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restaurants i love: polonia in michigan, usa
i only add places to the “cafes/restaurants/etc. i love” section if it is an absolute love. and i think now after the third visit, we can finally at polonia polish restaurant in hamtramck, michigan to the list. i first visited polonia in 2011 on my very first visit to michigan to meet alex’s family. one can be a little nervous when they’re about to meet their boyfriend’s parents for the first time, but right after picking us up at the airport, they took us to polonia. all discomfort dissipated. polonia is located in a special place: hamtramck, michigan, a suburb of detroit. it used to be a old polish settlement…
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My Three Week Poland Trip Itinerary
planning to visit an entire country in three weeks’ time is sort of daunting. the first step i took was to think about the obvious, unmissable places i needed to see on this trip. that would be kraków (my triumphant return!), warsaw (really jonesing to see it!) and gdańsk (love affair with this city ever since seeing it on the amazing race). with three major cities, i started to see a path forming in my mind: working my way up the country from south to north (or vice versa). the next logical steps were to fill out the other areas. i polled all of my facebook friends with polish connections…
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I Dyed in Szczecin
it was my last full day in poland and i was on a (very very full) train from the hel peninsula bound for szczecin, near the german border. i chose to visit szczecin because i’d heard a lot of great things in the travel bloggy world about this gritty polish harbor city and i wanted to see it with my own eyes. naively, when booking the trip i planned a handful of “one-nighters”, and this was one of them, my last hurrah in poland. but little did i know that one nighters aren’t such a great idea when you’re on a long backpacking trip. those days were such whirlwinds and admittedly,…
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a year of travels: 2014
you know those facebook “year in review” things where it shows you your year as if it knows you? (and how well can a social media website know you, anyway?) when i clicked on mine, a photo from 2013 popped up as the centerpiece and then a load of random photos: reggie watts (?!), a landscape shot of hel, poland, a still from big brother 16. just pathetic, facebook.sometimes, if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. in that spirit, here’s my travel year in review of only my favorite travel memories… and it’s been a heck of a year and i’m feeling really thankful about…
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Going to Hel (Poland) and Back
well, reporting back about my polish backpacking odyssey this summer has almost come to a close. but definitely not before i talk about the single place in poland i was most excited about: the beach town of hel, located on a sandbar peninsula of the same name on the northern coast of poland which extends thirty-five km out into the baltic, and varies from only 100m to 3 km wide. i thought it would be something special to behold, for sure. anything this interesting geographically really gets my vote! we took a ferry ride from gdansk on this boat. i think the name of our boat was a good sign of things…
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Glimpse of Malbork Castle, Poland
one does not travel to northern poland and miss malbork castle, an absolutely beautiful red brick (very characteristic of the area) castle built by the teutonic knights in the middle ages. i am happy to report that i am currently feeling quite cured of being castled out like i was last spring, so a visit to the giant fortress on the vistula river seemed like a fantastic day trip out of gdansk at just over an hour by train. (photo via) besides all of these beautiful ornate interiors and ballrooms, i really found this unfinished chapel quite fascinating. damaged in WWII, the chapel still does not have a roof and the…
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Sopot, So Good: Poland’s North Coast Jewel
a real highlight of the entire three week backpacking trip to poland was getting to the coast, and one of the places i was most excited about was the small beachy resort town of sopot, only about a half-hour train ride from gdansk. but sopot isn’t exactly the sleepy little coastal town you’d think of: this place is happening. sopot’s famous for its history (both marlene dietrich and adolf hitler stayed at the famous resort hotel) and a reputation for a good party. apparently young poles (and others) flock here by the thousands in the summer time to take advantage of the clubbing atmosphere. but that’s not why i was…
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Solidarity Movement in Gdansk, Poland
august is an extremely historic month to be visiting poland. the warsaw uprising, ghetto uprising, and solidarity movement all occurred in this month, and everywhere i went, i felt like i was visiting a sight on the exact anniversary of an important event. besides taking in the beauty of the city center, the solidarity sights were by far the most interesting and powerful of my stay in poland’s most northern metropolis. there is so much to see and lots of information to soak-up about this historic movement that got it’s start here in gdańsk. while walking away from the city center towards the harbor, you eventually come across the solidarity…
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Gdánsk Magic Gdánsk
i deeply enjoyed my time in the most northern polish metropolis on the baltic sea, gdánsk. the photo above really says more than i could: we were just getting ready to head out to catch a boat when i deeply felt that i needed a raspberry-laden gofry (waffle), like right now. so my last couple of minutes in the city was spent gazing out at the harbor and scarfing down deliciousness. gdánsk certainly has some fascinating history, which i could go on about for pages. but i won’t, and i will leave you instead with just a select few facts: it was a major hanseatic league city, was designated a “free city” after…
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Whimsical Toruń
toruń, poland (a UNESCO heritage designated city) was just a hop and a skip away from warsaw on polski bus (which was actually early. what?!) and we arrived to this cute little town with the whole afternoon ahead of us! toruń is sort of a smaller kraków. the česky krumlov of poland, if you will. it’s incredibly tourist friendly and is the kind of place that invites lingering with an ice cream cone on a bench and people watching. there is ample signage all over and a couple of museums dedicated to the two things toruń is famous for: its gingerbread (piernika) and its famous scientist, copernicus, who was born here. but if you’re…
