Castle with a View

Monday, September 29, 2008

Hey! Want to see a castle? Go to Google maps and type Gora Kalwaria Czersk, Poland into the search box, you will get a great aerial view of a castle, a church, and the village connected to them. The current castle dates from the late 1300’s to the early 1400’s although there was probably one prior to that. The nearby church has a marker with the date of 966.

Easel and I went to see the castle this weekend. We were able to go into two of the towers—I climbed one, Easel climbed both. The view from the top of the tower was beautiful! I opted not to climb the second tower and Easel said it was a good choice. Easel described the stairway in the second tower as more a ladder than a stairway and said he climbed down backwards to get down safely. The third tower had a gate blocking the doorway. I took my camera and reached through the bars, pointing the lens up, and took a picture. Unlike the other two towers, which have been renovated, the third has no interior floors. My picture showed an empty brick cylinder that opened to the sky. It was like a giant chimney! We also enjoyed looking at the pattern in the brick. The towers had a diamond pattern of darker colored brick worked into the walls. It amazes me every time I see something like this. I certainly wouldn’t want to be working on something so tall on the top of a hill!

It was a beautiful fall day and we joined a number of others enjoying the cool, sunny day within the confines of the castle. As seems to be the case with every tourist site we visit, there were two wedding parties at the castle taking pictures. I guess if you want to commemorate your own personal “historic” moment, what better way than to take pictures in an historic place. At any rate, as we travel around Poland, we also get to see current wedding fashions!

I did a little research on the castle and discovered that it used to be the capital of the Mazovian region of Poland. It was quite an important city until the Vistula River changed its course and moved more than a kilometer away from the castle/city. Now, it’s a small village—one of two bearing the name Czersk in Poland. One former resident of the castle was Queen Bona Sforza, wife of Zygmunt I. She was Italian and their marriage was arranged by her uncle, Maximillian I of Austria. Maximillian hoped to keep an eye on Poland through his niece. There is a legend that says she had to leave the castle suddenly and in the hurry of departure, broke a string of pearls. The legend says that sometimes her ghost is seen walking the ruins, looking for her lost pearls. We spent a couple of hours at the castle but we didn’t see the ghost!