Day 68: Warsaw - Gdańsk

JUNE 10 - Check out of Level Rooms, with its Pac-Man theme, and head to Warszawa Zachodnia for our train north.

I don’t remember a ghost mopping the floor in the real Pac-Man game.

The scale of Warsaw and huge public transport system makes finding the right place to go a bit difficult. There are so many stations and stops that every time we go somewhere, we are never sure if it is the correct place to wait. In this case, the entrance to the train station for which I had the tickets was hidden behind a huge construction project, so it took a bit to decide we were in the right place. And it was one of three train station entrances, spaced out for several km along the street.

Today’s route: (A) Warsaw, (B) Gdańsk.

The ride is a bit over three hours. Yet again the landscape yields not the hint of anything more than mild hills, but gone now are the pine and mixed forests that have been a staple in our Eastern European journey so far. Now it is all rolling fields, a region given over completely to domestication.

Spend an hour waiting to get into our apartment here, as the host declined to fully inform us of the entry procedure until the very last minute. A minor issue if we were both using data-activated phones, but we are surviving all we can off of wifi only.

Today I was immediately struck by the smartly presented historic core of Gdańsk. Even outside the old city walls (partly preserved), the aspect is of a city that has been very careful to keep the traditional facades alive. The above street view includes the massive Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is one of the largest brick churches in the world, first constructed in more or less its current form in 1379.

The background of Gdańsk takes some time to understand. Years ago, I always thought of the city as just a massive, industrial port dominated by cranes and Soviet-style concrete factories. Those cranes do exist, looming in the distance, but the city is very energetic about the preservation of its unique history. Not an easy feat when, like Warsaw, that physical evidence was almost complete obliterated by WWII bombings.

Gdańsk (also known historically by its German name, Danzig), traces back as a settlement to the 10th Century. Until the 1308 it was dominated by the Piast Dynasty of Polish kings. Just prior to this, the Danes had invaded the city, and the Polish rulers requested the assistance of the Teutonic Order to drive them out. However, the Teutonic Knights stayed on, and, as we’ve seen in the Baltic States, eventually took over. A massacre of local Polish inhabitants in 1308 suggests that it wasn’t a welcome political development. This was the beginning of what would be a significant German influence on the city. Though I’ve noted this in many regions from Estonia southward, Gdansk was the first city where the classic German-looking architecture really stands out.

What followed were many years under the Teutonic Order, but by the mid 1400’s the Polish kings were repeatedly contesting the Knight’s power, and the city went back and forth between the two many times, until a peace treaty in 1466 ended permanently Teutonic rule. It also established Danzig as a free city, with no taxes or trade restrictions, granted by King Casimir IV of Poland (in a document called the Great Privilege).

This free city status did not always go well with the surrounding powers, and at times was contested militarily. In general, Danzig was able to carry on with business, and even during the Swedish-Polish war of 1626-29, it was never successfully invaded by Sweden.

Danzig attracted people from many different areas of Europe, producing a diverse population, and was essentially bi-lingual (German and Polish). Quite befitting of a ‘free city’ status.

The wars of the 18th Century, and a plague, diminished the wealth and importance of the city, It was annexed to Prussia in 1793, along with one of the partitions of Poland. After this it was occupied by Napoleon, before it returned to Prussia. This Prussian connection meant that after the unification of Germany in 1871, it became (in a way, once again) part of Germany.

After WWI, because of its strange historical political status, it was given to neither Germany or Poland, but was again declared the Free City of Danzig. This was a real bummer for Poland, who really wanted better access to sea ports. Germany, meanwhile, slowly stepped up nationalist sentiment in the ominous runup to WWII, by pitting the German population against the Poles.

Not the famous ‘Long Market’ street, but one running parallel, bristling with stalls selling amber jewelry.

Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, a more complete view.

I was expecting to go inside and just see the standard church stuff, but this fascinating object was to the left of the alter. It is an astronomical clock, completed in 1470, with a diameter of 4.1 meters. The outer rim includes 365 divisions, one for each day of the year, with the inner dials specify days of the week and permanent holidays. Some of the inner dials can be turned to correctly place the liturgical calendar with saint’s days, and the movable holidays. It ran until the mid 16th Century. The only reason it still exists today is because it was dismantled during WWII and stored away safely before the city was destroyed.

A portion of the wall around the old town.

Down by the canals, it is all restaurants and modern reconstruction of old style buildings.

The statue of Neptune along the Long Market, one of the landmarks of the city. The statue was completed in 1633, and has remained largely undamaged since that time, though it was moved for safety during the war.

You wouldn’t know it from the above photos, but Gdańsk is crowded with tourists today, many more than I was expecting. You know things are bad when the street musicians resort to wearing horse heads to get attention.

Poland