As I wrote last night – my room was completely empty except for me.

Naturally I stayed up late enjoying my beautiful solitude by catching up on TV I’ve missed til like 3 in the morning.

I also had a full, good nights’ sleep and didn’t get my ass out of bed until around noon this morning.

Yup, it was a good night.

I only had one plan for today – a 3:30 walking tour around the old town of Warsaw.

It was once again rainy and cold (about 4C) so I bundled up best I could and walked over to the meeting point for the tour.

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Our tough little troop of 15 people headed out on an abbreviated (because of the weather) tour of the old town for an hour and a half.

A few things I learnt:

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Supposedly the name Warsaw comes from a myth told about a mermaid named Sawa who liked it here so much she stayed and fell in love with a boy named Wars.

Together they were Warsawa.

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The Jews moved into town centuries ago and we’re quickly hated and ostracized by the Christians because they knew how to read, write and count.

Oh, and they also knew how to do business by undercutting their competition with lower prices – yeah, the Christians really hated that.

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And Madame Currie was born here but went to France to study and win Nobel prizes because there was no room for an educated woman in Poland as they were expected just to be housewives.

Have I mentioned I love walking tours?

After the tour it was about 5pm and I was freezing.  I was bundled up with a hoodie and a winter jacket as well as gloves and a beenie but I was missing one key thing – a scarf.

So, I stopped in H&M clothing store and picked one up.

Considering it’s going to be getting progressively colder through the week as I make my way to Krakow, Gdansk and then finally to Stockholm I’m thinking this scarf is gonna come in mighty handy.

Other than that I had lunch and dinner at the same restaurant I ate at last night.

For lunch I had a bowl of beetroot soup with perogies in it and then a dish of sausage with sauerkraut.

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For dinner I had ribs on a bed of more sauerkraut and finished it off with dessert poppyseed and raisin perogies topped with a vanilla cream sauce.

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Yup, no light meals to be found here in eastern Europe.

Ironically enough, I think I’ve actually lost some weight just because of all the walking I do every day.

And, yeah, that’s it.

No one checked into my room today so I had the room all to myself again tonight and decided to just sit up there, watch TV, and relax.

I do, however, how to be up bright and early tomorrow morning as I’m catching an 8am train to Krakow where I’ll visit the Wieliczka salt mines and Auschwitz in the next couple of days.

So, that’s it for relaxing – time to get my tourist hat on again and explore…

USSR Trip 2015, Trip Journal

USSR 2015
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