Sunday 18 June After two days of fairly intensive activity, we decided to take it a bit easy. We spent the morning catching up with writing and managing the Air BnB letting of Myrtle Street. It was a lot of hard work to set up, but the effort was worth it as the guests have been very happy, thanks in great part to Charlotte effectively managing the change-overs. Something Frances wanted to try was some of the special beers available here. Beer with fruit flavourings is popular, I think in part to the fact that there are many commercial beers to choose from, they all taste pretty similar – to us at least.
As we have spent a bit of time here watching people in the town square sitting in bars and restaurants, we thought it was about time to do it ourselves. The afternoon was quite warm and sunny, so finding a seat in the shade was not easy, but we found one to share at the Spiz with a couple of middle-aged Poles.
It’s lower left in the photo of the town hall. Frances ordered a Piwo Czekoladowe, a chocolate beer (yes, that’s right) but I settled for Piwo Pzseniczne, a wheat beer – try pronouncing those two! Frances thought her beer was excellent, not too sweet, and mine was OK, but not as much flavour as I expected.
After a short while we struck up a conversation with the two Polskis. Only one spoke a little English so the discussion involved lots of gestures. His wife works in Norway to earn extra income. They guys live in Wroclaw and remember the communist times. They said that they both speak fluent Russian, the second language at the time but now most young people learn German and English.
We finished our beers and went back to the apartment, narrowly missing the daily afternoon thunderstorm. This was a regular occurrence in Karlovy Vary, and to a lesser extent in Prague and other cities.
The rain is torrential for about 10-15 minutes, and then the sun comes out again. Not unlike Sydney in spring-summer. I’ve included a photo of the beach, also set up in the town square and enjoyed buy children and adults. Not sure if you can have a beer on the beach.
Before heading out for dinner tonight, we actually did a bit of research, finding some restaurants that might suit our budget and taste. We found none of the ones on the list, they’d either gone, changed hands or we couldn’t find them. We settled on a Chatka przy Jatkach, a restaurant serving Polish food, but also had English descriptions. Also there were other people eating so we could see what the food was like.
Frances ordered the extremely traditional Zurek, a sour rye soup with a boiled egg and diced sausage. Good but quite filling.
For main course she had smoked sausage with sauerkraut and potato wedges. After the soup, she could only get through half of the meal! I ordered pork chop with salad and chips.
A huge plate of food arrived with what looked like a schnitzel, shredded beetroot, white cabbage, shredded carrot, sauerkraut and chips. After tasting a bit of the schnitzel which tasted like chicken, I asked the waitress if it was really pork. She insisted it was pork as that was what I ordered. The only thing I can say is that the Poles can make pork taste like anything – even chicken. A Pole doesn’t usually consider a dish a serious meal unless it comes with a piece of meat.
However there are some vegetarian and vegan restaurants. The vegetables were very good, especially the beetroot and cabbage. They were only slightly flavoured but the taste was great. There was too much food of course so I left some as well. We’ll have to be careful or we’ll end up like balloons. I had a glass of their tap beer, Tyskie and Frances had a bottle of dark caramel beer with a raspberry shot to go with it – too sweet for me but Frances liked it. The guy at the table next to us was drinking vodka shots with the same beer as a chaser
Some farewell photos of scenes in Wroclaw. Add a comment if you want any details. On our way to Krakow (Pronounces Krakov) for three days, about three hours by train south of Wroclaw. During the trip, I’m reading The Art of Happiness based on quotes and interviews with the Dalai Lama. I’m about to start the section on suffering. Looking forward to it. He makes the initial point that because the essentials of life are satisfied in western society (as apposed to India or Africa) that even minor trauma can cause great suffering. I mention this after staying for 3 days in a very nice studio apartment on the 4th floor (top floor) overlooking the town square.
Because of the almost non-stop noise outside, we had to keep the windows closed most of the time, especially at night. The stairwell was used by smokers at all hours, and they would leave their butts in ashtrays outside their doors. Smoke rises. So, with our windows closed we had an almost constant stream of stale tobacco leaking into the apartment, interspersed with bursts of fresh smoke. As much as I hate to complain, this caused us just a little more suffering than we would have liked.
As we have spent a bit of time here watching people in the town square sitting in bars and restaurants, we thought it was about time to do it ourselves. The afternoon was quite warm and sunny, so finding a seat in the shade was not easy, but we found one to share at the Spiz with a couple of middle-aged Poles.
It’s lower left in the photo of the town hall. Frances ordered a Piwo Czekoladowe, a chocolate beer (yes, that’s right) but I settled for Piwo Pzseniczne, a wheat beer – try pronouncing those two! Frances thought her beer was excellent, not too sweet, and mine was OK, but not as much flavour as I expected.After a short while we struck up a conversation with the two Polskis. Only one spoke a little English so the discussion involved lots of gestures. His wife works in Norway to earn extra income. They guys live in Wroclaw and remember the communist times. They said that they both speak fluent Russian, the second language at the time but now most young people learn German and English.
We finished our beers and went back to the apartment, narrowly missing the daily afternoon thunderstorm. This was a regular occurrence in Karlovy Vary, and to a lesser extent in Prague and other cities.The rain is torrential for about 10-15 minutes, and then the sun comes out again. Not unlike Sydney in spring-summer. I’ve included a photo of the beach, also set up in the town square and enjoyed buy children and adults. Not sure if you can have a beer on the beach.
Before heading out for dinner tonight, we actually did a bit of research, finding some restaurants that might suit our budget and taste. We found none of the ones on the list, they’d either gone, changed hands or we couldn’t find them. We settled on a Chatka przy Jatkach, a restaurant serving Polish food, but also had English descriptions. Also there were other people eating so we could see what the food was like.
Frances ordered the extremely traditional Zurek, a sour rye soup with a boiled egg and diced sausage. Good but quite filling.For main course she had smoked sausage with sauerkraut and potato wedges. After the soup, she could only get through half of the meal! I ordered pork chop with salad and chips.
A huge plate of food arrived with what looked like a schnitzel, shredded beetroot, white cabbage, shredded carrot, sauerkraut and chips. After tasting a bit of the schnitzel which tasted like chicken, I asked the waitress if it was really pork. She insisted it was pork as that was what I ordered. The only thing I can say is that the Poles can make pork taste like anything – even chicken. A Pole doesn’t usually consider a dish a serious meal unless it comes with a piece of meat.However there are some vegetarian and vegan restaurants. The vegetables were very good, especially the beetroot and cabbage. They were only slightly flavoured but the taste was great. There was too much food of course so I left some as well. We’ll have to be careful or we’ll end up like balloons. I had a glass of their tap beer, Tyskie and Frances had a bottle of dark caramel beer with a raspberry shot to go with it – too sweet for me but Frances liked it. The guy at the table next to us was drinking vodka shots with the same beer as a chaser
Some farewell photos of scenes in Wroclaw. Add a comment if you want any details. On our way to Krakow (Pronounces Krakov) for three days, about three hours by train south of Wroclaw. During the trip, I’m reading The Art of Happiness based on quotes and interviews with the Dalai Lama. I’m about to start the section on suffering. Looking forward to it. He makes the initial point that because the essentials of life are satisfied in western society (as apposed to India or Africa) that even minor trauma can cause great suffering. I mention this after staying for 3 days in a very nice studio apartment on the 4th floor (top floor) overlooking the town square.
Because of the almost non-stop noise outside, we had to keep the windows closed most of the time, especially at night. The stairwell was used by smokers at all hours, and they would leave their butts in ashtrays outside their doors. Smoke rises. So, with our windows closed we had an almost constant stream of stale tobacco leaking into the apartment, interspersed with bursts of fresh smoke. As much as I hate to complain, this caused us just a little more suffering than we would have liked.
