Poland
Poland is the large neighbour south of the Baltics. This guide stays with four cities: rebuilt Warsaw, royal Kraków, the Hanseatic port of Gdańsk, and the textile city of Łódź. The currency is the złoty, not the euro. Polish is the language on every sign.
- Currency
- Złoty (PLN)
- Language
- Polish
- Capital
- Warsaw
Cities
Warsaw
Warsaw is a capital that rebuilt its old town from paintings and ruins, then kept growing into a wide modern city on the Vistula. The castle square, the Palace of Culture, and the parks are three different Warsaws, and a first visit should touch all three.
Kraków
Kraków kept its old centre through the war, a huge market square, a castle on the Wawel rock, and the former Jewish quarter of Kazimierz a short walk south. It is Poland’s most complete historic city, and in summer it knows it. Mornings on the square are the kind ones.
Gdańsk
Gdańsk is the old port of the Baltic, a rebuilt Hanseatic main street running to the Motława, a huge brick church, and the shipyard gates where Solidarity began. The centre is walkable and, in summer, very full. The crane and the water are the orientation.
Łódź
Łódź is a nineteenth-century factory city that became a capital of film and of very long streets, above all Piotrkowska. The textile palaces and the Manufaktura mills are the sights. It does not pretend to be Kraków, and that is its interest.