9 May. The fortress town of Przemysl.

My leg with quite some sratches and bleeding - I felt obliged to look for a doctor.

In the 19th century under Austrian-Hungarian rule Przemysl town was strategically fortified into a dubble-ringed stronghold to prevent Russian invasion. During WWI sieges and battles were many between the two super powers at the time. And from the fall of the two empires - with their Kaiser, Tsar and all - Poland rose out of the ashes as a free nation Przemysl prospering in its south centre. Today, the town is only five kilometers from the Ukrainian border which has damaged its economical potential quite badly.  Thus, you will find here and there very poor housing conditions.

However, Przemysl is a friendly place. I failed to find any GP facility open since it was Saturday and I had to take a cab up to Szpital Miejski on Monte Cassino. With my EU insurance card I was registered in a minute and within the hour I was treated - a needle in my arm with tetanus vaccine. The young couple helped me translate to Polish.

The hospital did indeed live up to its own motto

"From door to needle within the hour".

 

Back in town and across the river San with many restored houses, churches and other buildings...

Tillbaka i stan och över floden San med många vackra, pietetsfullt restaurerade bostadshus, kyrkor och andra byggnader 

 

 and in the midst of a surprisingly quiet presidential election campaign
och mitt i en för övrigt överraskande stillsam presidentvalskampanj

 

I visited near the Przemysl Dworzec PKP and PKS the new local museum

besöker jag det nya stadsmuseet nära Przemysl Dworzec PKP och PKS

Maria, the guide gave me a swift presentation before closing time. Her own family story was as interesting as the exhibits...  Thanks Maria!

 

The most famous about Przemysl is the double-ringed fortress but since I am no tourist I did not rent a bike for the suggested  bike tour along the outer ring Learning all about the two sieges in September and October by the Russians that ended by Austrian surrender in 22 March 2015 of the stronghold. A hundred years ago.



to be cont'd

 

POLAND - more pictures from Polin Museum.

 





 The only sign that cannot be read Points to the new Jewish Museum POLIN with its

numb facade and entrance shaped as a ?? anyone who knows what ??

 





WALKING FROM SWEDEN TO GREECE 2012 - 2020.
Acknowledgments:

Thanks, to each and everyone of you who made my sixth and final hiking stage such a fabulous experience full of surprising highlights and rendered me many moments of genuin happiness!
Special thanks to:
- Director of Szkoła Podstawowa w Woli Rokietnickiej Ms Narolska, English teacher Ms Levytska and the school janitor.
- Nurse Agnieszka Choma and dr Mariusz Kuczkowki at the Regional Hospital Emergency Room in Przemysl and the young couple who helped navigate
- The Romani sisters Matkowskich at the Folklore Festival in Przemysl
- Zbigniew and Grazyna Muzykar, Pod Visna in Kalwaria
- Magda, Lukasz and Anja, all on duty in their respective forest territories
- Jacek £eszega, Ustrzyki Dolne Town hall
- Michal Regiel, Ustr. Dolne Tourist Information Office
- Maciel Augustyn at the Polish Science Academy in Ustr. Dolne
- Family Piotrowicz: Witak and Karolina, Maria and Babcia, Polana village
- Macjul and Josefa in Chmiel village
- The two German shepherd dogs, Polana
- Dominik and Marek in Ustrzyki Gorne
- Leopold Bekier, Director of Bieszchady National Park, Ustr. Gorne
and to many more friendly and helpful persons that I met during my hike.

 

5 May 2015. Warszawa. +24°C. A taste of summer and certainly a spring time fuse.
Wizzair did it again: allowed my backpack including the sticks. Landed on time.
Airport train shuttle at low fare of 1.70 PLN to Warszawa Centralna and from there a short walk to Intercontinental Hotel to see if our 1984-85 au-pair Monika was in her Pearl Beauty Clinic&Spa. www.pearlspa.pl. But no, too busy elsewhere in town...
Soon after at check-in desk of IBIS Hotel Muranowska, a reliable standard hotel. In the evening, back to city centre for a meal at the pleasant Greek restaurant www.elgreco-restauracja.pl on Grzybowska followed by an espresso and a meringue at Green Caffee Nero down the Grzybowska

and a slow walk along a peaceful Marszalkowska Avenue

back to IBIS in front of the Monument to the Fallen and Murdered in the East.

6 May 2015. Warszawa. Straight after breakfast to the newly opened Polin Museum to learn more about the Polish Jewish Community - its history, its culture and its destiny.

Namnet Polin (Polen) kunde enligt legenden uppfattas betyda 'vila här' och det var vad många judar gjorde som hade dragit österut, likt sina tyska grannar i överbefolkade städer som Frankfurt/Main eller Köln från 13/1400-talen.

Det första som mötte dem var ett ännu inte uppodlat, skogsbevuxet land, som därför är temat för den första utställningsavdelningen.

The name Polin (Poland) was, according to tradition, to be understood as 'rest here' and that was what many jews did who - like their German neighbours - had moved east in the 14th and 15th centuries.

The first that they met was a territory not yet cultivated but densely wooded and thus the theme for the first exhibition section. I spent eight full hours trying to get a grip on the enormous information, perfectly displayed.

Once started your museum visit you met no chair, no coffee machine.

7 May 2015. 4:59. I am already packed and on the street to take the tram no. 18 to the central train station. The sun is up reflected on the latest skyscraper. Time to buy a breakfast before the departure 06:11 of the Warszawa - Lublin PKP InterCity.

The plan is to get to Jaroslaw and walk 15-20 km to Rokietnica and stay overnight Jasminowy Dwor. Changing from PKP train to PKS bus in Lublin was easy but I could start my walking not until 3:10 p.m.
As often in Poland today this place was a fully modern hotel in the country side.

8 May 2015. 10 am. Finally, a full day of walking! Along blooming colza fields, through mini villages and a surprisingly new and big school building.
For the 55 pupils there were nine (!) teachers including the director.

 

Noon. Entering the  f o r e s t , my favorite walking environment.

 

 



1:15 pm Ooops. Accident! A false step on the street through a part of Mackowice village and I fell scratching my right leg quite badly but nothing broken.



4:30 pm Przemysl in sight.

5:09 pm Hotel Pod Bialym Orlem in sight.

 

 (...to be cont'd...)

Så är det snart dags för min sjätte och sista etapp genom Polen på väg till Medelhavet.

En kort summering:

Hittills har det blivit nitton vandringsdagar, av vilka sex med en medvandrare ( två dagar under etapp två med Björn-Anders och fyra dagar under etapp fem med Daniel).

Som jag räknade med har vandringen ibland avbrutits av en bit buss eller en taxi. Ja, redan första etappen började med en buss ut ur Gdansk industriområden och en söndag när jag hade gått vilse fick jag lift med en svampplockare ett par mil.

Grovt räknat har jag vandrat 52 mil. Fågelvägen Gdansk - Narol är drygt 60 mil.

Istället för att som tänkt gå över gränsen i riktning mot ukrainska staden L'viv (Lwow, Lemberg) kommer jag att i maj månad fortsätta söderut på den polska gränsen.

Start preliminärt i Jaroslaw via Przemysl (smaka på det uttalet...) rakt ner till Ustrzyki Dolne (som betyder nedre Ustrzyki) och Ustrzyki Gorne (som betyder övre Ustrzyki).

Då befinner jag mig i natinalparken (och biosfärområdet), allra längst ner i Polens sydöstra spets med gräns mot Slovakien och Ukraina.

Knappt 15 mil. Jag räknar 7-8 dagar.

Hela Polen alltså 65 mil till fots. 26-27 vandringsdagar. 

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bieszczady_National_Park

Fram till den gamla galiciska (österrike-ungerska) fästningsstaden Przemysl har det varit Polen = platt land, slätt på markvägar över åker och äng, genom tall- och lövskog. Efter Przemysl börjar landet höja sig upp i de skogklädda Karpaterna.

Genom detta område sträcker sig en av de europeiska vandringslederna, E8. Frågan är bara om den är märkt. En del skulle kunna vara av intresse för mig från passagen från Rumänien vid  Drobeta-Turnu Severin, en romersk plats och bro över Donau, in i och genom Bulgarien till gränsen mot Grekland, mitt mål.

 

Som inför varje etapp: bestäm vandringsvägen från övernattning till övernattning, välj avresedag, boka flyg och rum, ta fram utrustningen: ryggsäcken, provpacka, kolla de rätta kartorna. (Den här gången är jag verkligen välförsedd tack vare min gode vän i Szczytno som skickat mig mer och fler än jag behöver. Både 50-och 75-tusendel. Mycket detaljerade.

I april 2013 råkade jag ut för snö och is i skogarna kring Olsztyn - dagarna före avresan hade det fallit  40 cm nysnö i Ostpreussen men solen smälte bort allt och endast gamla snölegor och is på skogbilvägarna var kvar.

I Karpaterna får jag nog räkna med senare vår pga inlandsklimatet och höjden över havet. Så maj månad känns rätt just nu. Flyg till Warszawa, tåg till Lublin och buss till Jaroslaw.

 Mer avslöjar jag inte nu.

The last section of the Republic of Poland put behind me, but surely, those twenty-three days of walking stay in my mind as a most charming experience.

 

 

I flew together with Daniel, my son, to Warszaw Lody Chopin Airport, took the train to Lublin after a delicious meal in the train station Warszawa Centralna. Lublin train station is a bit off city centre but close enough for a chilling-off walk along the avenues.

 

Best hotel in town is from my own experience IBB Grand Hotel Lubelski with a very attractive tarif. Double room from 350 Zloty including a generous breakfast.

 

In the morning by taxi 13 Zloty, again back to the bus station next to the trains, to catch the 08.01 connection to Frampol, our starting point.

 

Lovely weather, after all flat land (Poland comes from 'pole' which means 'field' or 'flat land' cf. Dutch 'polder') we started to see some elevations but only for a short while. Our destination and most of our route further south-east turned out to be as flat as ever. And even as sandy as before. More than 600 kilometers with sandy soil. Easy walking and gentle to your feet. Not exactly but relatively speaking. Frampol, a sweet Little Town from the early 18th C., was almost completely destroyed during WWII as the Luftwaffe targeted it on 13 September 1939 for 'instructive aims'. It was not a military object. Thus a war crime, a terror act like Guernica two years before.

 

We bought some bread and cheese and set on, in fact not towards south but more to the east.

Frampol is the said Place for Isaac Singer's novel Gimpel the Fool. Everywhere there are various marks from the visit 1987 of Jan Pawel II i.e. (Polish) pope John Paul II. In the village of Radziecin there is a Park Papieski, an arboretum to his honor.

 

 

 

From 09:30 to noon we walked under a pretty hot sun on bitumen roads with no or very little traffic. We had our bread and cheese 'lunch' in a forest

 

 

 

that led us south to the town of Bilgoraj, another scene of Isaac Singer's novels.

 

                                                  Daniel fann snart adress och telefon till sina kollegor på polska skogsstyrelsen.

Ingången till skogen mellan Frampol och Bilgoraj.
   Här som vid flera andra skogsentréer fanns pedagogiska
introduktioner, bord och bänkar för studier.

Hotel Sikarski. Rekommenderas varmt.
Välförtjänst kall Tyskie öl, som avnjöts med
pumpasoppa och polska piroger som kallades
ryska men som var dumplings, ett slags ravioli.







 

 

The first day was not that long, 20-25 km but perhaps a bit too warm, +25°C. www.meteoprog.pl did promise cooler weather and even some rain and we were Confident that we would make use of our 'wet equipment' - my French natural rubber boots and Daniel's Lundhags leather boots. We asked our way out of Bilgoraj around 9 o'clock in the morning. People we asked said 'Don't you have money to take a cab? They did not have a clue of our intended walking route across the fields to Edwardow village.

Taking the east exit, we passed old and new industries and private villas. There is abundance of EU signs of co-financing. Not on these constructions though.

more to come....

POLEN. ETAPP 5.

Så är det dags att packa, checka in on-line, kolla passet och resten! Denna gång i sällskap med Daniel. Det är mer än tjugo år sen sist, då vi vandrade uppför både Galdhöpiggen och Kebnekaise, en härlig resa under tre sommarveckor 1993 från söder till norr. Min femte etapp i Polen blir den sista. Avsikten är att vandra under fyra dagar från Frampol till Narol via staden Bilgoraj och genom Polens finaste lövskogsreservat.
Time for packing, to check-in on-line, check the passport and the rest! This time together with my son, Daniel. More than twenty years have elapsed, as we in 1993 climbed the two no 1 peaks (Galdhöpiggen, 2.469 m in Norway and Kebnekaise, 2 106 m in Sweden) - a splendid journey during three summer weeks from South to North. My fifth Walking in Poland we be the last one, from Frampol to Narol through the Isaac Singer town of Bilgoraj and lush leaves forest reserves.
This time, for a change, I have got detailed and real good maps as shown here.

Now, Narol is not the end of Poland. In fact, I still have some fifteen kilometers to the Polish-Ukrainian border but given the tight schedule from Thursday to Tuesday, this is the option we have. I will have to decide where to continue next year, in April. For sure, I will fly back from L'vov in Ukraine.

Planning for walking through Polska Lubelskie

3 July 2014, My next part in September will also be the last part in Poland. From Lublin to the Ukrainian border is 150 kms along the main roads. To experience a safer and more relaxing route, I will start south of Lublin at Janów through some of the finest parts, including nature reserves and finish in the town of Narol. Also, I need to make this distance, some 100 kms, in four days only. This time, my son Daniel will walk with me. He is fluent in Russian and a biologist. We are both looking forward to join for this event. Aside from the natural sensations there are many cultural things to relate to. Isaac Singer, jiddisch author and 1978 Nobel Prize Winner was born in Bilgoraj, one of the towns we will visit.