My mom and I decided to take a trip back to the motherland in May to visit family and friends, as well as to see Kraków and Zakopane. The trip was absolutely amazing!! Two full weeks exploring Warsaw, Polish mountains, Kraków, our summer house in Warka, visiting Polish cemeteries (yes, there will be a full post about them because they are absolutely breathtaking!) and drinking lots of vodka. It was a truly special time. I will break up our Poland trip into a couple of posts...so sit back and enjoy, as you dive right into Poland!
For 300 + Euros you can get this manual gem from Budget at the Warsaw Airport. We got ours for five days while all of Warsaw was out for May vacation. If you travel to Poland anytime from May 1st to May 10th, most of the county will be out for a week long vacation. It's absolutely awesome if you need to rent a car in Warsaw, since it will cut your commute in half! Warsaw traffic is absolutely awful so choose your car rental wisely or just go with public transportation. In the week with our pink Suzuki, my mom and I drove all over Warsaw as well as visited cemeteries all around the outskirts of the city. Since Mamo (my mom) informed me that she miraculously forgot how to drive stick shrift (she only drove a manual car for 20 years in Poland) I had the pleasure of manuring our pink beauty in the city as well as those darn Swiss-cheese-hole roads in the country side. We all made it alive!! But I did break a handful of rules....so if you drive in Poland here are some tips...
- 50 km/h in towns from 5 AM till 11 PM - (30mph)
- 60 km/h in towns from 11 PM till 5 AM (yea, yea , yea basically drive under 60 km in the small towns...slow it down! I was super confused at first and cruised through lots of town at 80 km/h (50 mph)
- 90 km/h outside urban areas (56mph)
- 100 km/h on expressways (62mph)
- 130 km/h on motorways (80 mph)
It is illegal to use a mobile phone while driving unless a hands-free set is used. Duh, ever tried driving a manual car while chatting on the phone? Impossible!
The permitted alcohol level in blood is 0.2 - that's basically nothing and many Poles have adopted the no drinking and driving rule. Smart! Don't drink and drive peeps!