The restaurant is one of the most expensive in Krakow, but the café is a great resting place for feet tired out by stairs and tours.

The castle tours are great for anyone who likes princesses and knights, or furniture, architecture, and interior decoration. A unique collection of heads (sculpted in wood, not chopped off!) is exhibited in the audience hall’s ceiling to remind the king that he is under scrutiny and to give him the benefit of different experiences.

For kids, the grotto at the foot of the hill by the river is guarded by a fire-breathing dragon. But he only manages to breathe fire in the summer. Perhaps the Polish winter is too cold for him!

Go early in the morning to get your tickets, since even on a freezing February weekday with snow, tickets to the castle tours were selling out before 10am.

The castle is run by the state and is closed on Mondays and free on Wednesdays.

The cathedral, run by the Catholic Church, is subject to a separate entry fee. Like the castle, it is very interesting from an historical and architectural point of view. It has the tombs of kings, poets, and saints.

The tours are not suitable for wheelchairs, and buggies must be left in the cloakroom. It is quite interesting to look around the outside even if you can't get in.

How to judge where the real heart beats? For me, Wawel is the most impressive and most resonant in history and significance. That seemed to be echoed by the fact that visitors numbered at least as many proud Poles as curious tourist foreigners.

For more than five centuries, Wawel was Poland’s seat of power and government and, even when the capital formally became Warsaw, kings continued to be buried in the cathedral (9am-3pm Tues-Sat, 12-3pm Sun). Fragments of the earliest structure (from 1020) can still be seen, though the current Gothic building dates from C14. On entering the cathedral, look up for prehistoric bones hanging by the door – supposedly the Krak dragon (of whom more below), though in fact a mix of mammoth/whale/hairy rhinoceros; removal is supposed to presage destruction of the cathedral. Inside, you’re immediately faced with the overwhelming giant sarcophagus (the Mausoleum of St Stanislav), and, to the side, a beautifully sculpted marble tomb of King Wladyslaw Jagiello.

Your eye is drawn down towards the choir-stalls which dominate the centre of the edifice, down to the Baroque high altar. Down signposted steps is the crypt housing the remains of 41 Polish monarchs (only four are elsewhere), and the cathedral museum (10am-3pm Tues-Sun, 5zl) in the northeast corner behind the sacristy includes illuminated texts and church ceremonial regalia and curiosities. From the outside, the dazzling golden dome catches the sun most attractively. Cathedral tickets are bought at a separate office 2 minutes back downhill – timed entry in high season.

The castle is divided into four sections, not all of which are open at once (State rooms – Komnaty Krolewskie; Treasury/armoury – Skarbiec; "Lost Wawel" – Zaginiony; and Orient Museum – Sztuka Wschodu). The first two are excellent, with guided tours round the art works, sculpture and tapestries plus salons in tableaux vivant; and a well-presented collection of jewels, crowns, china, baubles coupled with guns, swords, cannons, armour (for man, child and horse) and ferocious maces and daggars. Highly entertaining for all the family though the "star" exhibit (the Szczerbiac sword –C13 copy of 1018 original) did little for me.

The approach towards the cathedral, up the hill, gives a fine view over the river Wista, and you’ll espy below a path on which a metallic statute of the Krak dragon stands (picture below) on guard to the "Dragon’s Cave" (Smocza Jama – May-Sept 10am-5pm daily, 3zl – leave it to the school parties). Snatch a photo when Poles aren’t clambering on the rocky podium – if not, postcards abound. Occasionally, the dragon entertains by breathing fire (though he’s a law unto himself as to timing).

We had hoped to see the Wawel Castle, but arrived too late to get inside anywhere but the dragon's den. So, after walking around the courtyard, we descended a huge, claustrophobic spiral staircase down to a huge empty cave, which we walked through, and out to the dragon, a huge sculpture that breathed real fire!

Inside the rock are a series of caves which, according to legend, were once home to a fierce dragon. It was only after Prince Krak had defeated the dragon that the city of Krakow could be established. For 8 zloty, you can descend into the atmospheric caves and soak up their spooky ambiance. At the exit from the cave stands Bronislaw Chromy's 1972 bronze recreation of the dragon; it breathes real fire every couple of minutes.

A sizeable settlement with roots going back to the Bronze Age was built up here, and, in the 10th century, the rulers of the Piast dynasty erected a Romanesque residence here. That was replaced by a stone building, Krakow's first castle, when Poland's capital was officially moved here from Poznan in the mid-11th century.

The castle was rebuilt in the early 14th century in Gothic style by Ladislaus the Short; the surviving turret and pavilion from this phase now house the treasury and armory. The rest of the surviving fortifications, including the Thieves Tower, the Sandomierz Tower, and the Senator's Tower, are 15th-century additions built at the behest of Ladislaus Jagiello to refortify the castle during the early years of the rule of the Jagiellon dynasty.

Nowadays the rock is most famous as the home of two of Poland's finest tourist attractions, the 16th-century Royal Castle and the 14th-century Krakow Cathedral. These have both become symbols of Polish pride and are covered in separate journal entries.