The Planty, Krakow, Poland
Walking round the Planty in Krakow made me think about other cities and the importance of parkland - Princes Street Gardens and the Meadows in central Edinburgh; Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen; the Tiergarten in Berlin; the Trädgårdsföreningenspark in Gothenburg; and the Inches in Perth (Scotland). All of them give visitors and locals the opportunity for a brisk walk or a slow stroll in semi-natural surroundings.
When there aren't any decent sized green spaces close by, city centres can feel rather airless and claustrophobic - especially for walkers! Glasgow Green is some distance from the city centre, so too is the Parc du Cinquantenaire in Brussels (although there's the small and disappointing Parc de Brussels).
Maybe it's the shade provided by the trees, or the oxygen created by the greenery. And it's good to see other people enjoying themselves, having a walk and relaxing.
Krakow is particularly fortunate to have the Planty, wrapped around the Old Town along the line of the old city walls. You can see the last remnants of the wall in several places. Only at the southern end, facing Wawel Hill, is the green belt broken for a short distance.
I had a walk around in the early evening, on the first day of our 3-day stay there. The rest of the family had gone back to the hotel for a rest after our first visit to the Old Town and a tour in a horse-drawn carriage (see the Old Town story). Apart from young Ailsa that is. She was still awake and quite happy to go for a walk (in the pushchair), so we set off again from the Atrium Hotel just to the north of the Old Town.
(There are plenty more images from this walk in the Gallery).
We went past the Rynek Kleparski market and across the busy Basztowa at the lights, and down the Slawkowska (funny, Poland doesn't seem to use words for "street", "road" or "avenue"). Then we turned left into the Planty near a pond with a fountain which shot up into the air from time to time. Children were playing near a little bridge across the pond, carefully watched by adults. Behind them rose the tall trunks of a stand of birch trees. Nearby was a cafe with elaborate wide seats in the shade of the trees.
The next highlight was one of Krakow's best-known buildings, the Barbakan, a broad defensive fortress that has obviously been well-maintained and is open to visitors. It guards the way to the Florian Gate with its archway leading onto the Florianska and then to St Mary's Church in the main square (Rynek Glowny). Two young violinists were playing tunes with a flourish under the arch as people passed by.
We continued on towards the north-east corner of the Planty, where a wide underpass led under the ring road towards the nearby main train station. There was another musician, a woman playing an accordian. Having passed by the violinists I thought I should make a contribution to this one; all this random music adds to the enjoyable atmosphere of the place.
Evidence of more formal musical performances could be seen in the shape of the Slowacki Theatre, dating from 1893. The Lonely Planet Guide Book said that this stages both opera and theatre. If the shows are as impressive as the building then they must be worth seeing.
The Planty runs south from here, alongside the Westerplatte and past a couple of churches and a stretch of high wall. Lots of people were enjoying the evening air, strolling and chatting, or sitting and resting - or sitting and chatting! A few went past on bikes, along the wide tarmaced footpath. A couple of park workers were going along emptying bins into plastic bags which were then piled up in the back of a van, and the Planty as a whole was outstandingly free of litter.
There was a narrow section going past the second church, Dominikanek, then the park broadened out again as the Starowislna crossed it heading into the Old Town.
The next section was really a repeat of the previous one, but no less pleasant, with a longer avenue passing the religious buildings on the right. I was taking my time - and quite a few photos - and by now Ailsa had lost interest and fallen asleep.
The southern tip of the Planty is marked by the Royal Hotel and restaurant. From here you could continue down the Stradomska towards the old Jewish quarter of Kazimierz, walk round past Wawel Hill to the banks of the River Wisla, or, as I did, turn right through the gate to cross the southern end of the Grodzka. This is the street which runs north in a straight line through to the Rynek Glowny. When we were there the end of the street was fenced off for repaving work, but you could squeeze past to call in at the church of St Peter and Paul.
Just beyond the repaving works were some display panels covering two of the events of the 2nd World War which are deeply engrained in the Polish national memory - the Katyn Massacre of Polish officers by the Soviets in 1940, and the mysterious death of the leader of Poland's Government in Exile, General Sikorski, in a plan crash in 1943.
Across the road, Wawel Hill rose up steeply - or rather the walls of the castle did. To get onto the western section of the Planty we had to continue along the busy pavement - past the end of the Kanonicza where the tourist carriages and golf carts were gathered, squeezing through a narrow bit of pavement beside the Seminary, then turn right into the park.
This took us into another wide section of the Planty with a straight main footpath, religious buildings and museums on the right, and less busy areas of parkland to the left.
It was worth noting that with the evening sun from the west, the buildings on this side were illuminated better than those we'd just gone past on the east side, which would be seen at their best in the morning light.
Halfway along the south-western stretch, approaching the Franciscan Church, was another line of display boards - these ones devoted to local hero Pope John Paul II and his successor Pope Benedict.
Then the Planty narrowed as the University buildings pushed close to Straszewskiego (section of the ring road).
From here you could cross over the busy road onto Pilsudskiego and walk westwards for a kilometre, across the even busier Al Mickiewicza (part of another ring road) near the National Museum, to Park Jordana. We did this a couple of days later and bought food for a picnic in a little shop on Pilsudskiego. There are good play facilities for kids and a cafe beside a boating pond, plus lots more parkland and woodland to walk around.
Continuing north-east along the final section of the Planty, we passed two more sets of display panels. One was a long series of "before and after" views of historic buildings around Krakow that had been restored through the good work of the Civic Committee for the Restoration of Krakow Heritage since it was founded in December 1978 - 30 years ago. The progressive restoration of one building after another, to repair the damage caused particularly by industrial pollution, must have made a remarkable difference which we can now benefit from as visitors. Clearly this shouldn't be taken for granted - these historic buildings probably haven't looked as magnificent since the early decades after their construction.
Then there was another display, running past a large open-air (but covered) restaurant which appeared to offer good value meals. The subject this time was a Polish explorer - Kazimierz Nowak - who travelled through Africa in the 1930s on a bike. There was one more church to walk past - the Reform Church - on the north-west corner, and an area of raised parkland and flower beds to the left leading up to a statue among the trees. Then we were back at Slawkowska where we started. Time to hurry back to the hotel to get ready for a meal in the Old Town.
< Back to Poland page for links to other stories
Gallery
View a gallery of further images for this story.Comments
Join Walking Stories for free to comment on this story. Have an account already? Log in to comment.
