Auschwitz

One does not go to Auschwitz to have a good time, but we were drawn to it (as are some 6,000 - 8,000 visitors daily). It’s a long way from Warsaw, so we had to start early and got back late.

There isn’t much to say about it. We’ve all read about the horrors, and the industrial-scale slaughter of millions. I can’t write anything here to add to that, nor can I put into words the experience of being there.

Auschwitz is set up as more of a museum, tracing its history from army barracks to prisoner of war camp, to detention facility, to death camp. Birkenau is about 3 km distant, and there is very little here but the ruins, more or less as they were found at the end of the war. It’s all just sobering, but something that should be seen by everyone, if possible.

Our package included a walking tour of Krakow, which is a beautifully restored Medieval-Enlightenment city. The guide was unmotivated, and we would probably have been better off guiding ourselves with the Rick Steves book.

But we did see the university where Copernicus did his work, and the beautiful Gothic church where Bishop Wojtyla (aka Pope John Paul II) came to sit daily and pray in the back pew.

Also, we got our picture taken in the largest market square in Europe (St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican is larger, but officially isn’t a market square). And we admired blocks and blocks of gorgeous 16th & 17th century architecture, which managed to escape Napolean and two World Wars largely untouched.

It was cold, windy, and about to rain when we got back into a nice, warm vehicle and back on the road for a long trip back to Warsaw. It was a very long day, and not one that left us smiling, but one does not go to Auschwitz for a good time.