Rambles in Praga and goodbye to Warsaw

 Despite the cold, rainy weather we wanted to make the most of our last day and decided to check out Praga. Once a separate city on the other side of the Vistula, Praga was once known as an unsafe part of town. Things have improved in recent years and it is home to the vodka museum and at least one of Warsaw's best parks.

Taking the metro under the river, we started with a walk to the Koneser Centre which was pretty quiet given the weather and time of day. We checked out some of the street art and grabbed lunch at a cafe.

The Neon Museum sounded interesting, so we walked toward the nearest transit hub and stumbled across a record store that was small compared to the Sam the Recors Man of my youth but offered a diverse selection of rock, pop, jazz, Polish artists and more. My daughter found some treasures for her collection.

Hopping the bus, we followed Google's directions to find the Neon Museum... and came to a boarded up parking lot. Off we trudged in a round about route that we hoped would get us there, growing increasingly cold and tired. At last, we arrived. If you didn't know to look for it you would never guess that the nondescript building with broken signs leaning against it was a museum.

We had read that it was a small museum that would't take a lot of time. And that was a more accurate description that we'd expected. It is one large room with a central divider allowing the display of more signs. We were in and out faster than our walk there! It will be moving to a more prominent location at the Palace of Culture and Science in July, making it easier fir future visitors.

There aren't a lot of neon signs left in Warsaw. Apparently they were viewed as a holdover from the Soviet era and many were destroyed. The museum displays their relatively sparse holdings in a way that makes for fun photographs.

There is more to see in Praga but we were ready to head home and rest before our farewell dinner at Stolica in the Old Town.

It was a busy night in Warsaw - some sort of military event with civilians climbing in and out of vehicles parked in a plaza, plus a soccer game at the stadium - and traffic was a challenge. 

We've seen our share of unusual road behaviour, from a delivery driver going the wrong way down one way streets and shouting directions out their window to cars trying to squeeze past them in the gridlock they caused to an individual in a car determining that the road closure barricades were a slalom course to get where they wanted to be in the early morning because, after all, there were few pedestrians out and about yet. 

Our driver did his own version of ignoring the one way street before blocking a cross walk - prompting one runner to jog straight into the side of the vehicle to make a point. This was the only instance I ever saw of Polish drivers not giving extreme respect to pedestrians. No matter how fast they are driving, or how busy the roadway, everyone stops at crosswalks. 

After weaving our way through the traffic, we arrived outside the rebuilt city wall and walked in to Stolica. The atmosphere and food lived up to our expectations and everything was delicious. 

I finished my meal with the unusual black lemon sorbet and we had a few giggles about the colour of my lips and tongue afterward.

It was time to prepared for our return to Canada. Back at the apartment we put on one of my daughter's new albums - an Edith Piaf - and finished wedging the last few items into our suitcases. And then it was off to bed with a 5 a.m. alarm set for the morning.