Poland runs on day trips. Most of them leave Krakow.
What an Auschwitz-Birkenau visit actually includes. How far down the salt mine goes. Whether Zakopane is worth the drive when you have one spare day. Reviews of the tours you can book across Poland.
The four days a first week in Poland is built around.
What each one costs, how long it takes, and what travellers make of the guide you get.
01The full day outAuschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour & Hotel PickupGuided entry to Auschwitz I and Birkenau with transport from central Krakow, around seven hours door to door.
02UndergroundWieliczka Salt Mine TourThe Wieliczka tourist route: chambers, brine lakes and a chapel cut out of rock salt, with the ticket and guide in the price.
03The mountain dayZakopane: Cable Car, Chocholow Baths, Cheese & VodkaCable car above Zakopane, the wooden village at Chocholow, then an hour in the thermal water on the way home.
04After darkEvening or Night River CruiseAn hour on the Vistula under Wawel hill, drinks on deck, back in Kazimierz in time for dinner.
Krakow is a base camp. The big days are an hour outside it.
Three trips fill most itineraries: the memorial at Oswiecim, the salt mine at Wieliczka, and the Tatras above Zakopane. What each costs to board, and how much of the day it takes.
Krakow first, then Warsaw, the coast and the mountains.
A medieval square that came through the war intact, a capital rebuilt brick by brick, a Baltic port of gabled houses, and a mountain town that eats sheep cheese for breakfast. Six bases, and the best day out from each.
Poland’s most booked days out.
The full Poland list →These are the tours travellers take more than any others in the country, with the price and the length of day each one asks for.
1
Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour & Hotel Pickup
Travel from Krakow by air-conditioned bus to Auschwitz and Birkenau for a 3.5-hour guided visit. Expect original barracks, the Arbeit Macht Frei gate, gas chambers, personal belongings, and guides such as Nicholas or Ziggy, depending on the departure.
From · $21
Read our review →
2
Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour & Hotel Pickup
from $21
3
Auschwitz Guided Tour with Optional Hotel Pickup
from $69
4
Zakopane: Cable Car, Chocholow Baths, Cheese & Vodka
from $54
5
Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour with Pickup & Lunch
from $21
6
Wieliczka Salt Mine Tour
from $33
7
Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour Pickup/Lunch Options
from $200
8
Auschwitz-Birkenau and Salt Mine Guided Tour
from $54
Three cities, one river and a Baltic harbour.
The Vistula runs under Wawel hill in Krakow and past the towers in Warsaw. In Gdansk the Motlawa is lined with gabled fronts and the old timber crane. Evening sailings cost less than dinner and show you the skyline lit.
Krakow’s square is the biggest in medieval Europe, and standing in it is free.
Two hours with a guide covers ground you would otherwise walk straight past: the Cloth Hall and the trumpet call from St Mary’s tower, the ghetto wall in Podgorze, the cathedral bells on Wawel, the rebuilt lanes of Warsaw.
What a day out in Poland actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it charges. Poland is cheap by western European standards, and the set pieces are the cheapest part of it.
Old town walks, museum entry, river cruises and most of the guided runs out to Oswiecim.
Full days: the salt mine with transport, Zakopane and the thermal pools, the combined memorial and mine trips.
Private drivers, small groups with lunch, and the twelve-hour days that cover two sites properly.
Three things Poland has that nowhere else does.
A cathedral carved out of rock salt, Chopin played nightly in the city he left at twenty, and hot springs at the foot of the Tatras that stay open through the snow.
The Chapel of St Kinga
Miners spent decades cutting a church out of the rock salt more than a hundred metres under Wieliczka: altars, reliefs, a floor tiled in salt, chandeliers strung with salt crystal. Mass is still said down there and couples still marry in it. The tourist route takes about three hours and finishes in a shaft lift built for eight at a time.
- 1Wieliczka Salt Mine Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 9,393 reviews
- 2Auschwitz-Birkenau and Salt Mine Guided Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 9,020 reviews
- 3Wieliczka Salt Mine Guided Tour with Transport★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 7,429 reviews
Chopin in a small room
Krakow and Warsaw both run nightly recitals in old drawing rooms and churches, forty or fifty seats, an hour of nocturnes and mazurkas. Tickets cost a fraction of what the same programme fetches further west, and the rooms are small enough that you hear the pedals move.
- 1Chopin Piano Recital at Chopin Concert Hall★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 2,330 reviews
- 2Chopin Concert in the Old Town★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 2,287 reviews
- 3Warsaw Concert: Chopin – Painted by Candlelights with Wine★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 1,442 reviews
Thermal water in the mountains
Geothermal water surfaces hot along the foot of the Tatras, and the pools built over it run outdoors through the winter. Most Zakopane day trips finish here, an hour or two in the water with the peaks in view before the drive back down to Krakow.
- 1Zakopane Tour with Thermal Baths, Cable Car & Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 904 reviews
- 2Zakopane with Thermal Baths, Cable Car & Hotel Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 493 reviews
- 3Swim in Chocholow Thermal Baths with an Optional Zakopane Visit★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 406 reviews
Four Polish bookings that will not wait for you.
Most of this country can be arranged the night before over a plate of pierogi. These four run on timed entry, small rooms and a season, and in summer they go weeks ahead.
- 01Auschwitz-Birkenau Guided Tour & Hotel PickupEntry runs on timed slots with a cap on each one, and through the middle of the day in high season you go in with a guide or not at all.
- 02Wieliczka Salt Mine TourYou go down in a timed group and the whole route runs to that schedule. Arriving without a slot in July means a long wait at the shaft.
- 03Oskar Schindler’s Factory Entry Ticket & Guided TourThe factory museum is small and sells entry by the slot. The guided tickets go before the plain ones.
- 04Chopin Piano Recital at Chopin Concert HallThe recital rooms hold a few dozen people and run one performance a night. A same-day ticket is luck, not a plan.
By December the light in Poland is gone before four.
The winter is long here and the sightseeing hours are short. The answer is to go under a roof or under the ground. The salt mine holds about fourteen degrees all year, the museums are warm, the recitals start at seven, and the thermal pools are at their best when it is snowing on them.
By city and mountain town
By kind of day, memorial to mountain
Krakow, Oswiecim, Wieliczka, Zakopane, then the fast train north.
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