Walking Warsaw

All in all, we only had 20 hours to check out Warsaw. We landed in the evening and checked into the Radisson Blu Centrum Hotel, I was lucky enough to have some Orbucks saved up so the room only cost $35.

View from the hotel room

We walked up the street a few blocks to a busy area with a lot of shopping. At the corner was a little bar/cafe that looked interesting so we popped in for some food. We ordered beers, polish sausages, french fries, and some sort of dumplings.

Afterwards, we walked up the street to check out the shops. The McDonald's was huge and featured foods unbeknownst to us - we didn't try them but we took a picture!

Adjacent to the McDonald's was a grocery/department store, so we wandered through it. Back outside on the sidewalk there were a lot of people chatting and wandering around. We went further up the street to see the types of shops, which included Swatch and other upscale shops I would never step foot in on a normal basis. It was late in the evening and most of the stores were closing up, we were also pretty exhausted, so we decided to head back to the hotel.

The morning was raining, but that didn't stop us! For breakfast we walked half a block to the 99 restaurant. We both ordered the Polish Breakfast that consisted of bread, various cheeses, eggs, and deli meats. It was very European, but it was a refreshing break from the food in Kazakhstan.

Our waiter was kind enough to help us find the best way to get the old town of Warsaw. Since we didn't have a lot of time to research things to do, we had to jump on the quickest and cheapest thing possible. On the 3 block walk to public transport we saw a beautiful flower market:

We took the light rail about a mile up the road (it was the quickest way since we were so short on time) to the old town of Warsaw which had buildings dating back to the 13th century.

After WWII there was a lot of destruction to the old town, but it was meticulously rebuilt using as much of the original bricks as possible. The place was beautifully decorated for Christmas, which made this quick trip even more exciting!

Our first glimpse of old town after departing the light rail

Stairs to the bridge to cross the road

Going across the bridge

Looking down on the street from the bridge. The bottom right is where the first picture was taken.

The square of the old town is surrounded by shops and cafes. It looked as if they were getting ready to set up for some sort of celebration, and the center of the square contained a temporary ice rink.

On the walk to the old town square

In the old town square

We wanted to stay longer to take in the sights and explore more of the old town, but time was running short so we headed back to the hotel on the light rail. This is definitely a place we would like to revisit when we have more time!