ruda bugaj, central poland, PL

we have spent the 90th birthday with my mother-in-law and xmas celebration in ruda bugaj, a village near alexandrow lodzki + lodz with closest family in poland. NICE 😍

our stops in PL this time?

• wojanow castle (schloß schildau) in lower silesia, PL
• lodz, central poland => enjoy especially the pictures from the interactive museum of technics and science located in an old coal electric power plant very close to the recently modernized train station fabryczna (factory / fabrik) below
• ruda bugaj / alexandrow lodzki, central poland
• leba at the baltic sea ...coming soon ...
• moszna castle close to opole (oppeln), upper silesia ...coming soon ...

alexandrow lodzki

the catholic church + old wooden houses in alexandrow lodzki

evangelic church

city park

there is no real industry in alexandrow lodzki. at least there

is awe, a small local tights (strumpfhosen) producer

alexandrow lodzki

there are still few wooden houses where people live today...

lodz-fabryczna

lodz, museum of technics and science inside an old power plant

lodz, museum of technics and science. view at the coal bowl bottom up

lodz-fabryczna

some appartment buildings ruins in lodz-fabryczna

the upgraded train station lodz-fabryczna

even if there is no aboveground river in lodz today, waste amounts of water

was the catalyzer for the development of its textile industry some 200 years

ago back then under russian administration. thus a boat 🚣 is still a symbol

of lodz and lodz is called polish manchester by many folks out there ...

lodz - baluty

holy mass in a local suburb church in lodz - baluty

good-bye, lodz - baluty

the bzura creek close to the village ruda-bugaj

two of us exploring the surroundings far away from regular paths.

btw, why not the well-trodden roads instead? well, let's say it with the words

of my blogger buddy alex: what attracts the masses (often) discourages me -

- both, contentual and extrinsic 

there are hools in ruda bugaj, too?

security protected suburbs of the new rich in alexandrow lodzki / ruda bugaj

our 90th birthday + xmas table 😄🌲💖

few more pictures here.

schloss schildau (wojanow), schlesien, PL

our 2nd stopover on the way from munich (DE) to lodz (PL) after karlsbad (CZ) was the beautiful and really interesting to see wojanow castle - schloss schildau - palac wojanow in lower silesia (PL) (schlesien, slask) in poland - polen - polska. we love this former german settled areas in the trijunction CZ-PL-DE, you remember? 

there are at least two interesting stories to tell:

1. by a mistake i've booked two different rooms in two different categories in the same hotel wojanow castle for the same night => heaven & hell 👹. the 1st one in the middle of november, the 2nd in early december ... the annulation fee (storno) at booking.com is at the arrival day 100%. you woldnt expect any other number, would you? => 😱 ... [addendum 24.12.2024: as the hotel was half-empty outside of the regular tourist season, it charched just 1 of our 2 booked rooms (+ of course all the food + drinks at dinner + the breakfast) and we could get back the already paid hotel charge via booking.com today. NICE.] yes, there was a 2nd bad luck issue in schildau for us: we could not see the SCHNEEKOPPE (snezka) mountain from the garden restaurant due to heavy clouds. thus enjoy the quite low (1603m) but snowy hill at the CZ-PL border in my old blog post from 2021 i've linked above ... btw, snezka is the highest point of the czech republic. of course, poland has much much higher mountains in the high tatras region as poland's highest mountain is rysy (2499m) and is located at the SK-PL border. any conclusion? the lower silesia is always a nice place to be for us 😍
2. there is a 2nd nice hotel lomnica castle - schloss lomnitz - palac lomnica only some 200m-300m away. the two castles (parks) are divided only by the small bobr river (bober). yes, it is really small today ... but aprox 2-4 months ago during the heavy autumn rains in south-west poland, it indeed flooded the flat castle's park and even castle's cellar, so the winery was closed and machines run day and night in order to dry the rooms out there ...

our sightseeing aka stops this time?

• wojanow castle (schloß schildau)
• lomnica castle (schloß lomnitz)
• city of bolkow (bolkenhain)
• opatow in central poland => lunch break just 1h away from lodz (PL) by car

wojanow castle (schloss schildau, palac wojanow) since 1603-1607

wojanow castle (schloss schildau, palac wojanow)

erbaut 1607 = built in 1607

the breakfast room was a horse stable (stall, stajnia) before

the swimming pool was nice, the sauna + steam bath not any special ... 

i did not try the massage / beauty facilities this time, so i cant provide

any opinion on that. in summer you could swim in a nearby lake 🐋

dinner in the castle's saloon

this is the nearby fischbach castle (karpniki), which we have visited last year

good-bye schildau aka wojanow

industrial silesia

schloss lomnitz (palac lomnica)

what a nice timber framed church in the castle's park

good-bye, lomnica castle (schloß lomnitz)

city of bolkow (bolkenhain)

bolkow (bolkenhain) castle

on the road ...

for a short time we had beautiful clouds & colors down the road 

opatow, central PL

few more beautiful clouds & colors 😀

few more pictures here.