I bought a new camera. Dad told me to. The lens on my old one is having a ‘mare, the autofocus doesn’t work and it does this funny clunking thing when you turn the focus ring manually. I went in to look at lenses for my camera, but a lens alone was going to cost me about NZ$600, and I came across a beautiful new Nikon D3100 in the same shop which was NZ$830. I told Dad my lens had sort of carked it but does actually still work, and that I was trying to talk myself out of buying this camera. He said buy the Nikon. My camera was originally his, and he’d already had it repaired once, and he said it’s not worth fixing again. So while we were waiting for our train out of Krakow I went to the electronics shop, which had the same Nikon but with a much better range lens, and it was only about $100 more. So I bought it. I got the camera, the lens, a camera bag, and a memory card, all for about $1000, and I can claim about $160 tax back when I leave the EU. That is SO MUCH less than I’d expect to pay in NZ. I’m so excited!! I’ve always wanted a Nikon.
Other than that, Krakow was like this mad dash the entire time we were there. We arrived by train at lunchtime, that afternoon most of us went on an optional excursion (a trip that Tucan will organise for you but which is not included in the cost of the tour) to the Krakow Salt Mine, then we took a city tour by golf cart the next morning, saw Schinder’s factory at lunchtime, went to Auschwitz that afternoon (which is included in our tour), and took the overnight train to the Czech Republic that night. I would’ve really liked at least one more day in Krakow, I feel like we missed a lot.
The Salt Mine was interesting. Not overwhelmingly so though. We walked down 380 stairs underground, and spent about 2hrs walking through passages and room after room that'd been carved out of the salt.... as you might expect in a mine I suppose. A lot of the rooms had statues in them that had been carved out of the salt. You have to excuse my photos, I hate flashes so everything's at least like 2.5sec exposures.
I am Oz! Being photographed by a million or so other people while my shutter was open!
There were a couple of pretty impressive rooms. The cathedral was the best. It's absolutely ginormous. (That's totally a word and totally how you spell it.)
It has some pretty impressive statues, and carvings on the walls.
This was my favourite thing in the whole mine. The perspective is perfect. It's flat, but when you stand in front of it, it looks like it's been carved right into the wall.
The lights are behind her, not inside. The statue I mean.
Another interesting example of the fact that you can see through pure salt.
I'm not as verbose as usual unfortunately... Bit tired at the moment. Luckily a picture paints a thousand words so I'm already at five thousand and something.
The golf cart city tour was good because it covered everything in the near vicinity. Our hotel was in the coolest street, it was full of little cafes and restaurants and bars, and it was in the old Jewish Quarter. Krakow was pretty beaten-up looking, but I really liked it.
I found out that the reason there are buildings falling down around the place, or at least it's the reason in Krakow, is that there are so many people who they couldn't account for after the war who owned property, and because they didn't know if or when these people or their decendants would show up again they didn't sell the buildings on. I like that the government did that.
Fortifications in the city wall.
This was at... maybe a church I think...
Amanda being very cheeky with someone else's hat. "Quick, take my photo!"
We finished the city tour at Schindler's factory (as in Schindler's List). They made it into a museum, which has only been open for a year. It's an excellent museum. We had to be back at the hotel fed and watered at 130pm, so we only had an hour to get through, and it took that long just to walk from one end to the other. It's more about the war and the persecution of Jewish people than it is particularly about Oscar Schindler, but it was very well done.
Left: Floor tiles
Right: Pots and pans which form the outer walls of a room. Inside it's perfectly round and has the names of the people on Schindler's List all over the walls.
Fantastic museum. Really sorry we didn't have another few hours to spend there.
Lunch. Open baguettes from the best shop in town.
It was in a pagoda in the middle of the market square, along with four other baguette shops.
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