Finally Making it to Krakow, Poland....

Hello All!

Well, we left Budapest on a bus at 6:00AM bound for Krakow, Poland. We've been trying for our entire two years in Switzerland to get here on a trip and it just wasn't an easy task. Alot of traveler's you meet along your journey rave about this place so we knew we just had to see it. Our bus took 7 hours and I'm happy to say I slept the whole time. It was great!

We had arrangements to stay with a friend of a friend when we got here. A couchsurfing experience, sort of, but more comfortable for our first time since one of our good friends has stayed with this girl twice before. Ewa (pronounced Eva) was lovely, she was accommodating, chatty, and very friendly. So we hurried to her house to put down our things and then out for the evening to find our bearings in this city and get some dinner. We stayed with Ewa for two nights but after that we decided to check into a hostel. It was lovely staying with her but Megzi and I have decided we're not very good couch surfers, we like just being able to come to our room at a hostel and lay down whenever, just hang around!

The first full day of being in Krakow we made the short trip to the village of Wielizcka, about 30 minutes away by bus. They have a 700 year old salt mine, the only one of it's type that's worked constantly through the middle ages, it only stopped production about 15 years ago. There in that salt mine that tunnels down 9 layers under the earth you can tour some of the most amazing hand sculpted rooms and tunnels. It was inducted into the original UNESCO list back in the 70's and being there I didn't need to wonder why. I wish I could convey to you the real wonder that I had about this place. It was all salt...(all of it!! I licked the walls to see!) the statues were salt, the rocks in the chandielers were salt, the floor was salt...AMAZING! We spent the entire day there and even pigged out at their restaurant, the only one located 135M below the earth.

Day two found us heading for the Auschwitz/Berknau concentration camps. They were the largest of the German camps in WWII. What a completely moving day! We took an organized tour, we thought it would be pointless to go there and not be entirely informed, and we learned so much. I'd been to Dachau, near Munich, and I thought that was a big place but it was nothing compared to the size of Auschwitz/Berknau camp II. Massive, it went on for as far as the eye could see. The train tracks came straight into the camp and the people were hearded off, most of them not to be prisioners but rather straight to the gas chambers to die. The horrors that place has seen. The crimes against humanity that happened there...it's too much for my heart to take. The guide took us to the area of the crematorium there. She said that all around us were the ashes of the dead. They used them as fertilizer all over the camp. After she said that it was more than I could do to stay there any longer, I was glad the tour was up.

It was that evening that we moved into our hostel, a place along the main square of the city. A great location. We've met a few people but more importantly we have a kitchen to use, money saving method, and the freedom to come and go whenever. For the past two days we've just taken it easy, not done much but take walks and go into things that interest us. We plan to see the Wawel Castle today and then wait out the next day for our bus to Vilinus, Lithuania.

We were hoping to be able to leave here tonight but the bus only runs on Tuesday night and Friday. Luck of the draw I guess. The bus trip will be 14 hours, so overnight. We are really hoping that this bus doesn't take us through Belarus or through the tiny bit of Russia that also borders Poland/Lithuania. To go into those countries, even passing through on a bus, requires visas or transit visas and we don't have any. We've heard stories from people who have been kicked off of buses in the middle of the night for not having transit visas, not at this border but others, hope that doesn't happen to us!

Well, I guess this gets me all caught up for my travels so far. We have less than 3 weeks left now. We are looking forward to our return to Switzerland, and for me especially looking forward to getting back to Girls Aged 5 and 8, and then ultimately our trips to our respective countries. Please continue to pray for us in our travels and for our health/safety. We are doing quite well on our small budgets though the last week will definitely be stretching it, we hope to make it through without missing too many meals...hehe....

Thanks for all your thoughts and support so far!

Love you all!!

LuLu