Travel to Kraków where you will enjoy views of the Old Town area, and the Royal Cathedral on Wawel Hill with a ‘Local Specialist’. Your tour includes also the Old Town Square, and a visit to the Cloth Hall and St. Mary’s Church. This tour can be conducted either on foot or by car, depending which hotel you stay at. Krakow is also a seat of higher education.
We will then visit Collegium Maius, which is the home of the Jagiellonian University, founded in 1364 and thus one of the oldest in Europe. Collegium Maius, the University’s oldest building and today the University Museum, is located near the Market Square.
The Old Town Square in Krakow became its living room. Krakow is also described as the highlight of Eastern Europe, as it’ very historic, yet walkable, at least in its most historic part.
Opposite the Cloth Hall there is St. Mary’s Church, world-famous for its altar carved by Veit Stoss.
Krakow’s another charming district is absolutely unique, well-preserved Jewish Quarter. During meaningful tour we concentrate on remains of the lost world of Krakow’s Jews and Jewish culture in the district of Kazimierz: old synagogues, cemeteries. Import part of Krakow is also the district of Podgórze – a place where you will be able to track traces of Holocaust and extermination of Jewish community in Krakow, e.g. the area of the Ghetto and the concentration camp “Płaszów”. The end of the tour may be a visit to the modern, interactive museum in the former building of Oskar Schindler’s factory.
Kazimierz, Jewish quarter of Krakow
Later, we’ll stroll through Szeroka Street in the Kazimierz district to see synagogues and the birthplace of Helena Rubinstein before driving through the former ghetto of Podgorze. Kazimierz is steeped in history and its streets were used in several scenes in the film “Schindler’s List”. tour around the districts of Kazimierz and Podgórze, concentrating on remains of the lost world of Cracow’s Jews. We can first seethe remains of Jewish culture in the district of Kazimierz: old synagogues, cemeteries, and then move to the district of Podgórze – a place where you will be able to track traces of Holocaust and extermination of Jewish community in Krakow, e.g. the area of the Ghetto and the concentration camp “Płaszów”. The end of the tour may be a visit to the modern, interactive museum in the former building of Oskar Schindler’s factory.
Oscar Schindler’s Factory
Visit the museum located in the former Oscar Schindler’s Factory. The main exhibition “Krakow Under Nazi Occupation, 1939-1945” shows the dramatic choice that people made. Key phases of the period come in for special attention, including notorious Sonderaktion of November 1939 (during which 183 people were arrested, most of the university professors), as well as the creation and liquidation of the Jewish Ghetto “Krakow Under Nazi Occupation: 1939-1945″ showcase life during the war for Poles and Jews, concentrating at least some of its narrative on the disruption of Polish-Jewish relations against the backdrop of Nazi brutality. The atmosphere of the era is evoked by recreations of typical Cracovian interiors and street scenes. At the same time it presents the history of Krakow Jews and the tragedy of Jewish community being a part of the tragedy of the rest of the population.
Plaszow concentration camp
It’s hard to visit in Poland without being reminded of one of the darkest periods in the history of humanity. Kraków, for all of its beautiful and unscathed diversions, is not any different. Few travelers seem to realise that Kraków used to have a concentration camp “Plaszow”. Kraków is not a jumping-off point for visiting Auschwitz merely. Across the river, in Podgórze district, on a large area stands undeveloped and somewhat unvisited former concentration camp, created by the Nazis in 1943. This is the former site of ‘Konzentrationslager Plaszow bei Krakau’ – the Nazi German concentration camp in Płaszów, today a partially wild, field of grass, weeds and stone, which until recently had only a small indication of its own existence, yet extremely important in wartime history.
Nowa Huta & Communism Tour
Step back in time to take a journey into Poland’s communist past. Nowa Huta is an entire city built during the communism period. We’ll hear amazing communist stories and sample some flavours of the era. The tour will take you back in time to the period of communist regime, in a metaphoric meaning, happily. This visit to the district of Nowa Huta will provide opportunity to see the relics of the past and how they melt with contemporary changes. Our personal experience adds a lot to this tour.
Kosciuszko’s Mound
There is not many men like Tadeusz Kościuszko (1746-1817), Polish and American hero. This freedom-fighter was described by Thomas Jefferson as ‘the purest son of liberty that I have ever known.’ The love for Kościuszko was such that the people proposed to honour him with a monument in the tradition of the prehistoric mounds of King Krak and Wanda.
The Mound wasraised with soil from his many battlefields, including those in America, and his friends, statesmen and foreign dignitaries dumped the first wheelbarrows of earth. For the next three years people from all over Poland brought soil from their villages to add to the mound. All this work was all done voluntarily. Completed in November 1823, Kościuszko Mound is 34 metres high, 326 metres above sea level, and for contemporary visitors the big attraction is that on a clear day the Tatra Mountains can be seen from the top. The occupying Austrian military authorities built a brick fortress around the Mound in the 1850s, which they used as a strategic lookout point. The Germans gave up to entirely level the Mound and surrounding fortifications during their WWII occupation. They decided on destroying all other Polish monuments and national symbols.
Climbing to the peak is easy, and the panoramic views of Kraków are a worthwhile reward. You can also visit the surrounding fortifications, wax museum and five additional historical exhibitions.
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