Leanne and Don, life across the pond: VISITORS, SAVANNAH AND KRAKOW

Let's start this blog off with dessert, just because we like dessert. This is a small piece of chocolate cake with strawberries around it.

Yes is was good.

My nephew, Andy and his girlfriend Logan stopped by for a few days while on their european tour. We did a country walk near Arundel, after we got back to london we

went to the Globe theater to see the play Much ado about nothing. It made for a long day but there young so it didn't matter. I on the other hand was beat.

The next day they say more london sights and also went shopping in a vintage clothing store. Andy found this Jackson, Michigan shirt. Would that be considered a souvenir for london?

While they went into the Tower of london I saw this guy walking around. This would be more of a souvenir outfit.

We got back to the house and Andy took this picture of 25. We had not received the memo that 25 was having a meeting today.

The last day they were here i took them to Kensington palace. While they were in there Coach and i waited for them out front.

For the first few days that Andy and Logan were here, Leanne had gone to Savannah for her Aunt Jan's wedding. She had a great visit with family as you can tell by her smile.

The day she left she was able to see the eclipse,

and got a few pictures.

Andy and Logan left on thursday and Leanne and I would head to Krakow, Poland on friday. Our first stop after we checked into our hotel was to have lunch. Leanne is checking out the tour books as we wait for our food.

We're never sure when we go to a different country how the food will be. We were not disappointed with the polish food. Leanne ordered perogies.

I ordered stuffed cabbage---they were both fantastic. Good thing we share our meals.

After lunch (a nap would have been nice) we did a 2 hour walking tour of Krakow.

This is the St. Florian gate,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Florian%27s_Gate

At one time there was a wall around the Old city with up to 33 towers and 8 gates into the city. This is the only one left.

This is St. Mary's Basilica in the main square, it was completed in 1347

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Mary%27s_Basilica,_Krak%C3%B3w

The tower on the right is the bell tower, the other was a watch tower.

Every hour a trumpeter plays a tune from each side of the tower. The tune abruptly ends while he plays. To read why check out the following web page.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Mary%27s_Trumpet_Call

We walked farther into the city and came to a school where John Paul II was a student during WWII.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_II

Next we went to Wawel hill

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wawel

This is hill where the castle along with the

Wawel Cathedral

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wawel_Cathedral

The cathedral was built over a number of years so it has a lot of different styles.

I thought the metal water drains added some humor to it.

After all the walking we decided to take a break and do some vodka tasting.

They do love there vodka's or Wodka as the Poles pronounce it.

We picked four and they were on the sweet side. More like a dessert drink that you would sip.

We headed back to the main square and had dinner. We decided to go on the light side of things for dinner. We shared the dinner and ordered a salad and with potato pancakes and goulash. The goulash was not like what we have in the states. It was more like a stew with out any vegetables. For dessert we ordered an apple pie, it was more like a cake.

For a second dessert we had a Paczki, you can have them every day over here.

On Saturday we did a tour of Auschwitz-Birkenau and the salt mine in Wieliczka.

There were three main camps Auschwitz I, II and III and 45 satellite camps. We would be seeing I and II as Auschwitz III was torn down.

I will not explain all that went on at these camps, you can read about it on the web site.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auschwitz_concentration_camp

The first part of the tour was to drive around the Auschwitz II-Birkenau

Most of the buildings are gone but the fence around is still there.

From there we drove to Auschwitz I. This looked like more of a small town. All of the buildings were brick.

There was a hospital there but it was used for experiments and torture and not for helping anyone.

A view of one of the guard shacks

and the electrified fence.

We went back to Auschwitz II-Birkenau to walk around it. This is the train line that would bring people in,

The train like is on the left and the trees in the background is the back of of the camp.

When you read about this place in books, you don't realize the size of it.

We left there and drove for about 45 minutes to the town of Wieliczka. This town is famous for the salt mine that has been there since the 13th century.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wieliczka_Salt_Mine

Across from the entrance of the mine was a great restaurant where we had a lunch of white borscht soup and a pork knuckle. Great food, i had to write down what we ate so i can make it at home.

After lunch we walked to the town square to see the drawing called Salt World.

Poland's largest 3D painting and probably the second largest in the world. The painting is painted on the plate of the Upper Market Square in Wieliczka . Introduces the interior of the salt mine in Wieliczka . The composition depicted on the image contains characteristic elements of the interior of Wieliczka Salt Salts - Chapel of the Holy King - seen in a rocky outcrop. The painting occupies an area of over 350 m² .

This is what it's supposed to look like.

Our picture did not turn out as good as we wanted it to.

From there we walked to the entrance of the salt mine

Instead of riding down an elevator you have to walk down and get a ride back up.

We went down a total of 135 meters, or around 442 feet.

The tour showed the different ways they used to move salt out of the mine.

This is a large block of salt that would be taken out with ropes.

This is a horse treadmill from the 18th century. Once horses went down the mine they never came up. There was a stable area in the mine where the horses stayed.

Besides hauling out salt the miners carved statues out of salt in the mine.

They must have had a lot of free time.

Because there are more than a dozen statues in the mine. This is of a Polish king.

and a four chapels.

This is the largest chapel, everything is salt, even the chandler.

After the mine tour we went back to the hotel and dropped off our stuff. We headed down the main road in town, no cars which made for a nice walk. We found another Vodka tasting and gave it another try. It would be another four shots, potato vodka, a grain vodka, walnut flavor and cherry. For some reason we thought the potato was the best.

We walked back to the main square and were able to get a few good pictures of it at night.

After a walk around the square we found a place to eat with a view.

We were told that Polish pizza's were great so we thought we'd give it a try, it was excellent.

I picked the pizza so Leanne is picking out the wine.

Sunday we got we would walk to the Oskar Schindler factory, made famous from the movie Schindler's List.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oskar_Schindler%27s_Enamel_Factory

http://www.mhk.pl/branches/oskar-schindlers-factory

The factory is now a museum of the occupation of Poland by the Germans during WWII. There are a few things about Schindler.

We had walked thru the jewish section of Krakow and along the river to get there. It was a great day for a walk.

After the museum we walked thru this square of 68 empty chairs. This was the center of the Krakow ghetto and they represents the 68,000 jews deported from here.