"Only two years ago, during Euro 2012, we served three or four foreign tours a week," says Łukasz Hudziec, a history graduate and a tour-guide at the Free Walking Tour Foundation, who serve English-language tours in Wroclaw. "At the moment we are touring two groups a day. The number grows to three or four at weekends.
Łukasz Hudziec says that Wroclaw attracts tourists with its proximity to Prague and Berlin. The routes connecting Germany with the Czech Pepublic and Krakow with Warsaw also meet in the city.
"Foreign visitors, as they travel, also take the opportunity to visit Wroclaw. They consider it a normal, medium-sized European city," says Łukasz Hudziec. "It is only when they arrive that they learn more about its complex history, fall in love with its architecture and feel the atmosphere. They like it here so much that many of them regret that they haven't planned to stay in Wroclaw for longer. Krakow is crowded whereas Wroclaw, as one of the tourists said, is a "hidden jewel".
Americans from Google and Spaniards from Bialystok
Only last week Łukasz guided Australian and Canadian groups around Wroclaw, American and British visitors frequently choose to visit the city, the number of Scandinavian tourists is also on the rise. Visitors from foreign nationals whose branches are based in the capital of Lower Silesia, such as Google, also choose to go on a guided tour."Many of them return. They choose new topical routes to learn more about the history of Wroclaw," says Łukasz Hudziec."In September, the city will be flooded with international students who visit it as part of the Erasmus programme. Many of them travel around Poland in their free time. Wroclaw is visited by Spaniards from Bialystok, Rzeszow or Lublin. The majority of foreign visitors are either in their early twenties or fifty-five and older.Some foreign visitors come to Poland on the recommendation from Polish people they have met in their countries of origin.Łukasz: "It is enough that they leave their country and Polish people turn into Poland's ambassadors, even though they complain about it to their compatriots."Guides from the Free Walking Tour Foundation have several topical routes to offer: The Old Town, the Jewish Wroclaw, Street Art, the latter running through Nadodrze, and the Communist Wrocław, including architecture in Plac Nowy Targ i sedesowce). The Beer Route includes visits to Spiż and Piwnica Świdnicka, and it gives the opportunity to tell a story about the 14th-century beer war between the laity and the clergy, in which even the incumbent pope was involved.
Pilecki and traditional folk costumes
"Foreign visitors know that they are touring a Polish city. Travellers from the US or Australia are usually well educated and they are aware of what happened to this part of Europe after World War II," says the guide.Those who have formerly visited Krakow want to find out more about the Jewish ghetto, which was nowhere to be found in the German Breslau of the time. One of the guides was completely taken by surprise when two Spanish girls wanted to try on traditional Polish folk costumes. The other had to cudgel his brains to explain the Catholic rules of veneration to a tourist from China. She started to ask questions when she saw Saint John the Baptist in the coat of arms of Wroclaw.
A film crew from India visited Wroclaw in the spring. As they wandered around the city, they ended up in Copernicus Park, where they saw the monument of Rotmistrz Pilecki. The Bollywood director said that the life of the legendary Auschwitz prisoner during World War II, and the prisoner of the communist regime after the war, made a fascinating story to shoot a film and he would be happy to do it.
As they join guided tours, German tourists often pay attention to the elements of architecture that are typical of their culture, the same applies to Czech visitors who try to find testimony to their rule in Lower Silesia in the Middle Ages. Łukasz Hudziec: "With its monumental mass and colourful stands, the Market Hall always makes a great impression on tourists Our Gothic-style buildings are attractive even to Italian or Spanish tourists, who may be a little jaded with their own beautiful architecture.
See the Market Hall from the back - Unknown Wroclaw
Dwarf craze and street art
There are also tours when the tables are turned and the guides are all ears as they listen to stories told by their clients. Łukasz once toured two ladies who were born to Jewish families just after WWII: one of them lives in Israel, the other in California."It was moving to watch them recognise places they knew from their childhood. They told me where they had ice cream and where they used to play when they were little," says the guide. Another guide came across a journalist who specialised in street art. As they were touring Nadodrze, he tried to learn as much as possible about street art's history, its techniques and its phenomenon.The dwarves, which are now taken for granted by the locals, are all the rage with foreign visitors. Tourists from Asia and the West are more than enthusiastic when they come across dwarves on their way.The tours often last longer than the regular two hours and a half. Once they have completed the tour, the guide and the tourists often have lunch or a pint together, which is when they can make friends with each other.
One of the guides has been recently given a documentary about Fritz Haber. The Nobel Prize laureate invented not only artificial fertilisers, but also chemical weapons that were used during World War I. The documentary was sent by an American lady who joined a tour around Wroclaw. "Our walk helped her to remember his name," says the guide.
Łukasz Hudziec: "Some cities in Poland are considered household names, such as Krakow, Warsaw or Zakopane. Wroclaw is still working to be recognised as a city attractive to foreign tourists, and we are doing better every year."
w
