Exploring my Polish Heritage

After saying goodbye to John and Jaqueline I had another week until I was to meet up with my friend Hannah in the Republic of Georgia.  Since I had seen most of what I wanted to see in Turkey I decided I needed to go someplace new.  It was a tough decision but in the end I decided on Krakow, Poland since several friends gave it rave reviews and the flights were affordable.  I knew that my mom’s side of the family was polish so I asked my grandma if she knew where in Poland the family came from.  Turns out that my great-great grandparents lived in Krakow!  How fantastic is that…

Krakow

I flew to Krakow via Berlin, Germany and was surprised when I did not have to go through passport control upon leaving Germany.  And when I arrived to Poland no one asked to see my passport.  I guess that’s how it is when you travel within the European Union.

I arrived to Krakow airport at dusk and knew that I was going to love this place.  The temperature outside was perfect and I was surrounded by green meadows with red roofed houses.  I was quite content that I had missed the train into the city by 2 minutes and had to wait another hour for the next train.  I was just enjoying being outside in the beautiful Krakow countryside!

Krakow

I spent my time in Krakow wandering the streets of the “old town”, being entertained by the many street performers, and enjoying the smells which reminded me of my childhood days in my great grandmother house.

Levitating street performer in Krakow

Approximately 40 miles outside of Krakow is the infamous Auschwitz Concentration Camp.  It took about 3 hours to tour both Auschwitz I and Birkenau and at the end of the day everyone was emotionally exhausted.  I learned a lot that I had not known previously and there was one display that really got to me – the display case that contained heaps of women’s hair shaved off after the women were gassed.  Over 4,000 lbs of women’s hair had been found and that’s not including the hair that had been sold to textile industries for making blankets and clothes. 

Auschwitz entrance

Piles of prisoner shoes

There were also lots of pictures taken during that time showing how emaciated the prisoners had become.  The average diet in Auschwitz (bread/coffee/soup) permitted a prisoner to remain alive no more than three months.  There was one disturbing picture of a woman who had arrived to the camp weighing 165 lbs and 4 months later weighed only 55 lbs.

After the heaviness of Auschwitz I decided to do something fun and headed 2 hours south to Zakopane, a mountain ski town on the border with Slovakia, which in summer is a premier hiking destination.   The day I arrived it was sunny and warm and I spent the day getting acquainted with the city and figuring out the scoop on the hiking. 

Zakopane

I was excited about the day hike I was going to do - to this picturesque lake - but when I awoke the following morning it was raining cats and dogs and continued to rain the entire day and into the night.  I was so bummed but it gave me time to catch up on my travel stories and also to chat with other travelers - one of whom had been traveling for 4 years! 

Relaxing Greek Isle Style

After a whirlwind trip through Turkey (13 cities in 14 days) we headed over to Greece with the intention to relax… but first we had to endure a very long trip to reach our destination of Santorini.  We left Turkey on a 1-hour ferry headed for Chios, Greece and the following morning at 4am sleepily boarded a 10-hour ferry bound for Athens. 

Chios - our first taste of Greece

This was one time when I wish I had purchased the lightweight sleeping bag I was contemplating while in Nepal … everyone seemed to have the same idea - to sleep on the floor (and unfortunately right across the aisle from us, sleeping on the floor, was the loudest snorer I have ever encountered).  Slightly exhausted, we arrived to Athens with 5 hours to spare until the ferry to Santorini so we decided to check out the “must see” in Athens, The Acropolis. 

 The Acropolis in Athens

Back on the ferry bound for Santorini we felt like we were on a luxury cruise liner.  By far this was the nicest ferry I have ever been on.  Finally at 1am we set foot on the island of Santorini… 22 hours since we had last slept!

Santorini wins the prize for the most dramatic and stunning place I have ever laid eyes upon.  The island is a result of a volcano that erupted over 3,000 years ago, leaving a submerged crater in the middle of the sea surrounded by high cliffs of what would be the inside of the crater.  The villages on Santorini have white buildings with blue domed churches perched high on the cliffs and instead of streets you find winding paths of steps which make it easy to get lost but fun to explore this unique way of living. 

Stunning Santorini

Without a doubt Santorini is one of Greece’s most picturesque and most visited spots and the tourists proved that by arriving by the boat loads – in fact in was common to see 4 cruise ships in the harbor, and it wasn’t even high season yet!  The passengers were dropped off at the old port and from there to town you had to climb a switchback trail of 600 steps.  I was in heaven but those not looking for a workout paid to ride on the back of a mule.

Cruise ships in Santorini's harbor

After some much needed relaxation and exploring all there was to see on Santorini we headed over to the island of Mykonos which was touted as a “must see”.  We had one night in Mykonos before taking a ferry to the island of Samos and that turned out to be more than enough time for us.  We spent the day driving all around the island trying to figure out what all the hype was about.  Our only conclusion was that most likely Mykonos was a great place but Santorini’s beauty had ruined us.  

Mykonos

Getting back to Turkey from Greece the following day was a story in itself.  The travel agent who had sold us the ferry ticket forgot to check with the ferry company beforehand and we were in for a surprise when we showed up to get our tickets only to be told that the 8am ferry was not running and we’d have to wait for the 5:30pm ferry.  That gave us an entire day to explore the island of Samos.  Around 3pm with nothing to do we decided that we needed to drink the wine and ouzo we had purchased in Greece since we were flying later that day and most likely would not be allowed to bring it on board.  It was a fun way to pass a few hours – maybe a little too fun since we almost missed our ferry! 

The ferry was over an hour late getting into Kusadasi, Turkey and we were a bit nervous since we had a flight to catch.  With the taxi driver telling us to “close our eyes” while speeding down the roads and trying to calm our nerves by telling us that he had a 2-year old boy at home, he managed to get us to the airport 30 minutes before our plane took off.  What a stressful end to a relaxing time in Greece!

Whirlwind Travels through Turkey

For months I had been traveling amongst the filth and poverty of developing countries and was getting burned out (not to mention I had picked up a cough in China that was still bothering me 2 months later) so needless to say I was more than excited to arrive in Turkey.  The plan was to meet up with 2 friends of mine from California (John and Jaqueline) and travel together for a month.  After traveling alone for so long it was a wonderful treat to be in the company of great friends.

John, Jaqueline and Jamie

Arriving to Istanbul from Nepal (the poorest country in Asia) was a bit of a shock.  Long gone were the $4 hotel rooms and $2 meals.  Turkey was expensive!  Istanbul, a city of over 15 million people, was unique in that it is situated on 2 continents:  Asia and Europe.  For a city of that size I was surprised at how clean it was and how charming and hospitable the Turkish people were. 

Streets of Istanbul

After spending a few days in Istanbul exploring the sights we set out on a whirlwind trip of Turkey (10 cities in 12 days)!  Our first stop was Cappadocia where we stayed in a “cave hotel” and explored the fascinating cave dwellings unique to that area.  We also stopped off to visit one of the many underground cities that housed over 20,000 people at any one time.

Cave dwellings in Cappadocia

Leaving Cappadocia we headed to Konya, to visit the Mevlâna Museum where Rumi’s tomb in located and then continued on to Antalya, a city on the Mediterranean coast.

For the next few days we drove a lot!  Driving along the Mediterranean coast we stopped off at many of the seaside villages including Kemer, Ucagiz, Gocek, Olympos, Cirali, and Oludeniz.  After being on the go for so long we decided that we needed to stay in one place longer than just one night (mainly so we could do our laundry)so we chose to stay at a hotel on the river in Dalyan for two nights.

View from hotel in Dalyan

Leaving Dalyan we headed for Bodrum, on the Aegean Sea and were so excited to visit the castle and the archaeology, but were disappointed when we found out that it was closed on Monday’s, the day we happened to be there.  We continued on up towards Izmir and on the way stopped off to visit Ephesus, an ancient Greek city. For many years it was the second largest city of the Roman Empire.   Ephesus had a population of more than 250,000 people in the 1st century BC, making it the second largest city in the world during that time.

Ephesus, the ancient Greek city

We made it to Izmir in time to drop the car off which we had rented in Antalya and caught the bus to the port town of Cesme so we could catch a ferry over to Greece.  Unfortunately we missed the ferry connection that day and had to stay the night in Cesme which actually turned out to be a cute little town.