Dwti Draig

We ended up going from one beautiful Czech lake to another beautiful lake; but this one was in Poland and we had to navigate the awful E8 road to get there! The E8 is obviously a main truck route, and is just single carriage way, but boy is it bumpy, with very few places to stop for a breather. There are practically no lay bys on the way, maybe for good reason!

Poland is fast becoming one of our favourite European countries, after our visit to Gdansk and Poznan last year. We were eager to return and explore more of Southern Poland. We had planned to visit Krakow, Auschwitz and Wroclaw, but decided last minute to avoid Krakow as we are not at our best in the cities in this current heat. I also realised too late that I should have got tickets well in advance for Auschwitz, so put that on hold until another time too. 

So, we headed into Wroclaw in the west of Poland. We found a lovely camp site on the shores of a massive lake. It was expensive at 32E a night, but it was worth it for the access into the lake to cool down. It is very well organised here, with various sandy beaches, lifeguards, a beach bar, barbecues etc. It was worth every penny (cent) just for my solo early morning swim before the crowds came, and it is also blissful to watch the sunset over water in peace. I think my early water swim will be one of my favourite memories of the whole trip; it was just so still and peaceful out there. I spent ages just watching the ripples and listening to the sounds of the birds. I could have stayed in there forever! It has been so hot here, with temperatures well into the thirties every day that we have been in the lake a couple of times a day just to cool off. 

The campsite is about 10 miles outside of Wroclaw, so the intention was to walk into the nearest train station and catch a train in. We quickly decided against that, as I didn’t fancy a 40 minute walk in the heat, to sit on a hot train, to then walk around a city all day, and then do the same in reverse. Uber it is then! £9 well spent, and we were dropped off in the main square of Wroclaw. 

I knew as soon as I got out of the Uber that Wroclaw would live up to my high expectations of it. Wroclaw is often dubbed the Venice of Poland, with 12 islands and over 100 bridges straddling the Odra River. Wroclaw was known as Breslau under German control and was declared a “fortress city” by Hitler in 1944 and ordered to hold out at all costs. The resulting 3 month siege by the Soviet Red Army in early 1945 turned the city into a battleground. Nearly 70% of Breslau was destroyed, including much of its Old Town. The city was transferred to Poland after Germany’s defeat, and the city had to rebuild from the ashes.

During the Communist era Wroclaw was both a symbol of rebirth and a place of repression. The regime rebuilt much of its medieval character but political dissent simmered below the surface. In the 1980’s it became a hotspot for the Solidarity movement and also home to the surreal Orange Alternative, who were a protest group that used absurdity and art to mock censorship and dictatorship. The subsequent gnomes have now become some of Wroclaw’s most iconic residents!

The Rynek, or Market Square is one of Europe’s largest and most beautiful, with gorgeously ornate coloured buildings and churches. It has a fabulous Gothic Old Town Hall with an astronomical clock. We spent ages happily wandering around the square, taking plenty of gnome pics, before going for breakfast at a French cafe. We then wandered further, crossing bridges over onto islands and peeping into churches. I thought I had spotted a Russian Orthodox church, so we went in, and quietly took a pew at the back as there was a service happening; only to then spot the coffin at the front and make a hasty retreat! I was perplexed to spot the Ukranian flag outside the church, only to find out it was, in fact, a Ukranian Greek Catholic church, which follows the Byzantine (Orthodox style) but is in full communion with the pope in Rome. It looked Orthodox but is very definitely Catholic; they use the same rites, vestments, icons and chants as Eastern Orthodox churches, but recognise the Pope as their spiritual leader, unlike the Russian Orthodox Church. It is very easy to confuse the different churches in Central and Eastern Europe where history and religion intertwine!

We walked about 6 miles in total through beautiful Wroclaw, seeking out the shady paths in the many parks where we could. We also found our favourite Polish steak chain called “Whisky in the Jar” which we’d visited twice in Gdansk and once in Poznan. We were restrained this time, and didn’t have our usual 100E steak meal, but had some beer and non alcoholic cocktails instead, sitting outside in the shade overlooking the Town Hall; a million dollar view. 

I also enjoyed spotting some of the city’s 600 gnomes, aided with a gnome map! Lyn tolerated me really well, and was rewarded with a few pints in a real ale bar, even if he did spend far too long shouting “look, a gnome!”, to which I would excitedly reply “where”, only for him to point at me and say “knackered gnome!” or “hot gnome” or “grumpy gnome” and fall about laughing! It was funny the first couple of times! Each of the gnomes has its own personality; we found detective gnome, orchestra gnomes, pretzel gnome, banker gnome…. I think my favourite was the gnome burdened by a big heart lock, who has removed over 17 tonnes of locks off a bridge, and says that love is best not shown by something that corrodes!

We spent about 8 happy hours in Wroclaw, and I would definitely go back; preferably at a cooler time of year where I can go armed with my gnome map and tick a few more off! Lyn insisted on buying a pack of gnome playing cards, so we can play our nightly card games with a gnome flavour from now on! I think he needs all the help he can get from the little people as he’s only won one card game so far on this trip!

We spent another happy day and night by this beautiful lake, making the most of cooling off in the heat, before Lyn dragged me away. We had one last stay in Poland before we left, so we made our way for about 100 miles towards a town called Zagan. Of course our route there was not easy! The sat nav re-routed us away from a low bridge of 3.7m, as it should, only to take us to another low bridge; but this one was not marked! It looked like we could just scrape under it, but it was going to be tight. I got out of the truck to watch Lyn inch his way through; acting a bit like one of those signallers that guide planes in, but with none of their finesse! It was a proper heart in mouth job, but we made it, with whole millimetres to spare! Luckily the road was totally empty, otherwise we would have caused chaos. Again!

We were glad to make it into Zagan and quickly made our way into the car park we had ear marked for the night. We were not alone in there, as many Czech rally cars also made it their stop for the night, pitching tents around us. They were part of a Czech Gumball rally from Czechia up into Lithuania, with checkpoints along the way. 

We had visited this little car park for one reason only, and that was to visit the home of Tom, Dick and Harry, also known as the three escape tunnels from The Great Escape. We were parked on the grounds of where a huge POW camp, Stalag V111C was built in 1939. It held 49000 prisoners. Stalg Luft 3 was built in the Spring of 1942 and was designated for officers of the Allied Air Force.  It is most famous for the Great Escape.  

In 1943 the POWs of Stalag Luft 3 began preparing for one of the largest escapes of WW2, digging 3 tunnels in parallel. More than 600 POWs took part in building Tom, Dick and Harry. Harry was the longest of the tunnels; dug at a depth of 9m and around 110m long. The plan was for 200 people to make their escape. Finally, on the night of 24th March 1944, 76 airmen broke free of the camp. It was the single largest breakout of POWs to occur during the war, yet only 3 escaped to freedom. The remaining 73 were recaptured, and 50 were shot at the personal order of Hitler, directly defying the Geneva Convention. The shootings became a symbol of Nazi brutality and the Royal Air Forces’s Special Investigation Branch conducted a full investigation from 1945-47. This was one of the largest RAF police investigations ever. Although the top Nazi leadership faced justice at Nuremberg, many of the Gestapo agents involved were tried separately, with 43 identified as being directly responsible. Of these, at least 18 were executed by hanging and others received long prison sentences, with a few fleeing and avoiding capture. 

We parked in the car park of the small museum that commemorates the Great Escape, with a recreation of “Tom” tunnel, a guard watch tower, and POW c]hut 104. We took an early walk into the forest to find the famous “Harry” tunnel, where the entrance and exit are commemorated with memorials. 

Stalg Luft 3 is also famous for the Wooden Horse Escape, which happened there in 1943. The Wooden Horse was a vaulting horse used as a decoy to hide a vertical tunnel shaft. The horse was built hollow and large enough to conceal a man inside. Each day the horse was carried to the same spot near the perimeter wire under the pretence of exercise. One man dug as others vaulted over to distract guards. The digging took 114 days, and three men successfully escaped on October 29th, 1943. 

We left Zagan, after rewatching the Great Escape on our laptop. There were no motorcycles involved and no Americans saved the day; there was a lot of artistic licence, although the tunneling aspect was correct. 

We are now in Germany, parked up by another lake, as we make our way back towards our ferry at the start of next week.