Let yourself be surprised
- Richard
- May 23
- 5 min read
We are off again. On to Scandinavia. But then the unusual route via Poland and the Baltic States. In this blog our first experiences in Poland. What can we actually expect from this country? Is it really as unsafe as we have heard? Do we still see something of the typical Eastern Bloc influences?
Plan changed
In Morocco we had planned a route in advance. Now we want to be more surprised and go where the wind takes us that day. We know that Scandinavia is ideal for this, but what about Poland and the Baltic States? In Poland we had the intention to drive straight to Warsaw. TomTom, however, had a different proposal by avoiding the toll roads. What do we think of a visit to the Giant Mountains just across the Czech border? After a quick Google search, this appears to be one of the most beautiful hiking areas in Poland. So we let Globus 2 follow TomTom's instructions.
Giant Mountains
And what a surprise! This is indeed a beautiful area with fabulous rock formations. We were able to take several walks there and enjoyed it immensely. For the rest of the journey we took a look at the map. Auschwitz and Krakow now automatically come on our path. At the impressive Auschwitz we were surprised that many of the buildings are replicas of the original. In the nice Krakow we were surprised by the legend of the dragon and the origin of the city. If you also want to be surprised, read the collapsible legend below.
King Krak and the Dragon
"In a cave at the foot of Wawel Hill once lived a terrible fire-breathing dragon... This dragon roamed the countryside and did whatever it pleased: it ate the sheep and cattle and frightened the peasants so much that they never let their animals graze in the fields next to the river, the Vistula. What was even worse, the dragon loved to eat young girls! Many brave knights had tried to kill the monster, but before they could get close enough to strike, the dragon breathed fire and all that was left of the men was a pile of ashes.
King Krak wanted this dragon to be destroyed as soon as possible, he always feared that his daughter Wanda would be the dragon's next meal. He invited knights and noblemen to come to his country and conquer the dragon, he promised them that whoever could kill the dragon, would marry his beautiful daughter and become king when he died. Many tried. But the dragon was too big and too dangerous. The people became even more afraid, they hardly dared to leave their homes and the country became poorer and poorer.
One day the young apprentice shoemaker Skuba Dratewka came to visit King Krak. He asked him if he could also try to kill the dragon. The king said that he certainly could, but noted that it would be difficult because Skuba had no armor, or a horse, or a sword. But Skuba did not listen, he had thought of a clever plan.
After Skuba had obtained permission, he bought a dead sheep from the butcher and from a miner he bought some sulphur, which is a powder that they also use to make matches. He went home and there he cut the sheep open with his sharp shoemaker's knife, filled its belly with sulphur powder and sewed the sheep up again with his shoemaker's thread. He put the sheep in front of the dragon's cave and waited behind a rock until the dragon came out.
After a while the greedy dragon came out. He saw the dead animal and ate it up with relish. But the sulphur caught fire, just like a match, and the dragon felt his belly burning. He ran as fast as he could to the river to put out the fire and drank and drank and drank... But he drank so much that he became as fat as a balloon. He fell down and felt very ill.
Skuba left his place behind the rock and started throwing stones at the dragon. The dragon tried to spit fire, but because of all the water, only hot steam escaped from his mouth. He blew harder and harder, but suddenly... KABOOM! His fat water belly exploded! Finally the people were free! More and more people came to live around the hill and a city arose. The city was called Krakau, after King Krak, who had given the order to kill the dragon."
Source: https://www.polen.travel/en
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Warsaw
On to Warsaw, the capital of Poland. Here too we were surprised. The entire 'old' city centre there is however nothing old. After all, everything was bombed flat during WWII. The city centre has been completely reconstructed based on old photos. Behind the old-looking facades are completely new buildings. We were also surprised that it was relatively quiet there, even on a Saturday afternoon, and we completely missed the bustle of a capital.
Gdansk
Are we also going to Gdansk.....? Not at all on the route to Scandinavia, but on our previous blog we got the response that this is a really nice city. So why not? After all, we have the time to ourselves. And here too we are surprised again. What a hugely surprising hip city this is! The entire city is full of Dutch-looking mansions. We drink coffee in a Harry Potter café and enjoy local dishes such as: pączki (a kind of filled doughnuts) and the national dish of Poland: pierogi (potato dumplings)
Russian border
What not everyone knows is that Poland also borders a piece of Russia. A piece, enclosed between Poland and Lithuania, that is of great strategic importance to Russia, because it is located on the Baltic Sea. We were curious to see what such a border with Russia would look like. For example, the border runs right through a large forest here. Would there really be a fence there? Or could we cross the border unnoticed for a moment and also tick Russia off? We were very surprised to discover that there were indeed barriers, large rolls of barbed wire and a high fence running right through the forest. What surprised us even more was that the high rolls of barbed wire were laid by Poland and not by the Russians.
"If everything goes according to the book, you have no say."
A little naughty
Despite the prohibition signs we enjoyed taking a few selfies just behind the barriers at the barbed wire. And in the middle of the forest, no one in sight, that can't hurt...? If we had been more alert we would have seen that there were cameras all along the border and we wouldn't have been surprised by the border police when we returned to Globus 2. After an extensive check of all our papers we were fortunately left alone again.
Finally
Finally, we are very struck by how clean it is everywhere here. You don't see any plastic or cigarette butts lying on the ground. How do they manage that? Is it upbringing/culture? Now we have to be honest, not everything in Poland is only surprisingly positive. Apart from the Giant Mountains, all the way in the south, we mainly drove through very flat, boring rapeseed landscape. I often tell Kelly that I would like to get to my beloved Scandinavia a bit faster. But luckily Kelly convinces me to give these countries the chance to surprise me as well.
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