Kraków

Podgórze & Zabłocie

Across the river from Kazimierz, and the place where Kraków's twentieth century actually happened. Podgórze was an independent Austrian town until 1915, with its own market square and a neo-Gothic church on it; in 1941 the Germans walled part of it off as the Kraków ghetto, and almost every one of the 15,000 people forced into it was murdered. Zabłocie, the industrial strip to the east, holds Schindler's factory. All of that sits inside a district that is now — genuinely, not cynically — one of the most liveable and interesting parts of the city, with a contemporary art museum, converted warehouses, good cheap restaurants and a grass-covered mound with the best view in Kraków on it.

Who it's for: Anyone who wants to understand what happened here rather than only where it happened. Travellers who have done the Old Town and want a district with a resident population, lower prices and no coach parties. Walkers — the mound, the quarry and the camp memorial make a long, hard, worthwhile afternoon on foot. People who like post-industrial conversions: Zabłocie does that better than anywhere else in Poland.

Things to know

  • Do this district in one continuous sequence rather than in fragments: Ghetto Heroes' Square, the Eagle Pharmacy on the corner of it, the wall fragment on Lwowska, then Schindler's Factory. Each explains the next, and taken separately they don't land.
  • Schindler's Factory is not a museum about Schindler. The permanent exhibition is 'Kraków under Nazi Occupation 1939–1945' and covers the whole city; Schindler's office is one room near the end. People arrive expecting the film and are sometimes thrown.
  • Book Schindler's Factory in advance. Timed entry, capped numbers, and it sells out. It's free on Mondays but with limited tickets, no advance booking on free days, and reduced hours.
  • Closure days differ site by site and will wreck a plan: Schindler's Factory is closed the first Tuesday of the month, the Eagle Pharmacy opens Wednesday to Sunday only (free on Wednesday), the Podgórze Museum opens Wednesday to Sunday (free on Thursday), MOCAK is closed Mondays (free on Thursday) and Cricoteka opens Thursday to Sunday.
  • The KL Płaszów memorial site is open, free and unstaffed. There is no ticket office and no gate. The Grey House exhibition building is still being developed, so what you get is the landscape, the memorials and the interpretation panels — which, if you have read anything first, is enough.
  • Krakus Mound is a twenty-minute uphill walk from the ghetto square and gives you the best panorama in Kraków — the whole Old Town, Wawel, the steelworks and, on a clear day, the Tatras. Free, always open, and exposed in bad weather.
  • Liban Quarry, immediately behind the mound, contains film props from Schindler's List — including a road of fake gravestones — mixed in with the genuine remains of a forced-labour quarry. The distinction is not signposted and it matters.
  • Getting here: walk over the Father Bernatek footbridge from Kazimierz in about six minutes, or take tram 3, 19, 24 or 50 to Plac Bohaterów Getta. Zabłocie has its own train stop on the SKA line.
  • The Zabłocie eating and drinking scene is concentrated on ul. Lipowa and ul. Ślusarska around the museums, and it is genuinely good and materially cheaper than Kazimierz.