Eurasia Mega Trip - Day Three - Exploring Old Town Warsaw

 We only have a couple of days in Warsaw so tired or not we wanted to make use of our time. We chose our Airbnb because it was close to the primary tourist destinations of Old and New Town.

Warsaw is one of the most interesting places to visit from a historical rebuilding standpoint. During WWII, the city was almost completely leveled after the Warsaw Uprising. However, there had been work done for years prior (even before the war started), cataloging in the most detailed way all of the architectural detail of the city. When the war ended, there began a total rebuilding of the city based upon this work. It took many decades. During the process, decisions had to be made on what specific look any given building or monument should have because none of them were static in time. A building might originally date back to the Middle Ages and have had a number of renovations due to the changing style over time. Or their were fires and rebuilding. So decisions had to be made as to what period any particular building was going to be shown as. 

With as short a period of time as we are here, we obviously were not going to go into terrible depth with each building. But it was a good thing to keep in mind as we viewed what looks like a totally well preserved environment. 

Fotografie

Krasinski Palace, Palace of Justice, and Monument to the Warsaw Uprising Fighters

  

Unidentified Building 

 

 A Plethora of Churches

 

 

 (Extra credit - What kind of capitals on the columns?)

 

 

(Extra, Extra Credit - Two kinds of capitals on this one)

 

  

 And yes, because we KNOW you LOVE the BAROQUE

The interiors 

 

 

 

Contemplating the Divine

  

 And just when you think you will go postal over another Baroque/Rococo interior, you get...

 

 A Modern/Gothic Archdiocese Cathedral

 

 

 Scenes from the Castle Square, Old Town Square and streets between

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Espouses Fotograficus Polonaise

 

 Authentic recreation of traditional Polish Architectural Scaffolding

 

 Warsaw Through the Eyes of its Statues

 "Begone you modern high rises from our historical center!"

 

"You cannot resist change"

"We will defend the homeland!"

"My King, I bring you an army!"

"I ask for an army. I get a mass of tour groups."

"My lord. This is as good as it gets these days."

 

"Maybe you need a good, kick ass Mermaid?"

Let us reflect on this

SIGNS OF THE WORLD

 Traditional Polish Food

 

 A restaurant that either has smack down poetry or bare knuckle fighting

 

 There is a popular campaign against overly ornate burgers

Eurasia Mega Trip 2025 - Days One and Two - de-I and Wife Show How Veteran Travelers Role with the Punches

Day One and Two are all Travel. Getting from the US of A to our first agenda stop, Warsaw, Poland. 

On paper, this was a reasonably simple voyage. Pick-up a flight in Albuquerque. Fly to Chicago. Connect to our fight to Warsaw, Poland. Get to our Airbnb and there you are. First two days of travel done. But in the world of air travel there are always surprises that require the traveler to adjust. The travel of the last two days was a classic example. 

Our Monday morning flight from Albuquerque to Chicago was sold out. And it took off quite a bit late for number of incremental reasons. There were many on the flight with tight connections. The flight crew asked that all the passengers who did not have tight connections, let those who did deplane first. To my amazement, everyone did just that. 

It was no sweat to Wife and I as we had a 5 hour layover. Despite all that time, we found when we went to board that we were required to get the connecting plane's specific boarding passes as we were on another airline. Minor hiccup in the scheme of things. 

A couple minor things on the flight; wife's video remote didn't work, they didn't give us menus, etc. nothing major.

We arrive in Warsaw Poland. We have been warned by the EEU's new biometric entry/exit system could lead to long delays at arrival. That turned out NOT to be the case. We were off our plane in very short order, and while to process took a bit of time, it was not actually much longer than normal. 

That was offset by our bags not arriving. You would think that with all the travel de-I and Wife have done over the decades that this would be a common occurrence. But I've actually never had a bag misplaced. After waiting and waiting, Wife finally found the lost baggage office. Our airline app told us the bags had been loaded on the plane. A few calls and they said that maybe our bags didn't get on the conveyor underneath for some reason. We're told to go back to the baggage carousel and wait another 15 minutes or so to see if they came up. Damn if they didn't. 

Great! Now we have bags. We are too early to check-in to our Airbnb. We've been instructed to call the person cleaning the apartment when we arrive. They will arrange for us to drop off our bags until the apartment is ready. Except the phone number given to us doesn't work. So we cool our heels in the airport. Finally, we get a message on Airbnb with the correct phone number. We can come and drop off our bags.

We do. Now we have to kill four hours until we can get in the apartment. We try walking around but are too tired. So we find a park bench and just wait. 

At last we make it to the apartment. It is pretty nice. After the keeper shows us around, we are unpacking. Wife turns a bedroom light on and there is a huge electrical snapping noise followed by lights being off in about 25% of the apartment. We call the keeper back. The circuit breaker box was hidden behind a panel in a closet. Find the proper breaker. Lights back on. Later find a tiny bulb in a fixture had burst and their were small glass fragments on one of the beds. (Since I slept in that bed, I can confirm I got them off and did not wake up a bloody mess.)

We decided to go to the supermarket near by to get some things for breakfast (which turned out to be a very good idea). For dinner, we went to an Italian pizza place because it was close. 

After dinner, we relaxed and just settled in. Transition complete. Voyage has commenced.