up earlyish for breakfast and to return the car. navigating the old town is much easier in the daytime when you’ve worked out the map beforehand. geeeeee
wandered back to the hotel, saw the markets and the people on the side of the road selling things. flower stalls and a sex shop.
the “four quarters” fountain which we’ll return to later in the day
picked up robyn in the hotel
walked along Piwna, found Basilica of St. Mary of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Gdańsk
big white church, under heavy restoration.
so many donation boxes!
the architecture is so beautiful.
the Akademia Sztuk Pięknych at the end of Piwna
walked across to the golden gate, through to the prison tower & torture house
saw the Brama Wyżynna, main entrance to the city in the late 1500’s.
walked back down Dluga to Neptune’s fountain
saw the long market - the east end of dluga targ
green gate - before bridge
saw the cool river and boats
walked past AmberSky, the big ferris wheel
had some lunch snacks at the “Legendary White Rabbit”. I can’t tell if it’s a legit Jack Daniels branded place, but it’s definitely playing on the brand.
had cheese platter and robyn had wings. they were both fairly meh, but cheap and tasty. I had czech beer (pilsner urqel?) and she had mulled wine which was way too hot to start with.
wandered back to the town, meandering to the four quarters fountain again and to the Hala Targowa - the markets were a little “meh” but the ruins underneath were curious.
plenty of neat food in a very eastern european style - heaps of piles of meat everywhere and more like a wholesale butcher we’d see at home than a fancy don’t-make-it-look-animal place.
RMB found some caviar, sadly the servings were way too large and expensive for our budget today!
walking back we found Park Świętopełka which seems to be roughly crusader period, going by the fleur de lis?
wandered down to the waterside looking for the archeological museum. after walking around the street a bit we found the door, barely marked and high up a set of stairs.
all i can say is, thankfully it was free - the exhibits were sparse and strangely laid out, with basically no information about anything - and it won’t surprise you to note nothing was in english. it looks to all have been hand lettered in the 80’s, very odd.
found some viking? (maybe?) stuff right at the end before the exit
the exit takes you down some stairs then you end up in a blind hallway with a door that’s not marked. turns out it’s the exit, thanks folk
wandered back to the hotel to rest our (very) weary feet.
dinner at CHEF Food&Friends, had the place to ourselves because we turned up at about 7pm
oh. my lawd.
rmb had the beef tartare and it was lovely - a little light on the lemon and vinegar you’d expect but so tasty. I had the fried foie gras with beetroot sponge and truffle mousse - the sponge was light and fluffy, the mousse deliciously rich, the foie gras was delightfully lightly cooked and it all had a lovely rich meaty gravy
RMB’s main was pork tenderloin wrapped in bacon with pearl and onion jam I had two because I’m a pig, greased “russian” dumplings with curd cheese filling - covered in bacon sprinkles and about the size of golf balls they were delicious. I also had guinea fowl breast with truffle potatoes and vegetable ratatoulle. The potatoes were an amazing colour of rich dark inky purple, the ratatoille was lovely, and the white meat was nice enough. i’m glad I had the dumplings :)
After our meal the waiter brought us complimentary shots of Lubelska Wisniowka Cherry Vodka, a sharp, rich, sweet flavour that went down just right and added a kick to the beer buzz I had started on. (The beer was a Tyskie lager, on tap).
