Tarnow

If we can we like to take little day trips from our big city destinations to help us get a feel for life beyond the city. For our Krakow visit, we chose a day trip to Tarnow, which is 50 km east of Krakow. Choosing this town solely on the recommendation of a tourist information office was a little risky since the town was not mentioned in our guide book. But - it only cost us about $5 for train tickets and we were off. We met a nice young woman on the train who was studying biotechnology and headed to Virginia in a few weeks for a conference. She gave us some tips since Tarnow is her home town. She pointed out there was no way she could live in Tarnow after her studies were over - just not any job opportunities for her. It was nice to have her around when some police came through the train asking for passports. She explained that she had never seen the police bothering with passports before and indeed the other women in our car just blew them off without handing over any documents. Interesting. Once off the train, we headed for the main square. Eliot charmed another woman, who gave him some chocolate. Finally, we made it to the square where Eliot rolicked with the local kiddos feeding the pigeons. Another mother gave him some bread to feed them because, as ususal, I was woefully unprepared to feed anyone besides our family.
A view of the square.
After persuading Eliot the pigeons were full, we took a short walk around town before lunch. We saw the remains of the Tarnow synagogue, destroyed by the Nazis. The town was once half Jewish.
This museum had an exhibit on gypsy life, including the wagons you can see in the background of the photo. Unfortunately, we missed it being open by ten minutes.

We had lunch in a nice little place - more pierogies. Eliot made a little friend, a four-year-old named Claudia who he was talking about into the evening. It was nice to see a slice of completely non-tourist Poland. He took a long nap and was sleeping when we got on the crowded train back to Krakow. He woke up on the train and asked if we could get off nearly every time the doors opened.... Finally we were back in Krakow where we went back to the great vegetarian place we ate at the first night. Yum!