I'm going to skip right past Berlin and Poznan. I caught a mild flu or something on the plane and it had me pretty laid up for the first couple of days I was in Europe. Luckily, the hotel had a soft bed and a nice bathroom. I did get out and do the sights, but I was working on three-hour bursts with long naps in between. I left Berlin for Poznan on Wednesday morning, and that trip took significantly longer than anticipated due to road construction. Luckily, the last renter of my diesel Fiat Croma failed to return it with the GPS navigation CD so I was able to enjoy the countryside at a leisurely pace.
GPS aside, the Croma is a sweet ride. It's surprisingly quick, good on fuel, and diesel is about %15 cheaper than unleaded. If it had an Aux jack for my iPod it would be complete. As it is, my radio adapter works fine.
Poznan is a nice city - not fantastic - but it has a nice town center and churches. It also has a totally adequate brewpub called Brovaria that makes a decent Wheat and Helles. However, one night was going to be enough. Due to my early night, jet lag, and room that faced the tram line, I was up early and on my way. I decided to take the scenic route through the country towards Katowice, figuring that with the traffic and what not it would take me the better part of the day. I actually made it there in time for a late lunch, and that was with stops to look around some of the smaller towns. Only one construction delay for a total of 10 minutes.
This was fortunate for me, because during my lunch I decided I really didn't want to stay in Katowice - it was heavily industrial and there wasn't much to see. I figured since it was early I'd take the scenic road towards Krakow and find a place along the way. Apparently taking a wrong turn I found myself 5km from Oswiecim. I had planned to come here to do the Auschwitz and Berkenau tours, but decided to stop now while the weather was so accommodating. Enough has been said about both these places, and while Auschwitz is tragic in its brutality, the shear scope of the extermination camp at Berkenau is shocking. Even when you know exactly what you are going to see, until you walk down the road from the rail entrance to the gas chambers you can't get a sense of its scale. It takes at least twenty minutes to walk there from the front gates, past the rows of barracks and guard towers - down the wide gravel road where the SS selected which out of the arriving trainloads of Jews would work in the camp and which would march straight to the gas chambers (about 70%).
After all that, I figured I'd just head to Krakow since I didn't have a reason to go back out to Oswiecim. Old town Krakow is beautiful. While it's got its share of people hawking cheap crap, it's not annoying to the level of taking something away, like Prague. So, to sum up: This morning I walked around and did some of the castle, this afternoon I did an organized walking tour. Saw many churches and Miss Universe contestants, which I guess is here soon because they are having events all around town.
More to come.