Honestly, I was sad to leave Warsaw. The last few days had been full of urban discoveries, good food and perfect weather. We had seen the main sights of the city and thanks to walking and rolling through Warsaw's urban jungle all the time we had gotten a feeling of the city's layout. The single pieces on the city map connected to one big idea. We checked out of the hotel and brought our luggage to the main station. Finally we found the stairless entrance, too. There are low priced lockers in the underground passages accessible 24h.
The last sight we wanted to visit in Warsaw was Wilanow Palace. Wilanow is an area located on the outskirts of the city approximately 30 minutes away from the city central station. To get there you have to take bus 519 from the main station. After a short walk from the bus station we arrived at the palace. A security guard saw us and offered to help us immediately to get in the castle with a ramp. That is where Wilanow's accessibility ended. The castle doesn't have a lift and we were forbidden to go upstais on our own. So only the lower level was accessible for me. The wardens were excited about the situation. They were talking Polish but it was clear that they were talking about us. At first it seemed like they wanted to organize something but nothing happened. My boyfriend managed to get us audio guides, which was complicated, too. The exhibition on the lower ground was ok and the gardens were nice, but I liked Lazienki Palace better.
Wilanow Palace
The bus brought us back to the central station. The next destination on our trip was Gdansk and after the first experience with PKP I was looking forward to go there by train. As we bought our tickets at the ticket office the lady selling the tickets was a little startled but sold the tickets to us. We would find out why later that day. We strolled through the shopping mall connected to the station, picked up our luggage and went to the platform. The train was delayed and pulled in half an hour later. As we got on we realized why the lady at the ticket office had been startled. There were three other girls in wheelchairs who wanted to ride the train as well but only two wheelchair accessible spaces. Furthermore the conductor told us that they had problems with the train. So everybody had to get off the train at the next station.
Our new train arrived after a little while, the wheelchair lift was out of order, though. The conductors had to wind the lift up by hand. The girls were nice but the wheelchair space was cramped with four wheelchairs and sadly the three hour journey to Gdansk was far from our first PKP experience – I still love the Premium InterCity Express! As we left the train it was evening in Gdansk and the sun was setting. It had been raining a lot throughout the afternoon and after the April summer in Warsaw the evening had an autumn feel. A warm welcome to an unknown city for an autumn lover like me. Continue here.
Write a comment