A German and Polish Spring Break

What an adventure the last couple of weeks have been! So this past week was our spring break and I think it was the best spring break I have ever had! I traveled to Munich and Freiburg, Germany with a couple of friends and then went to Krakow, Poland. The entire break was just a whirlwind, but was truly fantastic! It was my first time really traveling on my own, which is a very invigorating and freeing experience.

[A lot happened in those two weeks, so this post is kind of long. I apologize and won’t judge if you just skip to the pictures 🙂 ]

So the adventure started out on Friday the 22^nd with a train ride from Vienna to Munich. Besides Amtrak, I had never been on a train before, so that in itself was pretty exciting. We got into Munich and found our hostel, put our stuff away and then started out for the first night of our German adventure. I was traveling with two friends of mine, Drew and Caitlin, and we had a blast in Munich. We spent about three days there and definitely got the German experience, touring around, eating traditional Bavarian food, and of course, drinking a lot of beer. We toured the city during the day and spent our evenings sampling some of the local beer and making new friends. The hostel we stayed at was great and we met a lot of cool new people there. Unfortunately we didn’t make it to the “Disney Castle,” Schloss Neuschwanstein, which means I will just have to go back some day!

On Monday we took a four hour bus ride to Freiburg. The drive was really beautiful. I woke up at one point and felt like I was back in Alaska, driving through Turnagain Pass, with all the snow and mountains surrounding us. I have really been missing my mountains, so it was a pretty good feeling! When we got to Freiburg, it did not take us long to realize that we might have overestimated the amount of time needed to see the city. Drew was just staying one night because she was meeting friends later on, but Caitlin and I had booked an extra night and it did not take us long to realize, that we probably shouldn’t have. Freiburg is truly lovely and quaint, but very small! What was really an experience was the place we were staying. Cheap hotels are rather rare in Freiburg and the “hotel” we ended up booking was a rather interesting place that was basically a room in this guy’s apartment. Our “double room” consisted of a twin size bed, a couch, and a mattress to shove in between the two for our “extra bed.” There were definitely some glances passed between the three of us reading, “where the heck are we staying?!” but overall it was not a bad situation. Our host spoke very little English and was straight out of the 90s with his Simpson T-shirt, smiley face belt buckle, and Smurf figurine collection, but he was very nice and the place was clean enough. That first day in Freiburg we met up with a friend of Drew’s and a friend of mine from PLU, both of which are studying in Freiburg with the IES program there. They took us on a little hike up Freiburg’s “mountain” and at the top we climbed a tower of stairs and were able to see the entire little city. It was truly a beautiful site! The next day we toured Freiburg’s one big attraction: The Münster! This is their big church in the center of the city. We were able to climb up into the tower and once more had a pretty awesome view of the city. We spent the rest of our time in Freiburg trying various places to eat and of course we had to sample their local beer as well (I have drunk more beer in Germany, than I have my entire life combined!) Although it wasn’t quite what we all were expecting, we had a great time in little Freiburg.

Then came my day of trains! I can definitely say I have been on a train now! Coming back from Freiburg was a 9 hour train ride to Vienna, with us getting in around 11:00 at night. Then the next morning, I left again at 7:45 to catch an 8 hour train ride to Krakow! So within a 24 hour period, I spent about 17 hours on a train!

It was worth it though for the magical city that awaited was more than I could ever have hoped for! Krakow is truly a spectacular and amazing city! I was traveling with my friend Ramon and we had the time of our lives in Poland. Polish food has really rich, hardy flavors and I loved it; we ate a lot of pierogies! The hostel we were staying at was very cozy and the hostess was so welcoming. She helped us plan our entire stay there and greeted us each morning with a great breakfast. Krakow is full of history, stories, and legends with an air of magic to them. The infamous Nazi concentration camp, Auschwitz-Birkenau, is only about an hour away from Krakow and there are many different groups that offer tours of it. We toured that our first full day in Poland, and although it was a rather hard experience, I definitely think it was a really important and powerful thing to see. The next day we took a free walking tour of Krakow and heard all about its history, myths, and of course, its dragon. With its mix of communist-style buildings, numerous churches, castles, little winding streets, and huge market square, Krakow is quite the place to just wander around! All of the old buildings in Krakow are the original buildings because it was never bombed during World War II since it was occupied by the Nazis, so there is some spectacular architecture throughout the city. Sunday was Easter Sunday, and was probably the most interesting Easter I will ever have. We attended a very nice Catholic mass in the morning, even though Ramon and I are not Catholic (when you are in a country that is 89.9% Catholic you don’t have much of an option of other churches). In the afternoon we went on a tour of Nowa Huta, an “ideal communist city,” that is about a half-hour tram ride away from the city center of Krakow. The tour was fascinating, but the weather was absolutely awful! After 3 and half hours of standing in a combination of rain, snow, and hail, I couldn’t feel my feet, but I learned a lot about communism. That night, sadly, Ramon and I had to say goodbye to our beautiful Krakow and catch our night train back to Vienna. After a night of restless sleep and full of claustrophobic feelings in my tiny bunk on the night train, we arrived back home in lovely Wien.

It was an absolutely wonderful spring break, but I have to admit that I did miss Vienna while I was away! It is nice to be back here, although I am not looking forward to getting back into the swing of classes. It is crazy to think I only have two months left in Europe! Time really does fly by here!

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