Hotel Rubbens Bydgoszcz

... fortune seekers, the melangoly inspiring chores on Gipsy fiddles...

Through the patter of rain on top of my tent I can hear the frogs still insistent on their mating calls, procreation is on their reptilian minds tonight. The sinister sound of an owl preparing for the mid night hunt...I am back in my self-sought solitary vagabond excistence feeling tranquil and peacefull of mind after three weeks of excersize and living it rough...

Toruń (Thorn), located almost in the centre of Poland on the Wisła (Vistula) river, is a birthplace of Mikołaj Kopernik (Nicolaus Copernicus), and its interesting Old Town belongs to the UNESCO World Heritage List.

It takes about 25 minutes to walk from the Toruń Główny main railway station to the city centre, which is situated on the opposite bank of the river. Now, the Vistula river in Toruń is quite large so the bridge that you ...

... II. Gdansk is largely rebuilt on the base of the original buildings.

While arriving, an older woman adopts me. She helps me with the locker, buying & validating my bus ticket, telling me about Torun. She only knows a few words of English so it is mostly sign language. A nice welcome. With my large backpack, I learned that if I am just doing 1 night and there is much of a walk and/or much transport then I pack my daypack and leave my big backpack at the ...

... a pariah but of course he proved his theory and is now considered to be a genius. They are quite proud of Copernicus in Torun and you see his likeness everywhere. You can even buy gingerbread men in the shape of him (well its supposed to look like him but to me it mostly looks like blob of gingerbread with a head on it to make it look like a human). Gingerbread is the other thing Torun is known for. You see a lot of gingerbread shops in the Old ...

The night I get to the ecclesiastic main town of Polan: Toruń. It has a medieval centre recognized by the UNESCO, and a huge Rynek with a nice town hall in the middle. This was the native town of Copernic, and lived for 7 years in one its houses. There is some teutonic castle in ruins and some protection walls. The river walk is also very ...

Back in the car we go and it's off to Lipno we go. We get there and get to the cemntary. Lines of cars and people everywhere. We survey the 2 sites and buy flowers and candles. We get to the the first stop and pay our respects. We than go to our 2nd stop and notice that someone has placed all these flowers on the grave (they were not there before). I'm pretty sure Dad and I were thinking the same thing. Who are these jack ass's placing all ...

... sells Filutek shirts. I get to the point where I flat out ask one shop owner and I get the response if I knew where they were selling one, I would buy it for myself. Hmm.. back to Tourist information I go to where via Dad I am a proud owner of a Filutek T-shirt. Thanks Daddy Waddy! We than go look inside a few church's and than get going.

I wake up at 5am to dad snoring uncontrollably loud. I know he can't help it (deviated septum) but dear god, the snoring could wake the dead. I feel bad for pops with all the driving he's done and don't wake him. I put my long johns on, jeans and all sorts of warm clothing, blankets and pillow and go to the car. I end up waking up the receptionist due to the fact that she needs to unlock the door so I can get out. I try various positions and finally fall "asleep" for ~3 hours. I ...

... ourselves a ride to the train station in a yellow bus (there was a guy in the party who actually lives in a yellow bus), a lot more fun than it was comfortable... Then almost everyone left for Warszawa and I had to wait until the night to go to Krakow, so I left my luggage in the yellow bus and spent the day walking around Bydgoszcz. An excellent weekend, met some very nice people and Torun is a very beautiful city. (Sorry, but I will only be able to upload photos after I leave Praha...)

... if I go for anything that looks like a jog. I've seen not one person jogging in my three weeks here, and any mention of diets ends with all coming to the agreement that the person in question has some sort of unbalanced mind. All I can do is do endless ineffectual squats and lunges and push-ups while watching movies in my room. I am driven on by fashion shows, and by Star Trek novels about genetically-engineered supermen. One day, my brilliant physique of an Ubermensch shall ...