Poland - 8 Nights

Fwiw I'm planning a trip now to Poland and am planning on skipping Warsaw . I'm planning on Gdansk 3 ish nights stop in Torun , Wroclaw 2 nights then Krakow 7 ish nights before taking the train to Vienna and flying out of there. I like the Rough Guide to Poland. It'll be my 3rd visit to Poland. It's a lovely country with lovely people. I'd recommend flying in one city and flying out another because it's not a tiny country.

I am heading to Poland later this year but combining it with Budapest. I had originally looked at Poland only with similar itinerary.
Like you, I am fast paced traveler and can cover a lot in a short time. My original idea was 2 days (3 nights) in Gdansk, 2 days (3 nights) in Wroclaw, and 4 days in Krakow (including 1 day dedicated to Auschwitz).

I also looked at the Baltic itinerary you are considering, but for that one I would need more days. With Helsinki, you will need more than 8 days I think. It's actually top of list for my next trip.

I think the Poland itinerary that you noted with 4 krakow, 2 wroclaw and 2 gdansk is initially similar to what seems to make the most sense for us. Maybe 4 nights krakow and 2 in the other places and time the trains to where we need more time. Trying to understand if we need to squeeze in Warsaw. We are more looking to see cool and interesting places more than big cities. Like we really enjoyed the two days we spent in Ljubljana recently.

If we are somewhat flexible on dates, would it be worth trying to make sure we're in Gdansk for the St. Dominic's Fair.

For the Baltic option, I think it would need to be either Vilnius or Helsinki with eight nights, but not both.

On a visit to Poland some years ago I really enjoyed a couple days in the mountain resort town of Zakopane. It’s about a two hour bus ride from Krakow, as I recall, and is something quite different from the other cities you mention. A good place to go in August as I expect it would be lively with Polish vacationers with good hiking and such. I think Warsaw is worth a visit, depending where you fly into or out of. I spent one night there and would have liked more time. Other than Krakow, a must see, I haven’t been to the other places suggested. I would like to get up to Gdansk sometime. This fall I’m doing something very like the Baltic trip you’re also considering, with a couple days in each of the three capitals, but not Helsinki as insufficient time for that.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/four-cities-in-poland-2019

Still tossing things around and are open to more suggestions. Still thinking something like arrive AM Friday in Krakow, stay 3 nights there, head to Wroclaw for 2 nights and then to Gdansk for 3 nights and have a 2pm flight home from there. Not sure if better with 4 nights in Krakow and 2 in Gdansk. In that case, we'd probably take an early morning train to Wroclaw to maximize time there and then again and early morning train to Gdansk. That basically would give us 4 full days in Krakow and 2 mostly full days (arrive by noon) in both Wroclaw and Gdansk.

Really depends on what you want to do. Solidarity center? Salt mines? Malbork castle?

In Krakow, Auschwitz for sure, Salt Mines likely. In Gdansk, Malbork Castle and if we have time, maybe visit Sopot. Otherwise, just mostly wandering around taking in the main sites and eating some good food.

I'm looking at the calendar and we could potentially add a 9th night arriving Friday afternoon instead. Would we then do Krakow (4), Wroclaw (2) and Gdansk (3) and be much less rushed that way? How much better would it be having that 9th night?

Should we consider dedicating a night or 2 to Warsaw? From what I've heard, it sounds like there is more history/museums/nightlife there, even though there's a nice Old Town there, not sure it'll be worth it. If we did, where do we take the night(s) away from? There's only so much we can see in this timeframe so we have to miss some things.

What do you want to see in Wroclaw? If you wanted to see Warsaw you could take out Wroclaw? 8 or 9 nights isn't much for 3-4 cities plus train rides and checking in and out of hotels, IMO.

Wroclaw seems like a pretty/quaint city to wander around and see local sites and have some good food/drink. We recently spent a couple of days in Ljubljana that we liked and my impression is that Wroclaw might be a bit similar in vibe. We are open to replacing Wroclaw with Warsaw if that might make more sense for what we are looking for, but initially, I don't think so.

I think your current itinerary is good as is without Warsaw. From what you described about your interests, feels like a smaller town such as Wroclaw may be more appealing than Warsaw. And you would add significant travel time.
I think you should finalize your dates and get tickets to Auschwitz directly through the museum. English tours do sell out especially during summer. I'm traveling in September and I just got my ticket.

I looked at Auschwitz tickets and there were plenty for August, but I will buy as soon as I book air.

One other question about Gdansk regarding St. Dominic's Fair. Our dates are flexible. Should we avtivetly avoid St. Dominic's Fair or would we want to go? I presume the Old Town will be packed and much harder to sit at resturants and cafes during the fair, but is going to the festival worth that invconvienience?

We had a topic discussion here about traveling during special events.
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/general-europe/do-you-look-for-special-events

As I mentioned earlier, I am planning on missing Warsaw for now. I've been to Poland twice for 2 ish weeks both times, and I just don't adore big cities unless they have a lot that I want to see in them, but do prefer the quieter smaller cities. That's why I'm planning on Wroclaw, and skipping Warsaw (unless some year I can snag Chopin competition tickets but I understand they're very hard to get).

Yes, we generally prefer smaller cities as well. I'm getting pretty comfortable with Krakow 4, Wroclaw 2, Gdansk 3, but still tossing it around a bit before booking flights.

We have been in all those cities plus Warsaw. Your last response’s itinerary is fine. At first we did not like Warsaw, very large city with a small old town section. By the time we left it was growing on us. We were there for 5 nights.
But missing it won’t hinder your Polish Experience.

Yes, I think we are pertty much settled on Krakow 4, Wroclaw 2, Gdansk 3. Can't see everything, but I think we have enough time to cover that without being particularly rushed.

Enjoy! It's my favorite country after my own.

Airfare booked, yay! Thanks for the help here.

@davidl - You'll be there before me (I arrive in September) so let us know how it goes!
Have a great trip.

Yay! Please share about your trip after you return. Enjoy!

I'll definitely come back here and share my trip.

One of the question in the meantime. With the three cities we are going to and that we are going at a fairly peak travel time, what other than trains and Auschwitz need to be booked in advance?

Among places you are visiting, we only have Krakow in common. For me, the tricky part is figuring out what is open and closed each day to decide what to visit when.
Seems like some museums as well as several rooms of Wawel Castle in Krakow are closed on Mondays.
I'm not planning on Oskar Schindler Factory, but I hear you need advance ticket.
And the underground museum in Krakow is closed on Tuesdays and a few other days. https://bilety.mhk.pl/rezerwacja/termin.html?idl=20&idg=0&idw=4&d=3

I'll definitely come back here and share my trip.

Yay! I'm another one going later this year and looking forward to reading about your trip.

Check to be sure your accommodations have AC. I understand that there is a heat wave going on now.

Yes, good point with A/C. We are staying at Apartmenty Braka 6 in Krakow and Wyndham Old Town in Wroclaw, both with A/C, but we have an apartment in Gdansk (that I can cancel) that I really like without A/C. I figured being up north on the sea, we very likely won't need A/C but is that a bad risk to take?

Changed Wroclaw hotel to Aparthotel New Lux. Looks very nice!
Rest is on auto pilot at this point.

I'm back!

Had a really great trip! I think Krakow 4 nights, Wroclaw 2 nights and Gdansk 3 nights was perfect. We had the shortest morning trains so we didn't lose much of the day in transit. Think the train to Wroclaw was on time and the train to Gdansk maybe 30 minutes delayed. We were in time to have lunch in both cases.

Beautiful cities, each with such great old towns. We did side trips to Auschwitz, Malbork and Sopot. Slightly regret not packing things a bit tighter in Krakow to get to Zakopane, but that would have taken up a full day and would have make Krakow slightly hectic but doable. We really would have needed another night to do that right. We did a good "free" walking tour the first day in each city and enjoyed those.

Only slight misstep was not getting tickets for the Gdansk WWII museum ahead of time. We looked at the line Saturday late afternoon and it was very long. I decided I would just go early enough Sunday to ensure we got in at 10 so I spent time myself on line that morning, no big deal, I would have not been doing anything in the apartment then anyhow. I was really really, not I could have gotten there at 9 and easily been fine.

Thanks again for all the suggestions and helping up have a memorable stay in a beautiful country.

Happy to answer any questions.

@davidl - Thanks for returning and sharing your experience. Looks like a very successful trip. Anything in particular that surprised you in each city? 2 weeks countdown to Krakow for me :-)

Except for 1 of the "free" tour guides, we could have gone absolutely the entire trip without any cash whatsoeve. He may have taken some app, I didn't ask.

The outside of Wawel castle is beatiful and it's great to walk around the grounds, but we were pretty underwhelmed by the audio guide tour of the 1st and 2nd floors. It's basically an ok art museum.

One thing about the museums that surprised us is that all of the audio guide tours are gps guided so the guide knows where you are and when you enter a new room. What a great step up from any audio guide experience we've had before. It looks like the equipment/technology is by a Polish company (Movitech). I'm really not sure why this isn't in every museum all over the world.

There are a couple of great spots to sit outside in Kazimierz for eating and drinking. Just areas with some chairs and fixed location food trucks. If you put in Trdelnik - Coffe & Freshly Baked Pastries you'll get to one. That one had a hot dog truck and Zapiekanka truck that put out amazing food as well.

We did sway from Polish food here and there and absolutely loved our meal at NOAH Israeli Food.

Auschwitz was really moving. Great guide there, very glad we got to make it there. Train back was delayed and delay time was going up so hopped in an uber which was a long drive, train wound up getting there around the same time, but it wasn't worth the risk of potenially losing 2 more hours sitting at the train stration. Wound up eating like $50 train tickets.

Wieliczka Salt Mines was fun tour.

Best Pierogies we had in Krakow was at Mr. Vincent.

Weather was about what we expected, overall probably an 8 or 9. It was about 34C high first day or 2 in Krakow, by the time we got to Gdansk, the high was closer to 20C. In the middle in bounced between and we had another day that was around 28C in the middle. Couple of days where we were dogding rain and got dripped on a bit. The whole first half of the day we went to Malbork was a total rainout, but it was probably the best place we could have been in the rain, wasn't a big deal. We defininitely needed the hotel AC in Krakow and Wroclaw. We didn't have or need AC in Gdansk.

Happy to answer any questions you or anyone else might have.

This is so helpful, thank you! You should put it in the "Trip Report" section of the Forum. I'm sure others will appreciate it as well.

davidl, I'm so glad you had a great trip! (A van Gogh themed pierogi restaurant was not on my bingo card for Krakow, but I've now bookmarked Mr Vincent).