Poland – Wieliczka Salt Mine
Oct 29th, 2006 by Oana
This was one of the best day trips we took from Krakow. We caught a maxi-taxi (only 2.50 PLN!) which took us about 15 km south to the mine entrance. 120 PLN later (including a 10 PLN sticker which allowed us to take photos), a funny tour guide took us down the mine shaft to Level 1.
Ian tasted some of the salt:
Then we saw a tonne of salt sculptures:
…and an underground lake:
… and an underground church:
Ian, ever the tour keener, even volunteered to work the antiquated elevator system a.k.a. donkey wheel.
All in all, we visited only 3 of the mine’s 9 levels. It was a lot of walking, but fortunately we didn’t have to climb all those stairs back up. We were whisked back to the surface in tiny metal cages, a very scary and claustrophobic 50 second ride.