Walking. Gossip. Travel.

Category: Poland

  • Warsaw – Robert Schuman Roundabout

    Warsaw – Robert Schuman Roundabout

    I’m easily confused at the best of times, but I was a bit puzzled as to why there’s a stone commemorating the life of Robert Schuman at what seemed like a random place in Warsaw. There’s no doubting the great ability of Schuman, he’s one of the best known of the post-war political European leaders and also a founding father of the European Union.

    It took me a little while to work out that the stone is here because in 2017 the Polish authorities named a roundabout after him. I’m not entirely sure why this roundabout was selected and indeed why a roundabout was thought to be a fitting honour. Anyway, it’s here for anyone who wants to visit it, just a little south of the centre of Warsaw.

  • Warsaw – PINTA Warszawa Craft Beer

    Warsaw – PINTA Warszawa Craft Beer

    It’s becoming more challenging for me to find a craft beer bar in Warsaw that I haven’t been to, but I persist in my efforts. Since it’s my first day back in Warsaw I visited my favourite bar in the city first, Hoppiness, and was delighted as ever. After that, I made the short walk to PINTA which I understand opened earlier this year. They’re a brewery who have been trading for some years and were apparently the first Polish brewers to have an international collaboration, with O’Hara’s from Ireland. Things seem to be going well for this bar judging by the reviews, they’re nearly all positive at the moment.

    The beer options are chalked up on the board, although they’re also listed at https://pinta-warszawa.ontap.pl/. The server was helpful and I’ve realised how much of my already very limited Polish that I’ve managed to forget. Not that it mattered much in this instance, the server spoke fluent English. In terms of the beer selection, it was excellent with a range of beer styles and the like, all neatly presented.

    This is the upstairs area of the bar, it’s all quite spacious.

    I went for the Kwas Xy sour from Browar PINTA, the brewery who operate this bar. A decent sour, taste of stone fruit and suitably, well, sour.

    I also went for cod bites and these have to be collected from a little hatch upstairs. A little greasy, but they tasted fine, although I tend to like most things in batter (preferably not vegetables, although they taste better in batter).

    This is a decent enough bar, although it was a little sterile since I visited on a Tuesday early afternoon when I was the only customer. Service wasn’t quite as engaging as Hoppiness, but it was polite and friendly, so that was more than good enough for me (and Hoppiness set very high standards). The bar was spotlessly clean, the environment was comfortable and so all really rather lovely. They also opened a bar in Wrocław in 2018, which reminded me that I haven’t been to that city for a few years. All very on-trend though, I’d like to think that there might be a little chain of these throughout Poland in a few years.

  • Warsaw – Fort Mokotów

    Warsaw – Fort Mokotów

    Mostly photos in this post, but I was intrigued by Fort Mokotów as I’ve had a little look at these forts across the city in the past, including Fort V Włochy. There’s not much at this fort, which was originally constructed in the 1880s and then extended within a few years. These structures were built as part of the Warsaw Fortress to defend the city from attack. This one was used to house Polish radio in the inter-war period, which meant that the Germans sought to destroy it early on during the war (before they sought to destroy everything else in this great city).

    Today, there are a number of restaurants and bars located here alongside numerous offices, but there’s not much else. Interesting though.

  • British Airways (London Heathrow T5 to Warsaw)

    British Airways (London Heathrow T5 to Warsaw)

    For the first time in just over a year, I’ve been able to get the chance to return to Poland, something which I’m more than pleased with. That meant a journey from London’s Heathrow T5 into Warsaw Chopin airport with the hope that I had collected together the correct documents.

    I’ve written about the BA T5 Galleries South Lounge before and so won’t repeat that, as not much has changed recently in terms of its operation. Drinks are still self-service, but food needs to be ordered via a QR code and is brought over by staff. The food delights in the morning included the breakfast option of a bacon roll with hash brown, alongside a fruit salad. The lunch-time options included Vietnamese vegetable curry, chicken jalfrezi with lime & coriander rice, beef keema with rice, mixed leaf salad, five bean salad with feta and a black rice, Quinoa & Edamame salad. I went for the jalfrezi and five bean salad, with the former being excellent and the latter being OK but a little short on feta. I’m always content with the quality of the food, but some people inevitably moan about BA’s offering.

    The lounge was though the busiest that I’ve seen it and that perhaps suggests some sort of normality is definitely returning. A couple of customers were completely rude in their dealing with the staff and although I wanted to say something, I thought that no good could possibly come from that. I was able to get one of the high seats by the power points and remained in the lounge for three hours or so, all very relaxing.

    The gate wasn’t called for ten minutes after it was meant to have been, instead it then switched to ‘please wait’. I guessed that this meant it would be departing from A10, the bus gate.

    And here we are, the bus gates. Boarding was well managed and Group 1 and then Groups 1 to 3 were allowed to board first. I’m in Group 2, as I’m not decadent enough to be in Group 1, but that was enough to get on the bus first.

    The bus was a little over-filled I thought (I didn’t photograph that), not in terms of it being dangerous, it just wasn’t comfortable for those who boarded last.

    And time to board, the aircraft was the A320 G-EUYT, which I’ve never flown on before. And I accept that no-one is really bothered about that, but there we go…. The aircraft was brought into service in February 2014 and it has only been used by British Airways.

    I had a seat in the emergency exit row which I like because of the slight extra space, but dislike that my bag has to be in the overhead lockers. For the first time I’ve seen though, a member of cabin crew was guarding the lockers by the emergency exits so that customers could ensure that their bags were placed there and not half way down the plane. Although I boarded early and this didn’t make any difference to me, it did speed up boarding later on.

    The flight was full and I’m not sure that there were any empty seats. The customer next to me arrived towards the end of boarding and started to put his bag on the floor. I was standing up as I was in the aisle seat and let him in, thoughtfully asking him if he wanted to put that bag in the overhead locker. He replied “no” and in my very British way I added “are you sure, it might be easier?” to which he replied “no” again so I sat back down. The customer at the window seat, who seemed perfectly friendly, was more direct and said only slightly gruffly “that bag needs to go in the overhead locker”, at which point I had to stand up again as that more direct approach worked.

    The aircraft was meant to take off at 15:15 and arrive at 18:50, but we took off late due to a delay in the baggage being loaded. We eventually took off at 15:47, but time was made up en route and we arrived at 18:46 (can I add that I didn’t sit and measure that, I took that information from Flight Radar). As an aside, the crew weren’t handing out wipes for customers to clean their seat area as they’ve done over the last year, I’m not sure whether that’s by omission or whether that has been scrapped.

    The on-board catering and I’m happy with this, it annoyed me when they removed it. There’s the option to buy additional items, but I noticed only a handful of people did so. Crisps and water is sufficient for me though, it wasn’t a long flight.

    The fare cost me £30 each way, which I have to say continues to offer excellent value for money, especially given that BA funded lounge access for me before the flight. The crew were friendly, the aircraft was spotlessly clean and the pilots were professional with timely announcements. I have nothing really to fault BA on, I thought that this was a well managed service.

    For those interested, anyone going to Poland at the moment needs to fill in a locator form and have their Covid pass ready, with both being checked. The Brexit arrangements mean that British travellers are inevitably now sent to a different area which all takes longer and passports are now stamped. Some idiotic British passenger (I admit to be judgemental as she was being rude) was lucky to be allowed in as she was complaining that she was being asked where she was staying and why was only she being asked? The member of the Polish Border Guard was calm and helpful, not mentioning that it was because she hadn’t bothered to fill in a locator form. This whole process only took around five minutes though and with that, I was back in Poland. How very lovely.

  • Poznan – Old Zoo

    Poznan – Old Zoo

    This zoo opened in 1874 and it remained the city’s main zoo until 1974, when the New Zoo partly replaced it as it no longer offered enough space for the animals. This location is much nearer to the city centre and I rather liked it, primarily focused on reptiles but still with plenty to see. It was relatively quiet when I visited, with plenty of space for the animals and reptiles that remained, with entry today being free to enter the park area and it was just over £1 to see the reptile house. I don’t like snakes in general, but I like looking at them through glass.

    Anyway, this post is primarily photos from my visit in 2016…..

           

  • Poznan – Lech Brewery Tour

    Poznan – Lech Brewery Tour

    These photos are from my visit to the Lech Brewery in Poznan back in 2016, although I’m disappointed to see that they have now been permanently discontinued.

    I managed to arrive a few minutes late due to circumstances beyond my control (I got a bit lost) and was rather nervous that I had kept around 50 people waiting when I saw the assembled crowd. It transpired that this group was for the Polish tour, whereas the tour English had just me and two Irishmen on it. They seemed to drink a lot of Guinness.

    There was a walk across the brewery site to start with and the tour guide was enthusiastic and keen. He didn’t actually work for the brewery and was instead trained by them to offer the tours, but he was very engaged with the whole thing, so it was a good choice. However, he admitted that the brewery had told him that real ale wasn’t really going to take off in mainland Europe and it was becoming less popular in the UK. I suspect that was more wishful thinking from the brewery management, and I’m not sure that Lech has made much progress in the direction of real ale or craft beer at all.

    My knowledge of the brewing process is limited, primarily as I seem to fail to be able to grasp anything scientific. I think I just like looking round factories and then having a drink, but I remember it was sufficiently interesting.

    A model of the site.

    At the end of the tour there was a drink provided at the brewery’s own bar.

    This is a very poor photo, especially as I must have forgotten to take one when the glass was full (and that’s how it started off). I was also given a Lech bottle opener which I still have and is one of my favourite bottle openers (insomuch that I have favourites….)

    Anyway, the tour was cheap to go on, the guide was engaging (and spoke English fluently), everything look sparklingly clean everywhere and the beer was as good as Lech gets. Since I visited the company has been taken over by Asahi Breweries and it’s disappointing they’ve chosen to stop tours entirely. I can’t confess to being a huge fan of Lech beer (and their reviews on Untappd are painful to look at) but I was impressed at the professionalism that was visible at the brewery itself.

  • Poznan – Restauracja Ratuszova

    Poznan – Restauracja Ratuszova

    This not being able to travel thing means I’ve decided to resort to looking at old photos, these ones are of my visit to Restauracja Ratuszova in September 2016. Located in the heart of Poznan, this was, and still is, a well reviewed traditional Polish restaurant. Obviously I was in an exotic mood at the time, as I opted for an outdoors table.

    Zywiec is OK, I prefer Zywiec Porter, but needs must…. All was as expected on this front.

    I think I was still going through my cider phase at this point, this is a strawberry cider from Kamron (a cider producer from Kielce) as clearly my half litre of Zywiec wasn’t enough.

    I have been asked why I keep ordering non-Polish food when in Poland. That’s because for my first ten or so trips to Poland, I did keep eating local food, and in this case, the national dish that is pierogi (or dumplings). They are very lovely, but, with the best will in the world, quite a lot of Polish food can be stodgy, and hence why I often veer off towards other cuisines. But, I do revert to these traditional Polish dishes from time to time and am rarely disappointed.

    In the case of this restaurant, the dumplings were filled with wild boar and they were rich in flavour, served with spinach, Chanterelle sauce and cranberries. There were helpful English speaking staff, it was a comfortable location and so all rather lovely. The meal came to £10 which included the two drinks, so given the central location, this seemed entirely reasonable.

  • Poznan – New Zoo

    Poznan – New Zoo

    This was my visit to Poznan’s New Zoo (the Old Zoo is still open and in the city centre) in 2016 and I remember it primarily as I only saw two other visitors there). I went on a weekday morning in September and the zoo is huge in terms of the amount of walking required, although there’s a little train service for busier times of the year. There were quite big gaps between the enclosures, but this is deliberate to give the animals as much space as possible.

    The one benefit about there being so few other visitors (other than no kids shouting about) is that the animals seem more interested in coming to have a look. Perhaps they’re hoping that they might be fed, but it was a handy advantage to get so much solitude. The admission fee is low, just a couple of pounds. Everything at the zoo seemed well cared for, not just the animals, but also the enclosures and public areas.

    Anyway, here are some of the photos….

     

     

  • Warsaw – Caffè Dell’Amore

    Warsaw – Caffè Dell’Amore

    Looking for a little cafe in Warsaw last week, this one was well-reviewed and is located between the central railway station and the Old Town.

    The fridges in the cafe with the cakes looking rather sparse, although they were reasonably priced.

    It’s not perhaps the most sophisticated of interiors, but it’s clean and organised with an Italian feel to the whole arrangement.

    The latte really was rather lovely, a richness of taste and at the appropriate temperature, ie, one which isn’t so hot it burns the mouth. The meringue was light and probably far too sugary for my health, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. The environment was comfortable and relaxed, although not particularly busy. It’s larger than it looks from the front, as there are some seats at the rear, as well as the outside seating.

  • London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Warsaw Uprising Graves)

    London – Lambeth – Imperial War Museum (Warsaw Uprising Graves)

    Returning to my little theme of the wonderful on-line photo collection of the Imperial War Museum….

    © IWM HU 105736

    This is quite a raw photo, showing a little girl in what was likely late 1944 and she’s passing by a number of graves. There were hundreds of these plots of graves in Warsaw as people didn’t know what to do with the number of dead. It was only after the end of the Second World War that they were mostly exhumed and moved to the Warsaw Insurgents Cemetery.