So, I gave up on the info line - it was 9:05 and our train was to leave at 9:50 - and the ticket line was long. I thought it a better use of my time to get into the ticket purchase line rather than the info line to actually get something done. While not all 12 sales booths were occupied, it struck me that the woman at the number 4 window was there, but wasn't helping anyone. She just didn't look up. That's the ticket friends, if you don't look up, there isn't actually a line of a bajillion people waiting to be helped. It's actually brilliant when you think about it. Finally after a solid 20 minutes in this line, Teresa buzzed that she could help the next person. And let me tell you, Teresa should have been one of the women not looking up. She did not love her job, and she did not love that we didn't speak English. I was a bit nervous this being our first train ride at all - and this town in particular didn't have a direct train there. We were going to have to do some maneuvering once we got to this OTHER town to get to Kazimierz Dolny.
Being the planner that I am, I had looked up the tickets online prior to just showing up at the train station. I had thought about traveling to the station the night before to get the tickets as the trip was my idea and I didn't want it to crash and burn since I had invited others with me. I knew that we wanted the 9:50 train and that it'd arrive in Puławy at 11:38. When we tried to converse with Teresa, she indicated that we would be arriving at 13:38. Wait.... that's 1:38. Why on earth would the ride be double the time? Teresa, quit playin. What's the deal? I asked - through Google translate - if there was a faster train (knowing I had seen it online and wanted that train, not one that showed up at 1:38). Luckily for me, Teresa needed her glasses to read what I had typed, and as she fumbled for her cheaters, she did not hide her joy in taking these extra measures to help us out. **sarcasm
Finally, we gathered that she was going to sell us tickets on the later train because 2nd class was sold out on the earlier one. We opted for 1st class (a whole two dollars more) and off we went. It was a pleasant ride along the Polish countryside, it went quickly with good conversation and new surroundings. When we arrived in the town before the town we were going to - we got off and were a little skeptical that this was all going to work out.
arrival at the train station
Naturally, the first thing I had to do was use the bathroom when we got off the train, and while I was in the loo, Tamara and Steve went to figure out how we were going to get to our town. Unfortunately because we didn't rush right off the train, the taxis were all snatched up, and we couldn't make heads or tails of the bus schedule, so we were a bit nervous. Luckily a taxi rolled up just before I started to panic and we were on our way. Phew.
We arrived and promptly set off to eat and celebrate our arrival. When in doubt, pizza is always a safe bet, so we indulged. :)
The town itself was really quite cute. We walked around for a couple of hours, walked up a bajillion stairs to see some crosses on the top of the hill - turns out you have to pay to actually get on the landing where the crosses are, but they don't tell you that until you're at the top - well played Poland. We enjoyed the get away from the city and the creative shopping they had there.
I think my favorite part of the trip were the souvenirs that Steve came back with. They are hand carved wooden monks - or hassidic jews - we're not entirely sure. They were at a flea market in the town and Steve managed to get two for the price of one. It may prove to be helpful to have a bargain shopper among the ranks as I travel in the future. <3
Steve in action
So happy....
At another shop - wondering if he should build the duo to a trio...
Steve telling us how much charm this one has
After stopping for ice cream - well deserved in the heat we faced that day - we wandered a bit more and decided it was time to go back home.
When you come across a giant rooster, naturally you hop on for a photo
When we were ready to leave, we meandered back to where we were dropped off by the taxi. Sadly there were no taxis. We walked a bit more, and found a sign that read "taxi" and had a number, so naturally we called it. Sadly, with our lack of Polish language skills, we were unable to communicate where in the town we were. I tried naming different buildings, telling them the street name, all of the things that normally work when calling a taxi, to no avail. I wanted to just scream, WE'RE NEXT TO THE SIGN THAT SAYS TAXI AND HAS YOUR NUMBER. We stopped a Polish guy, gave him the phone and for whatever reason he couldn't communicate where we were either. It didn't make sense. I got back on the phone and basically just said "thank you" as politely as I could and hung up. So - we did the next best thing, tried to get an Uber. until this happened:
Nuts and bolts. We wandered a bit more and finally found a taxi that was a jeep type vehicle riddled with mud up to the windows. With this we knew one of two things were going to happen. We were either going to take this vehicle and offroad along side the Visła to get ourselves back to the train station, or we were going on safari. Luckily, he just drove us back to the train station and we returned to Warsaw without incident. Day trip #nailedit.
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