Magical Krakow

On Wednesday morning, we did a walking tour of Krakow's old town area and Wawel Hill with a local guide. We saw the inside of a couple of cathedrals and walked the grounds. Also heard the story of a woman who became King (not queen) at age 10, married a much older guy, than passed away at age 25 during childbirth, and apparently the baby also died. Crazy story! The cathedrals we saw in Krakow were very tall but tight quarters inside, so one of them wouldn't even let us take pictures because it would cause too much of a foot traffic jam. 

When we were done, our guide let us take a break and we went to one of the little buildings to enjoy some coffee and I bought a Polish chocolate bar as well, which was really good.

After the walking tour, a couple of friends tourmates and I went to a local restaurant that serves up food cafeteria style and you can pick from many different dishes for cheap... students often eat there. For example, I got six different items and a bottle of water for about $10. So far, the exchange rate has definitely been in our favor on this trip!

From there, we went to the Leaky Cauldron, which is a little cafe paying homage to the Harry Potter books and movies. Unfortunately they didn't serve alcohol, so we just got a couple of fruity drinks they called "potions," which contained dry ice, so they had that cool effect.

After that, we walked around, did some shopping, then one of my tourmates and I set out to find a laundromat so we would have some clean clothes for the next few days. There's only so much you can wash in your room and have it dry in time for to pack for your next destination! The key for when you only have hand washables is to wash all of them at once in a washer so that it can extract as much water as possible, then hang dry them in your room for at least one full day. The laundromat we found also serves food, so we enjoyed a couple of glasses of Prosecco and some duck pierogies while we waited for our clothes to finish.