Greetings from Poland again. It is still cold here, but we are in Krakow now and it is quite a bit warmer here than in the north. Today was a balmy 0F, and it should be warming all the way up to 20F by the time we leave! I have my sunscreen and swim suit at the ready.

Los Pubelos Pardido de Dios

I have picked up a few more words of spanish from traveling with my two Spanish flatmates the whole time; most of this involves the obligitory swapping of swear words and insults, but this phrase actually had some relevence to our travels. The phrase directly translates to "the villages lost of god" and is used to describe places so small that not even god can remember them. A bit sad, I know, but we found a lot of these villages on our way home from Lublin. With the weather being so unpredictable, we decided to head back home a bit early, and taking full advantage of our car, we took back roads for most of the way so we could get off the beaten track for a bit and see more of the authentic Poland. I don't know if we succeeded, but we found some really cool places. I'm not just going to leave you hangin, there are pictures to follow of course, but it is pointless to decribe them now.

Majdanek

Backing up a bit, we did manage to make it to the concentration camp, but had an amazingly hard time trying to locate it. The horrible irony of desperately trying to find a place that others tried so hard to avoid did not escape me. However we did find it eventually, though only after following a Polish man that we met in a gas station. We arrived after it had closed, but we were able to persuade the guard to let us in. It was super intense; the desolation of this place was amplified by the dark and frigid weather, and being the only people there only added to this feeling. Not a place I want to go back to, but I'm happy we saw it.

Krakow again...

We are back in krakow now, and are trying our best to get out and see things while still ensuring that all our limbs and appengages stay attached to our bodies. Today we walked around the town and checked out some of the shops, went to a cathedral, played in the snow (my spanish friends have not seen real snow ever, so it is a favorite past time of theirs now).

Well that's all for now...it's late here now, and I'm hogging the computer again. I'll try to write more later. Goodnight!