After our morning tour in Krakow we traveled to Warsaw.
Arriving midafternoon in Warsaw we did not lose any time, luckily the Palace of
Culture and Science was across the street from our hotel so we decided to visit
this huge skyscraper. This massive Russian style Palace built in the 1950s was
a gift from Stalin to the people of Warsaw...Everything about the palace is
big...to date it is the tallest building from Frankfurt to Moscow at 760
feet...we rode up to the observation deck for the commanding views of Warsaw
and the view from the ground was also very impressive. We maneuvered our way
through the underground tunnels back to our hotel to meet our guide John for a
city tour. We drove by the Palm Tree Circle past the former Communist Party
Headquarters now home of the Polish Stock Exchange and the only Ferrari
Dealership in Poland...from this point, we started our walk to Old Town via the
Pilsudski Square passing the Hotel Bristol to St. Anne Cathedral where I
climbed the Tower for a panoramic view of the Old Town, Castle Square, the
Royal Way and across the Vistula River. In 1945, with the exception of two
buildings nothing remained of the Old Town...by 1956 the Old Town was totally
reconstructed. Entering the Castle Square, we came upon a lively area of cafes
flanked by the distinctive pink Royal Castle...continuing on we came to St.
Martin Church and to a viewpoint overlooking the escarpment of the Vistula
River...from there we walked back to where the car was parked taking in the
sights of Old Town Warsaw...Warsaw is a very progressive city...from an
infrastructure perspective Warsaw has peeled away the many signs of the
Communist regime with huge building projects from skyscrapers, roads and
immense shopping malls....our time was short but we enjoyed the city very
much...onto the first of our 3 Baltic states...Lithuania.
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