GLIWICE

I wonder where to start the description of attractions in Gliwice. I do not know whether the Gliwice radio is the most beautiful attraction of the city - de gustibus non disputandum est - but it certainly is the most important place of Gliwice.

I - Radio station.

At the exit road from Gliwice towards Tarnowskie Góry, it is visible from the tower, which is often called Gliwice Eiffel Tower. Next to it there are massive buildings. This is famous for Hitler provocation against Poland radio station.

We moved back in time to 31 of August 1939. It is 8 pm. To the premises of the radio station comes a group of men who speaks Polish, stating that they are Silesian insurgents and they want to give an important message. At this point, all the action almost finish with nothing. Attackers do not know that this is only the radio station that is supporting broadcasting from another part of town and it does not have ... a microphone. Consternation! However, after 10 minutes it turns out that there is one primitive microphone used only in case of storm, during which retransmission of the signal is ceased. The idea was to prevent the listeners from changing the station in their radio the Polish Radio broadcast - Katowice. One of the attackers begins to read a statement: 'Attention please. Here is Gliwice. The radio station is in Polish hands ... ' and that is what went into the ether. Unaware voice over man reads to the end the prepared text, but no one hears it!!!  

Stop. Let me finish this description. There is no way I can compete with the museum guide, who has a vast knowledge about the events that took place here. Moreover, he explains and shows the exhibits in the authentic interiors of the radio station.

It's impressive. You just have to be there and to see and hear. . Let us go outside. On lthe neat area,there is an 111-metre high tower antenna.

The massive structure is made of ... not impregnated larch wood, connected with 16,100 brass screws. There is not a single steel nail in the construction!

It is worth coming here for the second time in the evening. You will not regret visiting it twice. Illuminated tower makes a huge impression. This does not mean that in the meantime they will get bored. I would never not let that happen. Feel free to visit the other attractions of Gliwice. Welcome to the famous Palm House.

Visiting the radio station:

Tarnogórska Street 129 | 44-100 Gliwice

Telephone number: (48) 32 300 04 04

Monday: closed

Tuesday: 10 am - 4 pm

Wednesday: 10 am - 4 pm

Thursday: 10 am - 4 pm

Friday: 10 am - 4 pm

Saturday: 11 am - 4 pm (May - September: to 5 pm)

Sun: 11 am - 4 pm (May - September: to 5 pm)

II - Palm House.

Near Victory Street and Dubois Park stretches the Frederic Chopin. Trees, shadow, alleys and benches invite you to rest. But head to the great glazed structure with an area of ​​2,000 m square. We enter the magnificent lobby with a cloakroom in the basement. We leave aside not only the unnecessary clothing but also the city with its noise, busy streets.

We move into the world of exotic wildlife. We pass another pavilions arranged en suite. Huge palm leaves are hanging over our heads. We want to take a ripe banana or orange. We observe with disbelief the plants whose fruit, stems or leaves we use in our households. Once we are in a moist, warm and sultry tropics, once we are in the desert, and we carefully pass spiky cacti.

With disbelief we listen to the words of the guide that indicates that they gathered here more than 5600 plants of all sorts, tiny and large ones, whose upper parts are lost somewhere under the ceiling. There are plenty of animals as well, especially fish floating in the newly built aquariums.

We walk down the alleys, rest on a charming benches in the charming corners. You have to rest because the path on our way back leads through the pavement under the roof. Here we can feel like in a real tropical jungle for those few minutes. Because of the humid and temperatures we feel the sweat on our backs. How the travelers wandering for weeks, for instance in the forests of the Amazon, can bear such conditions.

Relieved, but attracted by the floristic specimens we head the exit. Or what about resting for a while in a small cafe? Short black will do us good. What is more, we will continue wandering around the city after the break and see its attractions.  

Visiting Palm House:

Opening hours:

Monday - Closed

Monday - Friday 9 am - 6 pm

Saturday - Sunday 10 am - 6 pm

Telephone number: 32 231-32-39

III GLIWICE CENTRE

Although we walk for some time in Gliwice. it is only now that we have the opportunity to say more about it. Before we get to the merits, I have a riddle for you, for which you can find the solution below.

We walked along the streets in various cities. Have you noticed a lack of a metropolitan accent present in other GOP cities GOP and in Zagłębie (about which there is also a part in our walking guide)? The first information about Gliwice is from the year 1276 or 760 years ago. Walls, whose remains can be seen today, nearby Gliwice Old Town are from a breakthrough of fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.

Welcome to the charming main square and the town hall from the fifteenth century located there. In the basement there are remains of the former town hall cellars date from the thirteenth century. Around the old houses, and not far from the town hall, there is a sculpture of Neptune.

The place which is a meeting point for the young couples, just as iconic as 'Adam' (the monument of Adam Mickiewicz) on the main square in Kraków. I am about to explain why we came in here.

Feel free to visit the Piast Castle, built together with defensive walls. There is a modern multimedia exhibition waiting for us. The building generally restored thanks to subsidies from the EU. In its exhibition halls it presents a permanent exhibition entitled 'Gliwice - a city of many cultures'.

Castle is the seat of two departments of the Museum City: archeology and history. The exhibits gathered here are mainly guild souvenirs from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, souvenirs from the period of the Silesian uprisings and the plebiscite, activities of the Union of Poles in Germany. The attraction of the set are military, including weapons of old Japan - samurai armor and swords, Chinese and Korean swords.

Archaeological collections is primarily a collection of the most precious and most numerous dishes, tools and ornaments from the excavations in the cemetery of Lusatian culture.  

In addition, there are numerous flint and stone tools from the Stone Age, brass and iron, Lusatian culture. All artifacts were found at threnody Gliwice and the surrounding area.  

Piast Castle.

Under the Walls Street 2 | 44-100 Gliwice

Telephone number: (48) 32 231 44 94

Monday: closed

Tuesday: 9 am - 3 pm

Wednesday: 9 am - 4 pm

Thursday: 10 am - 4 pm

Friday: 10 am - 4 pm

Saturday: 11 am - 5 pm

Sunday: 11 am - 4 pm  

IV VILLA 'CARO'.

Or maybe you want to see how representatives of the rich middle class lived in the nineteenth century? I understand that the interiors, which I want to present you, can make you envy. But do you really dream to live like this? How to make sure we have a minimum of privacy when there is a bunch of cleaners, cooks and other service around the house? Or maybe you only think so, because we spend our entire life in small flats? It is not worthy digressing. You will get the opinion later.

We stand on the Lower Ramparts Street (In Polish Dolne Wały) in front of imposing villa in the garden, separated from the street with a high fence, guarded by a bronze lion.

Villa was built in the years 1882 - 1885, where the Jewish entrepreneur Oscar Caro (the name derives from him) lived with his family. Rooms on the ground floor are elegant, formal, used for receiving guests (living room, dining room, boudoir for the ladies and a separate one for men, where you can talk less formally. Elegant decor, furniture, trinkets are impressive.

All of these are original souvenirs of the owners. Rooms on the first floor are modest and there the family had a normal private life. Today, the villa is the main building of the City Museum. And what? Impossible to live here? I do not want you to raise your hopes. I doubt the city is willing to get rid of this remarkable ornament.  

Villa 'Caro'.

Lower Ramparts Street 8a 44-100 Gliwice

Telephone number: (48) 32 231 08 54  

Sightseeing:

Monday: closed

Tuesday: 9 am - 3 pm

Wednesday: 9 am - 4 pm

Thursday: 10 am - 4 pm

Friday: 10 am - 4 pm

Saturday: 11 am - 5 pm

Sunday: 11 am - 4 pm  

At the end I suggest you going out just like that, within the narrow streets of the Old Town, or Krakow Square near the Silesian University of Technology. Thanks to its students, the city despite the right age, is still a young and vibrant city.  

Now it is time to solve the riddle.  

This missing piece of Gliwice, the reason they vary from almost all the cities described before is the absence of the characteristic sound of the tram moving on rails!!!

Once, there was a tram. For unknown reasons, municipal authorities closed down the trams recoiling from ... 115 years, of which 111 years as electric trams. They have been replaced with the smoky buses. I know, I know what you want to say.

In Tychy, after all, there is no trams. Fact. But it has never had the trams, and this city is entwined with 6 trolleybus lines. This is the third city in Poland after the Lublin and Gdynia, where you can go by 'trajtek' (an informal name for trolleybus), or if you prefer 'bus with the braces'. Well, I am very sorry for the digression. But perhaps the life is more important...