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| The view from our balcony |
The hotel had an optional breakfast, but on this day we chose to walk outside and see what was available nearby. We ended up at Costa, a British chain coffee shop.
Note to self: don't let the kids have free reign on choosing food. The girls each had a caramel slice (but didn't even eat it all), and Miles had cake I think. Because of this, Clara was extra crabby throughout the morning.
After breakfast, we headed toward Old Town. Google Maps had told us that this would be approximately a 25 minute walk, but with cranky kids it took about 45. To be fair, I did stop occasionally to take photos, but it was mostly the kids who were slow.
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| See what I did there? |
We walked through Saxon Garden, a lovely public park. The kids wanted to play at the playground, but we made them wait (mean grownups).
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| The arches in the background are part of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier |
We lingered at this pond while the kids ran around and chased pigeons, one of their favorite holiday activities.
I'll have to do a separate post just about the architecture, because it was really beautiful and interesting. As we walked, we told the kids to look out for mermaids. The mermaid is the symbol of the city, and they are all over the place. I'm sure we missed more than we saw, but it was a good way to keep the kids from getting bored of walking.
Pretty soon we reached Old Town, and the kids took several minutes to run around and explore.
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| Royal Palace |
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| Part of the wall that used to surround the city |
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| St Anne's Church |
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| King Sigismund's Column |
We made our way to Market Square, where the Warsaw Mermaid can be found. The kids loved this area, and we paused again to let them burn off some energy.
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| The kids wanted a silly picture. I love how Matt and Anna have the same look on their faces. |
We noticed that Clara was growing increasingly shouty, so we decided to have lunch. (With all we had seen so far, seems hard to believe that it was only midday by this time.) We found a cute little restaurant on a side street and ate there.
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| He loves his Gigi |
I had coffee that had a shot of some kind of honey liquor in it. It was strong but nice. We had pierogi, potato pancakes, Polish sausages, and pork steak. Everything we tried was delicious.
After lunch, we had the kids play in Market Square a little more while Matt and I picked out our art souvenir.
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| She makes friends everywhere |
At this point, we started wandering again.
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| Having fun outside of a shop |
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| Tickle fight |
We came upon another section of the wall that used to encircle the city, and we were able to walk on this part.
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| The views from above |
We followed the wall, and I was happy that there wasn't a drop off on one side like the walls in York.
Before long, we had arrived at the Barbican, originally built in 1540 to help defend the city. Much of the structure was destroyed in World War II, but was rebuilt using bricks from demolished historic buildings from other Polish cities.
We then went down to follow the wall from the ground.
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| Look, I was there too |
Below is the Statue of the Little Insurgent, which commemorates the children who assisted and died in the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. It was touching to see, although the gravity was lost on our kids.
By this point, the kids were saying that it was boiling hot (it was not), and that the only thing that would help was ice cream. They had been walking all day, so we gave in and then circled back to Old Town.
I took a few photos of Anna in front of what I thought was St Anna's Church. It wasn't until we returned home that I discovered that it's called St Anne's Church. (Sorry, Anna.)
There are benches set up around the city that play Chopin music. We only found two, but the kids loved playing the music and dancing.
Since the kids had been relatively well behaved, we took them to the playground at Saxon Garden for some free time. On the way, we approached the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The building is the only part of Saxon Palace to survive World War II, and we happened to arrive just before the changing of the guard.
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At the playground, the adults sat in the shade while the kids played. Mostly by digging and rolling around in the sand.
After a good play, we walked back toward the hotel along Nowy Swiat. This was a busy street with shops, flower stalls, and places to eat.
The kids were filthy and tired, so we grabbed takeaway from Kebab King and ate in the hotel.
The food was okay, but the paczki we had for dessert more than made up for it.
Once we ate, we chucked the kids in the shower and let them watch television. Paw Patrol in Polish is apparently just as entertaining as it is in English. Miles swore that the theme song was saying, "Krav maga," which was pretty amusing. After a couple of shows, it was time to go to bed. I scooted myself down a bit on the bed, and although it was not exactly comfortable, it was a better night's sleep than before.
