Next country - Poland!

While my last name is Puskarich (of my father-in-law’s Croatian roots), many of the traditions Tom brought into our marriage are adopted from his mother’s side of the family, the Polish side. 

We share the “oplatek” at Christmas, eat sour soup at New Year’s, sing “Sto Lat” at birthdays, have a cookie table at weddings, and eat pierogies any chance we get. 

Going to Poland for the first time was made even more special because it was Carol’s first time as well. Her ancestors immigrated to the United States in 1902 and while the Sala and Wojnar families have flourished in America, there are still some distant relatives living in southern Poland today. More on that later...

We explored the Poland as a cross-country road trip starting in the northern city of Gdansk.  

I have never been to Amsterdam, but Gdansk is what I always imagined it would look like.

It was pretty, pretty, pretty! 

The city, formerly called Danzig, is where WWII began when Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. Gdansk was heavily damaged during in the war and had to be rebuilt. 

The designers chose the Dutch style of architecture in its rebuild to reflect its historical trading influences, and also, in the aftermath of WWII, to erase the German ones. 

Poland has a complex, difficult and fascinating history. 

We took a morning and went through “Museum of the Second World War.” 

The building itself was an interesting design. 

We got audio-guides in English, and each adult paired up with a kid (Tom went solo) to work through this detailed and amazing exhibit. I was with Sammy. Sammy thought the museum was interesting, but also very dark. He was fascinated and repulsed by the propaganda section that displayed storybooks for children.

He found other parts too hard to watch, and at one point noted that there was somber music playing and so we must be approaching a difficult section. He was right as we went through a hall of faces that represented people killed in concentration camps.

We also had a walking history and food tour of the city. 

Other Fun things: 

We visited the fifteenth-century astronomical clock in St. Mary’s Church. At noon each day, you can see the clock in action.

There were women dressed in period clothing on the front row. 

Motorboats that look like cars riding on the water

Incredible Street Musicians 

Gdansk was full of easy walking streets and loads of food options. There were a good number of tourists, but it is apparently rare to find someone visiting from the United States, because people kept being surprised to find out we were American. However, everyone was friendly and kind and we were so glad we spent time here. 

On the way to our next location, we stopped over at the Marbork Castle.

Which is most noted as being the largest brick castle in the world but also was a medieval fortress for the Teutonic Knights. 

As an American who has rarely seen a castle, I was confused about who these knights were and why they needed a castle. Weren’t castles for kings? 

I learned that the Teutonic Knights were a Catholic religious order of German knights founded in the 12th century during the Crusades. They originally focused on aiding Christian pilgrims in the Holy Land through establishing hospitals, but later shifted to Northern Europe and became more militaristic.

The castle grounds were huge, and we only explored a fraction of them. 

I loved how each door was different.

Tom marveled at the huge… um balls, that lifted the drawbridge.

Carol loved the gardens

The kids just loved running around in imaginative play. Most castles we had been to were largely museums of the "look, don't touch" variety. This place was so big that it was easy to just be a knight, a princess ,or even a prisoner.

In fact, if you were to ask them their favorite place in Poland, they would definitely say Marbork Castle. 

If I were a kid, this would be my favorite too!