Day 13: Kraków and Zakopane

Today was a very busy day. This morning we went back to Wawel Hill to visit the Royal Apartments and State Rooms, in the castle. This was the section that was closed on our previous visit. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take any pictures inside. Below is a panorama taken inside the fortifications, for some reason this photo turned out blue.

Touring the castle took about 3 hours, which included a guided tour of the Royal Apartments, and individual tours of the State Rooms, Treasury, and Armory. The rooms are all restored to different time periods during which the castle was occupied. The seat of the polish kings moved from Kraków to Warsaw in 1596, when the Wawel castle was destroyed by a fire.

This afternoon, we took the bus to Zakopane, which is in the south of Poland, near the Slovakian border, at the base of the Tatry Mountains. Our bus ride took us through the foothills, with many beautiful views such as the one seen below, of a village in a valley.

This was our first view of the mountains!

And this is the view from the balcony of the chalet we’re staying at.

For dinner, we went to a small restaurant on the main street in Zakopane. During dinner there was a group playing traditional highland music… and a very cute little dancer!