Poland - Fortress, Forest Walk, Speaking Polish

I loved the breakfasts in Poland! Ula said it's easier for her to just put everything out rather than ask people what they want and make individual plates of food. New types of meat and cheese seemed to appear every day as well as different types of salad or sliced vegetables.

Clockwise from top, left:

Basket of two or three types of bread.
Platter of six or seven types of meat.
Plate of three kinds of cheese.
Smoked cheese (texture was like a dry, less salty feta).
Plate with sliced tomatoes, radishes, and cucumber with green onion.
Eggs scrambled with onion and two kinds of sausage.
(The yellow mug is my tea with lemon - when I tried it for the first time and told Ula I liked it she was thrilled and told me I could be her daughter forever - she thought it was "super" anytime I enjoyed Polish things.)
Sliced soft cheese and tomato with vinaigrette dressing.
Butter.
Jam.

This is the fattest, furriest, friendliest weiner dog mutt I've ever seen. They called him "Freddick" but I went with "Freddy".

Spring has arrived in Poland! I enjoyed temperatures in the high teens or low twenties throughout my stay!

Today Ula introduced me to her childhood haunts. She was raised in a beautiful, tiny town called Srebrna Góra, which is nestled in a narrow valley. (Ula moved to Ząbkowice with Ela when she married Stanley.)

Stanley dropped us off along a steep road leading to a fortress above the town. I've had trouble finding information about the fortress online, so for those who like extra info, you'll have to skip it this time! Here are photos of the exterior and interior. Here's what I found: "The biggest fortress in the mountains of Europe (also known as Festung Silberberg), built 1765-1777 as ordered by the Prussian king Friedrich The Great after wars over Silesia region, along with fortresses in Świdnica (Schweidnitz), Kłodzko (Glatz), Nysa (Neisse) and Koźle (Kosel) was called by him 'one by the five keys to Silesia'."



After wandering through the fort, we followed a path along the top of the outside edge of the massive trench surrounding the fortress. Ula told me about how she used to explore this area as a child prior to the area undergoing reconstruction and repairs. She said it was the ultimate place to play games - crawling through tunnels and exploring the hills with complete freedom.

Reminded me of the Kootenays, British Columbia.

On the left and in the background are fortress walls, in the middle is a shallow area of the trench (much deeper and wider at other areas), with the pathway on the right.

We descended the hill and turned down the road to follow another pathway through the forest and along two huge bridges that haven't been used in quite some time. Birds were singing, butterflies fluttered past, trees and flowers were blooming, and the sun was shining brightly. A beautiful day for a long walk! Ula said she used to spend hours walking these trails as a child.

Emerging from the forest to sweeping views of agricultural land.

Stanley picked us up and on our way back to the house we stopped by a bar and Ula said that Stanley was going in to pick up some pierogies for me for supper because she didn't have time to prepare any for me from scratch. I told her it really wasn't necessary and she said, "No, no! We must serve you pierogi while you're here!" I was secretly really thrilled to have a final chance to enjoy pierogi in Poland! Nothing quite like home-made pierogi, and those from the bar were just like my Babcia used to make them!

We stopped at a grocery store to pick up a few items and then Stanley headed home, leaving Ula to give me a tour of Ząbkowice before walking back to the house. It's a small town so the tour didn't take long, but there are some beautiful areas.

The usual impressive town hall, or "rat house" as they like to call it.

Ząbkowice has a leaning tower, but the exact date of its construction is not known, neither is the purpose for which it was originally built. It is also unclear why the tower began leaning, although I was told it was caused by an earthquake. I found a note online stating that the tower is thirty-four metres high and the deviation from its vertical position has now reached over two metres at the top (for comparison, the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa is almost four metres from where it should be).

Poland's take on the leaning tower.

Ruins of a castle in Ząbkowice.

Ruins of a castle in Ząbkowice.

This evening Mariusz brought his girlfriend, daughters, and Ludmila for a visit and so I had a final chance to say goodbye. It was great to see them again and I called my family on Skype so they could meet each other. Jonathan held our dog up to the webcam because I had told everyone how we named our dog Suka, which is the Polish word for female dog, and they got a good laugh out of seeing our fluffy little mutt (yes, we named our dog "Bitch", but most people don't know that's what her name means... although now all of you know...). My dad came on the webcam and used some of the Polish words he could remember, much to everyone's delight.

When they met me, my relatives in Poland were quite horrified that I neither speak Polish nor drink vodka (Ula gasped in mock horror, "What kind of Polish girl are you?"). My favourite quote from Ula was when she was explaining Polish pronunciation and she finally said matter-of-factly, "Polish is very easy after a bottle of vodka." (The tongue needs to be really loose.) I studied Spanish about ten years ago and having experience with the vowel shapes and rolled "r" sound definitely helped when attempting Polish. I was happy that whenever Ula asked me to try saying Polish words I would say the word and she would look surprised for a split second before shrugging and saying, "Ah, she's Polish," as though I were born to speak the language so it shouldn't be surprising that I could pronounce the words decently on the first try. She found it really amusing that I would rattle off a whole bunch of English and then say a word like "babcia" or "pierogi" with Polish pronunciation without a second thought because I grew up using the words.

I did learn a few Polish words during my stay and my favourite was "Smacznego!" (pronounced smatch-NEH-go) which has the same meaning as the French phrase, "Bon appétit!". When sitting down for a meal we would all say, "Smacznego!" to each other. It's a fun word, both in sound and meaning.

The plan was for me to go to Wrocław tonight, stay overnight at Ela's apartment (she had to go back last night and work today), and then she would take me to the airport by bus in the morning to save the long drive first thing in the morning. I asked Ula if I would be catching the bus to Wrocław and she replied incredulously, "No, no, no! You are princess Amanda! You are too little to take the bus! Of course we will drive you." I couldn't argue with an explanation like that.