Wednesday 20 July 2011

And One for Buckets

And One for Buckets

            Today was the day to leave Krakow.  We left our bags at the hostel in the luggage room and finished up the previous night’s laundry (the towels remained).  We went to the milk bar again for food.  Will got meat and potatoes (in “Haunter’s Sauce”, which I assume is made of the Pokémon’s juices).  I got the apple pie thing and an omelette.  We then marched to Wawel Castle, where we saw Smokza’s cave (the armory was sold out of tickets).

            Smoksza (pronounced “SMOKE-sha”) was a mighty and terrible dragon.  He was a menace to the town, constantly killing people.  He also ate lots of babies and sheep (their words, not mine).  A valiant knight came up with a daring and clever scheme to defeat Smoksza.  He soaked a sheep in sulfur and fed it to the dragon.  It reacted violently with the dragon, forcing him to drink half of the town’s river.  The dragon then exploded.

            Smoksza then became the symbol of Krakow.  Yup.
Will makes an iffy replacement dragon. 

            The cave was short but neat.  It also cost €0.75, so it was totally worth it.  After the cave, we went to the Jewish district, Kazimier.  I was determined to go into at least one synagogue this trip.  Two were closed, but two were open.  The ones that were open were both museums, no longer active.  Krakow only has one active synagogue (not many Jews left in Poland, sadly).  I was really surprised that it wasn’t open on Saturday (the end of Sabbath, which starts Friday at dusk), but it was under construction or something.  The synagogues were pretty cool.  A lot of them were pretty beat up, I assume from the Germans, but the fragments that remain are neat.

            I was pretty tuckered out and had trouble navigating us back (yay two nights of dancing till really late).  Thankfully, Will’s sense of direction and use of landmarks brought us back to the castle, where I was then able to navigate us the rest of the way. 

            For dinner, we had pizza at some place in the town square.  After that, we went to the train station.  This was a sad train.  Will confirmed that his glasses were in Prague late last night, so we tried getting a bed reservation at about noon today.  They were out.  We had to sit in normal seats.

            Unfortunately, these weren’t even normal seats that have seats in front of them.  In those seats, you can curl into a ball, prop yourself up, and sleep, albeit uncomfortably.  These were two rows of four seats, each facing each other, in a small cabin.  It was uncomfortable as fuck.  Goddamn.  Basically, the night sucked.

Will’s Corner
            I want a dragon.  First person to bring me one gets a fabulous prize.
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 Dear Joe,
            When you inevitably explode, you will become the patron saint of parties.
Love,
Will and Andy

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