Kraków, Poland 4

On Day 4 we made a day trip to Memorial and Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau. First we had a quick breakfast at a bakery near our hotel. My cinnamon roll didn't look pretty but it was still warm and actually tasted fine. I think J had a savory sandwich. 

The bakery was also near the main market square of the Old Town.  

A small model of the old Town Hall was placed at the foot of the Town Hall Tower. It showed how the Town Hall was looked like.  

There was also a big head. The bronze sculpture, titled "Eros Bendato (Eros Bound in English)," was made by Igor Mitoraj, a Polish artist in 1999. With empty eye sockets and bandages, the hollow head of Eros, the Greek god of love and desire, is often interpreted as the god’s imprisoned desires. It looked kinda scary... 

We also made a quick visit to St. Francis's Basilica again. I liked the floral and geometric patterns of the walls.

Our excursion driver picked us at the hotel and took us to a meeting point to get on a tourist bus to the Auschwitz-Birkenau museum. The former camp is located in the suburbs of the town of Oswiecim, about 67 km (about 42 miles) west of Kraków. I saw many corn fields from the bus window during the one and a half hour ride. 

We arrived at Memorial and Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest of the German Nazi concentration camps and extermination centers. Of the 1.3 million people, among them a great number of Jews, deported there, more than 1.1 million people lost their lives. The scale is too large to imagine... The tour started at the former Auschwitz I camp. We were in an English-language guided tour group with other 10 or so people. We often ran into other tour groups in the site. Many people were visiting the museum on the day. 

We walked through the main gate to the Auschwitz I-Main Camp with the historically original inscription reading "Arbeit macht frei." The people in the above photo were another tour group. Tour group traffic was jamming around the infamous gate... 

The electrified barbed wire fence ran both side of the gate. I believe today it's not electrified anymore although I didn't confirm it by myself. 

The majority of the Auschwitz I camp has remained intact.

On the other hand, the interiors of some of the buildings have been modified to exhibit educational information and objects as well as historic collections from the camp and its inmates, including preserved photographs, a gas chamber model, empty cans of the poisonous gas Cyclon B, personal items brought by the deportees, etc. There were many photographs, too.

The reconstructed Death Wall was located in the yard at the side of block 11.

The main camp was very large. According to the museum, "In August 1944, it (Auschwitz I) held about 16,000 prisoners."

This gas chamber and crematorium was open for tour.

After the main camp tour, the tourist bus took us to the former Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp, which is 3.5km far from the Auschwitz I. The Auschwitz II was the largest part of the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex, which held over 90,000 prisoners in 1944.

Many brick chimneys, the remains of ruined prisoner barracks stood over there.

At the end of preserved railway was the destroyed gas chambers.

We took a look at the inside of a preserved wooden prisoner barrack, which was the end of the tour.

The departure to Kraków had a delay because the bus hit a van (still the bus was a victim) at the parking and we had to wait for police. Eventually the bus was ready to go. I haven't seen any police after all, though. I saw a field filled with small white flowers from the bus window. Such a peaceful beautiful scenery looked a little awkward after the visit to the enormous death camp...   

We were back to Kraków safely. The ballon was up!

We got off the bus around the north of the Jewish quarter. It was around 5pm. We didn't eat any during the tour. We were tired but still wanted to eat something light and quick before going back to hotel. There was a Pierogi restaurant called Mirror Bistro. Pierogi sounded perfect. The place looked casual, like a fast food restaurant, and nicely quiet with only a few customers. 

I had two kinds of vegetarian pierogi - Ukrainian Classic (potato, cottage cheese, and onion) and Polish Christmas (Polish cabbage and forest mushrooms). You can choose one topping. I did sour cream. They were tasty and wonderful! The best pierogi in Kraków for me! J had the mix of Polish Christmas and, I think, Farmer's Field (groats, onion, bacon, and green parsley). His topping was fried onion. I believe he liked both the pierogi and the topping very much.

It was lovely to stroll in the Planty park on our way to hotel after the long busy day.

To be continued...