Lo 'n Anna - Family Travel Adventures: More Company & Warsaw Poland

They can hardly contain themselves...
the excitement is OVERWHELMING!!!

July 2016 - More Company & Poland!!

Shortly after Grammy Jo and Aunt Connie were safe across the pond, Aunt Diane and Uncle Brain made the journey over to spend some time in a place they had visited nearly 20 years ago! We had a great time showing them around Dublin and some of our favorite spots!

They are so excited to see people they manage to knock all their luggage over with their hugs!

One of the highlights was the Little Museum of Dublin which tells the remarkable story of the Irish capital. The museum was opened in 2011 with a public appeal for historic objects. The response to that appeal illustrates the remarkable generosity of the Irish people. Today there are over 5,000 artifacts in the collection.

The girls got a big kick out of the life-size Bono!

I am slightly bummed, because I remember taking a lot more pictures with these two, but they must have been with their phones... so I don't have many pictures of us together. I plan to get them at Christmas and add them in later!

Wow... Back in the HOMELAND!!!

WARSAW POLAND!

Seeing that Russ has a strong Polish background, not to mention he and the girls saw WAY more of the country than I did, we tag-teamed this post to ensure both of our perspectives and memories were covered!

We arrived on Saturday after some tight hugs from Aunt Diane and Uncle Brian who were leaving for Scotland the next day. The flight from Dublin to Warsaw was reliable and uneventful… thank you Ryanair! We were due for some boringly, predictable travel!

Our taxi turned out to be a bit more of a challenge than expected. However after a week in this place, it turned out to be one of the more simple journeys! The driver did not speak much English, so of course we turned to our Smartphones and Google Maps to get to our destination, the Platinum Towers apartment complex.

Shortly after arriving, we made a bee-line for the city-center in search of the famous polish food!!! For those of you who don’t know Chmiel is the Polish word for “hops." This may explain Russ's affinity for Bell’s Two Hearted Double IPA. Luckily, they didn't have any of that in Poland!

Growing up as a Pollock and having many Polish friends and family, there are many fond memories of fresh Pumpernickel bread from Hamtramck, Grandma’s Gumpkies, hot off the griddle Potato Pancakes, Kowalski Holiday Kielbasa, Carol’s signature Pierogies… Anyhoo... you get the picture. Hence why the first thing we set out to do was EAT!

I had found a couple places on my favorite travel blogs before arriving to ensure we had only the most authentic, delicious, food! The first stop was a place called Baszyliszek in Old Town.

Yep... lots of different options. Can't say we ate much of the black one though... I thought Annelyse was going to loose her entire dinner when Russ told her it was blood sausage. The girl has a weak stomach... Not exactly sure Russ thought she should be educated on the ingredients at that specific moment....

We filled our faces with polish breads, pierogies, local cheeses and polish sausages. The food was delicious and relatively cheap. The dollar is strong relative to the Zloty, so we ate more in that meal than we had in a week for less than 40 USD. Dangerous!

More pictures of the food... Russ really just wanted to have them to send back to the family to make them jealous :)

After dinner treats... the girls got suckers and we got "juice"... it was complimentary, so we weren't exactly sure what it was, but had a cherry flavor and burned on the way down, which Loralye then renamed it to "Hot Juice"

We saved some of our dinner so we could feed the birds. All through dinner they kept landing on our chairs and around the table, which was a lot of fun, until of course one of them pooped on the chair. Then they weren't so cute and hand santizier was doused on every square inch of our table.
P.S. Lo was hot... luckily not as a result from drinking "Hot Juice"

Ice cream... why not... after what we ate for dinner,
the day was a complete loss!

After stuffing our faces and feeling like gluttons, we opted for a walk to burn off some of our dinner. We meandered between Old Town and New Town, which coincidentally, are right next to each other, separated by a wall known as the Warsaw Barbican.

Located between OT and NT, the Warsaw Barbican is one of the few remaining relics of the fortification network that once encircled the city. Seeing that Warsaw was practically leveled by the Germans in WWII, Old Town has been rebuilt in a style designed to recreate the previous look. This also means Old Town is newer than New Town...(did you follow that?) with parts of New Town dating back to the 14th Century.

Warsaw Barbican - Wall between Old Town & New Town

Monument dedicated to Chopin in Lazienki Park.

With only having one day left between me and the work week, we contemplated our options. I had read about Lazienki Park (which means "Bath's Park" in Polish) and thought it would be a nice way to spend a Sunday, not to mention, fit some history/learning in for the girls!

Lazienki is the city's largest park and was truly stunning! We weren't sure if the park would be worth the time and effort to get there, but without a doubt it was!

One composer we learned about ahead of the trip was Frederic Chopin. Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic era who wrote primarily for the solo piano. He is world-renowned as a leading musician of his era. A child prodigy, he completed his musical education and composed his earlier works in Warsaw before leaving Poland at the age of 20.

Girls in the park... we could have walked for days in here.

The peacock decided to photo-bomb them!

The park had a nice pond which had these little boats, similar looking to gondolas, but with a canopy. Of course we had to take a spin around the place!

The Palace on the Isle

Enjoying the boat ride!

We almost tipped the boat trying to get these pictures... but they were worth it!

The Palace was originally constructed in 1680 as a bath house for local royalty!

Photographer Annelyse back in action!

After Lazineki we headed back to Old Town to do some souvenir shopping and to take some pictures of the city! The girls loved the wooden nesting dolls, so we were on a mission to find the perfect ones! We all love putzing around new places, taking our time popping into little shops and taking in the new city.

A perfect way to spend an afternoon! Perfect until we putz for too long and the girls request shoulder rides. With probably 20 lbs in a backpack and a 40 or 50 lb kid, Daddy gets some good exercise on vacation... and also needs a chiropractor when we return home!

Old Town Warsaw

The Royal Castle in Warsaw formerly served throughout the centuries as the official residence of the Polish monarchs. Burned and looted by the Nazi Germans following the Invasion of Poland in 1939 and was almost completely destroyed in 1944 after the failed Warsaw Uprising. Reconstruction of the castle has been carried out over the years making it and the entire square a UNESCO world heritage site.

Old Town Square

Lots of narrow streets to get wander through and procure food and souvenirs... this place was dangerous!

We talked about babushkas a lot during the trip, however for some reason, no matter how many times I explained that a babushka was a colorful cloth scarf worn by women, the girls were convinced these hats were babushkas. They were cute nonetheless! We had to be quick trying this on and snapping pictures. The attendant at the shop didn't think they were as cute as we did, messing with his precious merchandise!

We came back to this place several times just to they could try these on. I am just happy they didn't ask what they were made out of!

Heard chanting and singing while eating dinner. It was a group of Puerto Ricans... We were excited to show our friend Stephanie this picture of their presence in Warsaw since she is also Puerto Rican!

We did a little home cooking of our own... we can only eat out so many times before it's no longer fun for any of us. Kielbasa, brats and pierogies in the apartment were just what we needed after a lovely day out exploring!

Russ's Commentary... This was our first taste of a pretty significant communication / cultural difference, more pronounced than any other place we had visited previously. Culturally we haven’t been too puzzled in most of the places we’ve visited, but we were left scratching our heads a few times. (I actually bought another book, When Cultures Collide to help gain understanding after this trip.) I’m still not sure if the Polish didn’t know English that well, thought we should be speaking Polish, or sometimes just didn’t want to be bothered. There was a certain gruffness or lack of animation in communication which was strange. Also, this was by far the place that seemed to be most bothered by children, where other places are very warm, welcoming and understanding of them.

Swimming is always a favorite for the girls when we travel. Unfortunately we would only swim once on this trip at the Holmes Place which was a health club and leisure center right on the site of the Platinum Towers. It felt pretty stuffy as we walked in, and I didn’t get the impression the members appreciated the presence of children. We didn’t care though, so we grabbed a lane in the pool and had a good old time! What was even better was hoping out of the cold pool and getting into a nice warm wading pool attached to the hot tub. We probably spent another half hour in there, good fun! We found out upon our next visit on Wednesday that we would be denied entrance. Someone must have gotten their undies in a twist and had a word with the club about children only being allowed from 1-4 on Saturdays. We would make the best of this though!

After being rejected, we decided to move on and find better things to do in Warsaw!

Taking the Metro!

Tuesday we decided to explore by way of the subway which had a stop very close to our apartment. We made our way to Nowy Świat Street, pronounced “Novy Schwat” for a nice stroll and some Starbucks.

This was a lovely walkable street where we also stumbled upon a Dunkin Donuts (one of the very favorites for the ladies). Since we already had Starbucks we decided we would have to make it back out here for breakfast one day!

We walked past the Holy Cross Church where in 1882 an urn containing the heart of Frédéric Chopin was immured in a pillar. We also went past the Fredyryk Chopina museum, found a little playground where the girls made some little Polish friends and then headed over to the Copernicus Science Center and Planetarium. We found out tickets were not available this day, so we would have to return later in the week.

Starbucks Junkies!

Holy Cross Church

Seventh Heaven... haven't seen one of these in a while!

Chopin Museum... we didn't dare attempt to go inside!

Here is a nice playground we found wandering around. They even met a little polish girl which prompted Annelyse to come over and ask me for my phone to use google translate to communicate with her. Smart little cookie!

Interesting scenery along the way... Here is one of the most important murals in Warsaw, Marionette Soldiers, by Italian street artist BLU. It took 4 months to finish it in 2010. BLU’s topic of art works are strongly connected to the current situation of a country or history of a city.

Wednesday we had a down day, explored around the hotel and the local shopping center and tried to swim again. When swimming didn’t work out, we decided to get some more polish foods (and ice cream) from the local store, cook at the apartment and go for an evening stroll.

Thursday we returned to Dunkin Donuts for breakfast and then wandered back to the science center and planetarium. We all really enjoyed this experience, pushy kids and annoyed adults aside.

DELICIOUS!

In the Planetarium.

Waiting to charge the little spaceship for blast off.

Go, go, go

Playing with the dry ice floating around inside. It was fun to blow it around the exhibit.

Lo's version of the woman with the cat. Nice work Lo!

This was an activity station where the kids were supposed to sketch this portrait.

A view of the bubble maker from the ground floor... Looking up at the people blowing to create the bubbles.

The gigantic bubble maker. This was a cause for some tears to start the day when pushy kids kept cutting in front of Anna and Lo. This was completely crowded at the beginning of the day, but all cleared out at the end. I had to run up stairs to get to a position to blow a bubble after they pulled the pullys and started the bubble.

Success! (See the bubble floating?) This was the best one of the day and the kids loved chasing it! Good teamwork Anna, Lo and Dad!

Friday we were very excited for Lyndsey to get off work a little earlier and to meet her in Old Town again for some souvenir shopping, dinner and more good family time exploring. On our way to Old town, we decided to explore by way of the trams. We stopped off at another shopping center for lunch (unfortunately McDonald's), then made our way toward the river Vistula and surrounding activities near the riverfront which is also located just a short distance from New and Old Town.

We were dropped off by Szkolny Park Sportowy and park Romualda Traugutta where we enjoyed wandering through on our way toward the Vistula. We spent a bunch of time at the Multimedia Fountain Park as well. These are dancing fountains which light up and are even more impressive at night. We were pretty impressed even during the day because it was unseasonable warm in Warsaw and we were very very hot from being out in the sun. To top the day off, we even had the best, authentic pierogies ever this evening at the pierogarnia... Zapieck Polski!

Making friends at the food court in front of McDonalds at the shopping mall.

Multimedia Fountains

Darn it, we didn't bring our swimming suits!

Posing, trying very hard!

More posing...

Stop posing like that!

We found out there is even a neighborhood in Warsaw named “Chmielna”. We had another nice lunch in the town, and even grabbed some delicious cinnamon rolls that I have no idea what they are called. We will just call them Mmmm, mmmm, good. After that we decided to just take it easy and head back to the apartment for dinner and have a solid polish dinner, relax and do family games for our last night. Kielbasa, pierogi, meats and cheeses were easy and delicious!

Local work truck for the company Chmielna!

I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting about how wonderful this experience has been for our family, in particular the closeness and bond we are all forming with each other. The best one to me is how close Annelyse and Loralye are becoming. The way they play and laugh together, hold and comfort each other, cause trouble and just plain love the company of each other is one of the most satisfying feelings I have as a parent. I took a few pictures this trip that really capture the essence of this. I love you little girls and can’t wait for our next adventure as a family!