The beautiful sights we saw in Poland will stay with us a lifetime! In this post, we will share our memories of Poland with you! This short trip took these two traveling seniors to the beautiful village of Korycin, Poland for a Polish wedding of our good friends Ania & Mondo! They invited us & of course we said yes!
A Wedding in Poland!
Our friends, Mondo & Ania were flying back to Poland – to her home village in Korycin – for a traditional Polish wedding for her family & friends who were not able to attend intimate civil ceremony in the U.S. There was no hesitation on our part when they asked if we would come to their wedding in Poland! One – we LOVE them and think the world of them & Two – another country we can mark off our list! Here’s how it went down!
The setting of the wedding was in Ania’s home village of Korycin [pop. of around 530+/-] in northeast Poland where her family still lived. The wedding was a couple months away & I can’t even imagine the hoops & headaches that they went thru to get this wedding planned between two continents. While the bride’s family was planning the huge wedding, we had to get our travel plans together as well!
The bride could not have picked a better date for the wedding. Visiting Poland in May is considered to be one of the best months to see Poland as the weather is warming up from winter plus you are in low season! [Remember low season means lower prices.] Thankfully, there was only a slight shower on a day prior to the wedding.
Dark Skin in Poland?
Landing in Warsaw we honestly were not sure or accepting the Polish locals would be of dark skin in Poland. For the first two days/nights in Warsaw we spent walking & seeing the sights. Let me add that Ania had a serious discussion with The Big Guy when they invited us to the wedding. Ania told The Big Guy that in Korycin the people had only seen dark skinned people on the television. She was concerned that the people might stare at him & not know how to act around him. The Big Guy eased her concerns by letting her know that he had traveled to destinations similar to her city. I think she was more concerned than us.
Once we arrived at our hotel in Warsaw, Poland, we decided to take a walk & checkout the area for a market & places to eat later. On our walk an older lady walked past us, turned around & started walking back-wards facing us with this huge smile on her face. She was chuckling and clapping her hands. The Big Guy and I just smiled back at her & waved. She was so excited to see us & gave us a BIG Thumbs Up! This little lady eased whatever tensions we may have had for the balance of the trip.
Huge Faux Pas
Our faux pas as a tourist in Poland happened shortly after we left the little lady waving to us. We had found a grocer & picked up some fresh fruit & a bottle of wine for later. Seriously, we pride ourselves on being one with the people in whatever country we are visiting but we totally took a dive on this trip. We made it to the checkout line, paid for our groceries & waited for cashier to put items in a bag. We quickly realized, once she continued ringing up next customer, that we should have had our own bag & we were responsible for bagging our own groceries. It seemed we had caused a little bit of a hold up in line. Oops! The Big Guy & I couldn’t help but laugh at how “tourist” we must have looked as we grabbed our few groceries & juggled them back to hotel laughing at ourselves – tourists! LOL!
Train Ride to Bialystok
On our third day in Poland, we were scheduled to move from our Warsaw hotel to a small village hotel in Korycin for the wedding which was scheduled for the following day. We would take the train to Bialystok, Poland where Ania’s brother, Jacek, would be picking us up for our final destination, Korycin.
A Little Polish History
While waiting to board, we met a fascinating young man, Tomasz P. He made sure we were getting on the right train & ‘looked” after us until we boarded. Then he made a trip to our car to be sure we were comfortable. We invited him to sit with us & the two-plus hour train ride flew by. Tomasz educated us on Poland & the effects of Russian occupation. He so openly shared with us some of the things his Jewish grandparents & parents had seen & how they had been affected by Germans as well as Russian occupation.
The Big Guy & Tomasz still stay in touch.
Poland was under communist rule until 1989 & their influence can be seen in the village of Korycin. As we walked, houses were pointed out to us – exterior walls made of whatever materials they could get their hands on – wood, brick, stone, cement, etc. Also it was explained to us that houses could only be a particular size & shape!
Want to read more interesting facts about Poland?
I found this amazing article while researching & it is pretty awesome. Check out ‘25 Interesting Facts About Poland That Most People Don’t Know‘ by Anna Everywhere here.
Wedding Day in Korycin!
Korycin is a beautiful village. We were welcomed with open arms, trays of sweet breads, homemade cherry wine & just a lot of love. We spent a couple nights in the hotel across the road from the village.
Before we had even signed in to register, the owner’s wife took us upstairs to sit in the sun room while she brought us coffee & a plates of sweets. This is how we were treated the two days we spent in this hotel. She let us know the next day that she had to go to town for appointment but she had breads for us and breakfast would be served by her husband, the owner.
For the day of the wedding, we moved to rooms reserved for us at the banquet hall for the after wedding party. The car, a leftover we were told of Russian occupation, was dressed to carry the bride & groom from the village to church back to this location later that day for the reception.
Back to the bride’s family home, everyone was in attendance it seemed. The bride & groom rode in the little flower covered car driven by Jacek. Everyone had a seat in a particular car & we were off for the caravan drive thru the village before heading across the road to the church. The polka players were walking in front of caravan playing polka music. You really had to see it to believe it.
We hadn’t gone maybe to the end of their street when a row of men closed the street off by standing across it. The Big Guy & I looked at each other like ‘what the heck is going on?’. Then we saw Jacek jump out of the lead car with a bag. He gave each man a small bottle of liquor/vodka. They waved & parted to let the caravan thru. We go maybe one more street & there is a row of children standing across the street. Jacek gets out again, this time with a bag of candies, & gives each child a piece. They wave & part the way for caravan to drive thru. It was really quite cute & made everyone in the village a party to the wedding.
The wedding was beautiful! The church was beautiful. First wedding I’d been to where the bride & groom sat in chairs for part of the ceremony. The Bride & Groom were such a handsome pair. Mondo, how he came to the table! He had attended Polish classes back in Texas & was able to speak all vows in Polish during the whole wedding ceremony! Both of us were so impressed by Mondo’s love for Ania that he had learned Polish so he could communicate with her family & friends in their language. A big old Texas boy speaking Polish fluently….you had to be there.
The wedding was beautiful but then the party afterwards! The food just kept getting served. Every time I thought I couldn’t take another bite, more food was being served. The food kept coming way after midnight. Gallons of vodka on ice on every table. We like a glass of wine & I personally can appreciate a good whiskey & coke on ice but that night it was all about the vodka. My takeaway was Polish vodka is pretty darn good. I can’t even try to repeat any of the Polish/Russian salutes or tell you how many shots we drank but we ate, we danced, we laughed, & drank the night away. The Big Guy & I lasted til after 3 a.m. We were headed to our room when we got pulled back down to the dance floor for one more dance. I don’t know what time the party ended but we were told that normally these parties last for up to three days!
A Little Sight Seeing After the Wedding Day
Storks Are Real!
After the wedding day & until our flight left, Jacek was the perfect tour guide. He gave us the grand tour through the Polish beautiful green countryside. Even the huge forest were amazing backdrops to the quaint farms. This is where I found out that storks are a real bird! Yes, I truly thought storks were the ‘cartoon’ birds that delivered babies in so many of those children’s books. Imagine my surprise when I asked Jacek what were those tall poles with platforms on the top of them used for? Most had what looked like a pile of large sticks on them. “Oh, those are stork nests”. What? Storks are real? He continued to tell us that in order to keep farms from burning down because of the storks building their huge nest of sticks in the chimneys that they started erecting these pillar post & platforms for the birds to build their nests! There were indeed huge storks nesting or standing on some of the platforms.
Jewish Settlement
We were able to visit a small Jewish Settlement to view the hundreds of archives depicting Jewish history. At the entrance to the walled settlement an elderly gentleman was carving pieces of wood into figure heads. This is the one he carved & signed for us while we waited.
Floating Lithuania Border
In the countryside, Jacek took us to an old stone guard tower still standing with what I imagined was a moat at one time around it. Attached to this tower was an old barb wire fence with sign on it stating country border of Lithuania.
Bison
The European Bison are a huge point of pride for the Polish. We were able to visit the Białowieża Forest to see some of the huge beast first hand! They are also prominently on label of Zubrowka Biala Vodka – a bottle of which we brought home with us. This vodka is famous for the bison grass blade in every bottle. It is a very nice vodka.
What We Didn’t Have Time To See & Would Love to Go Back to See
Poland should be on everyone’s must see list. There really is so many things to see & it definitely takes more than one week to see it all. It is a beautiful country & the people were awesome! The history so full that I couldn’t even begin to scratch the surface in a blog but I hope you venture to some of the links for further reading.
Places we would love to see when we return to Poland would include Krakow, Auschwitz Memorial & Warsaw Jewish Ghetto Tour [considered “to be one of the most haunting and historically poignant places to visit in all of Poland”] to name just a few. Old Town Warsaw Market & the Bialystok market centers are well worth another trip!
