine to find out that the tour lasted 2 hours and was about $25—it was a no go. But that didn't stop us from wasting a bus ride outside the city. We walked around the salt mine grounds and took a few pictures and bought a few things. When we went back to Krakow, it was time to grab a bite to eat and head to the train station. When we were near our hostel, quite close to the Wawel Castle, Ana shouts out, "Jolin! Jolin!" I looked out of the window and who do I see? Jolin! In her bright pink pants and her boyfriend Chen Zhen! And we were trapped on the bus! Great! We waited as the bus drove away from where we saw Jolin and we could do nothing. As soon as the bus stopped, we ran out in the direction of Jolin. I knew that she couldn't be too far because she was walking slowly and Krakow really isn't too big of a city. We walked down the main street I thought she was on and arrived at the castle…too far. We headed back, thinking she might be shopping in a store or inside a church. Still nothing. And then we found her, sitting on a bench with Chen Zhen and we all ran up and gave her a big hug. Who would have thought we'd meet up in Poland, after a month in the Czech Republic.

We spent our last few hours in Poland with Jolin shopping around the main square. She walked with us to get our luggage from the hostel and took us to the train station. Poor Jolin! Apparently on her way to the train station in Prague, her backpack was opened and missing from inside was her wallet, money, external hard drive, and some miscellaneous items. Our train ride to Berlin is certainly one for the books, so stay tuned for more stories.