Silesia's Cinderella City

As the main city of the ancient region of Silesia, Wroclaw has always been home to the area’s most important institutions and has a remarkable inheritance of historic churches, cathedrals, and secular buildings. As the seat of the Silesian bishopric and a university Wroclaw is a centre for culture and the arts, and oozes that thoughtful but energetic air that pervades all great cities of learning.

The other invaluable inheritance of Wroclaw has been the Polish cultural wealth of the old city of Lwow. At the end of WWII the liberators of Poland were the Red Army and in the post-war redrawing of borders, the Ukraine and White Russia expanded westwards to encompass large chunks of formerly Polish territory. The Polish city of Lwow was among those that suddenly found itself within the borders of the Ukraine and similarly the German city of Breslau found itself within the new Polish borders. Mass immigration by citizens of Lwow transformed German Breslau into Polish Wroclaw and the new citizens brought along art collections, libraries, and the epic painting telling the story of one of Poland’s proudest military victories; the Raclawice Panorama.

But leaving specific buildings and heritage aside, the city is just a very pleasant place to wander around for a few days. The focus of the historic old town is the huge market square lined with tall, narrow townhouses sporting colourfully decorated renaissance facades. There are dozens of outdoor cafes lining the edge of the square, and in it’s centre is a complex of buildings including the old Gothic town hall, which is a massive masonry hedgehog of a building with fanciful dragons, gargoyles, spires, and spikes piercing the sky in every conceivable direction. Narrow cobbled streets lead off the square to innumerable churches, the old Jewish quarter and the river and bridge across to Ostrow Tumski.

Ostrov Tumski, otherwise known as Cathedral Island, was the original founding place of Wroclaw and could almost be a colossal open air museum of Polish Catholicism. Since the bishopric was founded here in the year 1000 churches, monasteries and the cathedral have been built, damaged, destroyed, and added to over many centuries. The most recent addition to the island, the1986 monument to Pope John Paul II, underlines the fact that despite its museum-like credentials, Wroclaw is still a living, evolving city.

A living, evolving city with a very bright future, it would seem.

Quick Tips:

Wroclaw may not be the first name that springs to mind when travellers are planning their visits to Poland, but it has as much to offer as any of its more prominent step-sister cities. Independent travellers have been appreciating Wroclaw’s charms since the fall of the Communist regime, but the city now seems to be catching eyes across the world. As a venue for one of Europe’s largest upcoming sporting events (the 2012 football world cup), Wroclaw will soon have its chance to shine in the international spotlight. And if the city succeeds in its bid to host the World Expo in that same year, its difficult-to-pronounce name will be twisting the tongues of people around the world.

With that in mind, it might be helpful to know how it’s pronounced. The ‘C’ sounds like‘TS’, the ‘W’s at the beginning and end are pronounced like English ‘V’s, but it’s the L with the diagonal line through it that is a problem for most foreigners. It’s apparently supposed to be pronounced like an ‘L’ but without touching your tongue to the roof of your mouth behind your teeth (try it). I certainly didn’t manage it and resorted to what most foreigners seem to do, which is to pronounce it as a ‘W’. The name comes out then something like "VROTS-waav".

The currency of Poland is the Zloty. In July 2007 one Euro buys about 3.8Zloty and one US dollar buys 2.7. Current exchange rates can be checked online.

A copy of the In Your Pocket guide to Wroclaw will be the best 5Zl investment you can possibly make towards an enjoyable and informed stay. The pages and pages of restaurants, cafes, and bars have suggestions for all tastes and budgets and the snippets on subjects like 20th century architecture and Jewish Wroclaw offer insights that are difficult if not impossible to find elsewhere on a short visit. It’s updated quarterly and is available from news stands and accommodation providers who care about providing their guests with good information.

Best Way To Get Around:

The main international train line from Krakow and Katowice to Berlin passes right through Wroclaw. From Krakow the trip takes about 4 hours and it cost me a little over 40Zl. To Warsaw there are several trains each day, taking about six hours and costing around 50Zl. Connections across the nearby border to the Czech Republic are workable but not wonderful. The trip to Prague involves several changes of train and takes about seven hours. The only direct option is an overnight bus that arrives at the awkward time of 1:30am. Getting to Olomouc takes five hours and involves changing at Kedzierzyn Kozle, Raciborz, and Ostrava. The Polish rail website is clumsy to use, but nevertheless is the best place to check current schedules.

By road, motorway #4 runs from Krakow and Katowice, while its highway #8 if you’re coming from Warsaw. Within Wroclaw there are car parks scattered around the edge of the old own which cost between 2 and 3Zl per hour. Parking infringements are punished with wheel clamps, which could be bothersome to have removed if you’re not travelling with a telephone or don’t speak Polish.

Within Wroclaw there’s a dense network of tramlines, but the most useful will probably be the ones that run from the train station to the centre along Kollataja. The 2Zl tickets (bilety) are available from automats near each tram stop and need to be validated upon entering the tram. If you’d prefer a taxi, you can call Super taxi on 9622, Hallo Radio Taxi on 9621 or the adventurous-sounding City Turbo Taxi on 9662. Mostly, I just walked.

The Stranger Hostel is the original of Wroclaw’s four backpackers’ hostels, and if you arrive at the train station with a bag as heavy as the one I was (foolishly) carrying, it’s also the best-located. Diagonally across the intersection from the train station carpark, I was there within five minutes of my train’s arrival.

The entry to the building that houses the hostel is freshly and brightly painted and a beautiful old wooden staircase leads you to the second floor and hostel reception. Check-in was friendly, quick and efficient and included a free map and a tour of the hostel facilities (which included free Internet access and free breakfast until the early afternoon!)

The hostel rooms all open off a central hall, which houses the reception desk, brochure racks and a small store of souvenirs and travel essentials like toothpaste and earplugs for sale. I saw two bathrooms and both were clean and recently renovated as was the kitchen. My favourite room in the hostel though was the big colourful common room. In one corner is a raised platform that has earned itself the moniker ‘supercouch’ and scattered around the rest of the room were three or four two-seater sofas, some stools and for anyone who wanted to sit and write, a table and chairs. Another popular feature of the hostel is the big screen painted onto one wall and the projector facing it. Because I was only there for a couple of nights I spent most of my time out in the city, but the collection of DVD’s is apparently quite comprehensive, and I could certainly see the attraction of vegging out in front of a film for a couple of hours, perhaps something by Kieslowski with English subtitles.

I was impressed by the staff at the hostel as well. The young lady who was working when I arrived was in the mood for a casual chat, and in the course of that I learnt some interesting things about Wroclaw and how people feel about it, both as a city of recently arrived families and the upcoming football world cup in 2012 and the possibility to host the world expo in the same year. The only time I saw her without a smile on her face was when I asked if I could take a photo of the reception area with her in it. The guy who worked the next morning was equally as friendly and informative. From him, I had a thorough map-based tour of the old town, including suggestions for the best places to get coffee (always among the first questions I ask locals in a new place) and where to find some of the mysterious gnomes (not that I ever found the fishermen who are apparently beside the sand-island bridge).

With a location and staff like that, and some of the cheapest beds in town (50Zl) I’ll happily be staying there next time, too.

The Mleczarnia café is a fantastic place. If you’re in Wroclaw, you simply MUST search it out and have a drink there.

And search you will. For one thing there’s no sign. Another problem is that some of the locals don’t even seem to be sure where it is. I’d already heard of the cafe and had its address written down. When I asked a Wroclaw local about the best places for coffee though, it came up in the conversation. Actually he first recommended two chain stores close to the main square, Coffee Heaven and Coffee Republic. They’re a bit in the mould of Starbucks and not really my cup of tea. When I pressed the question further, he said “Oh no I don’t go there myself, my friends and I go to Mleczarnia”. OK now we’re talking!

“It’s a big old dairy, really dark, lots of people sitting inside just by candlelight and at night it turns into a bar sometimes with live music.” Great! Can you show me on the map? He marked two places, “it’s either this street or this street. It’s the old Jewish part of Wroclaw and a bit run down, but interesting to walk around.” When I actually got down there and started looking for it, I realised it was the place I’d already heard about.

The interior I thought was just beautiful. All the furniture was old solid wood, lots of round tables, the candlesticks, crockery and other hardware was all antique and made a marvellous overall impression. It was obviously arranged by someone with a great deal of artistry and not an ounce of pretence. I’ve been to a lot of cafes and bars decorated with old furniture and bric-a-brac, but I thought this place was absolutely magnificent! It had such an effect on me that I’ve been haunting the second hand stores looking for bargains ever since.

But enough about me, how will it be for you? Well, the service was excellent; friendly, fast and patient with my mangled attempts at Polish. The espresso with milk (5.50zl) was perfect for my tastes and the iced coffee (8zl) that I followed it with was delicious. I also had a slice of cake (5zl) and noticed that there were toasted sandwiches, pasta dishes and other snacks available for reasonable prices. Smoking was allowed but the ventilation seemed good and there were also four or five tables under a big old Linden tree out in the back garden.

The only negative that I can come up with is that I didn’t find Café Mleczarnia earlier in my stay. Oh and the other is that it’s five hours from where I live. If Wroclaw were much closer, the cafe alone would be worth making the trip for.

Rating out of five? Six!

You’ll probably want to have a drink at one of the cafes on the square while you’re in Wroclaw and Pod Słodką Borówką seems like as good a place as any.

I was first attracted by the comfy-looking outdoor area and by the name. With a moniker like Under the Sweet Blueberry, there had to be cakes in there somewhere. And sure enough, the first thing you see when you walk in is a thickly stocked glass fronted cake cabinet. Sponges, tarts and slices, chocolate, cream, and raspberries. Table for one, thanks!

Actually I didn’t have to ask for a table. I decided to sit indoors after all, because it was much emptier than the terrace area on the square and there were some loud Englishmen out there who I was certain were going to spoil my mood. I walked through the whole place, including the upstairs room (with a piano) before choosing a small round table with a view of the door and the aforementioned cakes cabinet. (Why there? Well, we former mafia kingpins always like to sit with a view of the door; and the cakes cabinet, well, you’ll have to work that out for yourselves or read some of my other journals…)

The interior was all very nicely decorated. There was lots of marble, cream, antique white and polished glass. The wall that I sat on was completed covered with beveled-edge mirrors and the plushly upholstered sofas and armchairs were all covered in a colourful but elegant floral stripe. Historic photographs and an amazing collection of vintage hats were the finishing touches of the ground floor.

I took my seat, the waiter was with me in seconds and I chose a large iced coffee. I tried to order in Polish, but had to resort to English because the Polish for iced coffee is ‘Mrozena Kawa’, which is not so close to the Czech-with-a-bodgy–Polish-accent ‘Ledova Kava’ that I asked for. The main thing is that the drink was really good. Strong, tasty, not too little ice-cream nor too much cream; for my taste in iced-coffees, pretty close to perfect. And for 12zl in a café on what is arguably Poland’s most beautiful main square, excellent value to boot. If you’re not quite in the mood for ice coffee the normal espressos and macchiatos are all available or you could have one of the enticingly named ice cream sundaes like Pretty Helen or Potpourri Flambé for 18Zl.

So in the place I went to for the cakes and the outdoor area, I neither ate cake nor availed myself of the seats on the square. Despite that, I enjoyed my visit and will certainly go back if I’m ever in Wroclaw again. Hopefully the loud Englishmen will all be at the football and I’ll be able to sit out the front.

The Gnomes of Wroclaw are comic little bronze sculptures that brighten up your day whenever you stumble across them.

The work of local artist Tomasz Moczek, the gnomes are scattered across the old town in some unlikely places. The first one I chanced across was fat papa gnome off to the side of the pedestrian tunnel on busy Swidnicka Ul. and a little further on were the two fellows that became my favourites. Along Swidnicka there is a row of granite balls of uncertain purpose. They’re quite decorative but I’m sure they also act as some kind of traffic barrier along the mostly pedestrian street. I guess the gnomes are unconvinced too, because two of them have decided to roll one of the granite balls away. Progress is slow though because the two gnomes haven’t coordinated their efforts and are pushing in opposite directions. (Perhaps it also has something to do with the balls being firmly set into the ground, but if any one knows about moving stone, it should be gnomes).

Around the corner on Olawsa Ul there’s a whole collection of gnomes taking great delight at swinging from the lampposts and poking fun at the Wroclawans and visitors passing underneath. On Kuznica another gnome stands guard beside a steel hatch that looks like an innocent basement vent but is apparently a major portal into the Silesian Gnome underground. The receptionist at the hostel I stayed in also told me about a couple of gnomes who like to go fishing alongside the Piaskowy bridge, but perhaps they’d taken the weekend off when I was there, because I never managed to find them.

If the gnomes pushing against each other and getting nowhere strikes you as appropriate in a place that suffered 50-odd years of communist-government bureaucracy, then it’s perhaps no accident. Most locals see the gnomes as a tribute to the Orange Alternative surrealist art community, who were highly active during the 1980’s protests against the communist regime. With the heavyhanded suppression of the solidarity movement in the early 80’s, the Orange Alternative turned to absurdism to make their point while avoiding direct conflict with the security forces. Their stunts included dedicating communist anthems to residents of the primate section of the Wroclaw zoo and organizing a 2000-person march to demand the release of Santa Claus (replaced with Father Frost by the fervently irreligious communists). The Orange movement also discovered that dressing up as gnomes was a wonderful technique for deflecting any allegations of suspicious or dangerous political activity.

So, like a lot of things in this part of the world, there’s a serious story behind the gnomes of Wroclaw, but they still manage to make you smile.

The enormous main market square ('Rynek' in Polish) of Wroclaw is one of the city’s main attractions. The greater town hall complex that occupies the centre of the square is almost as big as an entire city block and the actual town hall itself is a fantastic creation of Gothic turrets, spires, and gargoyles. The outside edge of the square is ringed by colourful old townhouses with steep gables and many of the restaurants, cafes and bars have busy outdoor terraces that add a lively festive atmosphere.

The red-brick town hall took centuries to construct and the tale of this is told in the varying architectural styles. The oldest sections are pure early Gothic; plain and functional brick surfaces with pointed arch windows and stone pinnacles along the roof-edge of the gable. The more recent sections show the influence of the early renaissance in round-topped arches, and richly carved surface decorations.

An astronomical clock was built into the eastern facade in 1580 and it watches over a recreation of the old whipping post that stood on the square from 1492 until its destruction during WWII. (The whipping post was the site of public floggings and other punishments but the most frequent use now seems to be as a raised platform for photographers to get their lenses closer to the intricate details of the town hall).

At the opposite end of the town hall to the whipping post is the statue of Fredro and just around the corner is a modern fountain of laminated glass that somehow manages not to look out of place on the otherwise faultlessly restored (after WWII) old town square. This end of the square also opens onto the smaller Salt Square (Plac Solny). The medieval salt market has now been replaced by fast food stalls and a colourful flower market. The townhouses ringing Salt Square are just as beautiful, if not more so, than those on the main market square.

Just steps from the northwest corner of the Rynek stands the gigantic church of St. Elizabeth. The tower is 91 metres high and the privilege of hauling yourself up the 292 steps will cost you 5zl. The views are nice and there’s always a sense of achievement involved in conquering a tower like this, but for me Wroclaw was much more charming at ground level.

That said though, there are only so many times that you can walk around the same square. Fortunately for Wroclaw and its visitors there are plenty of other worthy sights, like the churches on Ostrow Tumski and the Raclawice Panorama, (the great cycle of canvasses depicting General Kosciusko’s 1794 victory over the Russians) that was moved to Wroclaw from Lwow when Central Europe’s borders were redrawn after World War II.

And the outdoor cafes on the square are always there for a refreshing drink when you’re done.