I arrived in Cracow, Poland after traveling for 29 hours by plane. I was very tired when I got here on Sunday 23rd of October.
Cracow is a beautiful city with many cathedrals and old buildings, including a castle where kings used to live called Wawel (pronounced "Vavel"). This castle is on a hill, overlooking the Vistula river.
There is a legend that a dragon called "Smok" once lived in a cave under Wawel Hill before the castle was built there. The story goes that each day the evil dragon would scare everybody, burn houses with his fiery breath and eat their farm animals for his food. King Krakus wanted to stop the dragon, but his bravest knights weren't able to do anything against the dragon. The King ended up promising his beautiful daughter's hand in marriage to anybody who could defeat the dragon. No one could do it. But one day, a poor cobbler's apprentice had a go. He stuffed the body of a sheep with sulphur and put it outside the dragon's cave. The dragon ate it and soon became incredibly thirsty. No amount of water could stop his stomach ache, and after swelling up from drinking half of the Vistula river, he exploded. The apprentice married the King's daughter as promised and they lived happily ever after.
This, of course, is just a story, but there is a statue of this legendary dragon under the castle.
So, Cracow is very old. It has been a city for 1,400 years but people have settled here for even longer than that, since the Stone Age.
In my next post, I'll tell you a bit about the school I am working at.
Location:Ul. Zamenhofa, Cracow
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