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| There is a large disembodied head in the main square of Krakow, Poland |
Today's weather forecast said there was a 99 percent chance of rain. That's fairly definitive. And it definitely rained all day long without any break.
In fact, I am supposed to have only one day in Krakow where there will be a break in the rain. So, rain notwithstanding, it was time to head off and explore Old Town Krakow. And the main attraction in Old Town -- other than the Leonardo da Vinci painting -- more on that later -- is the Rynek Glowny, the Market Square, the largest such town square in Europe.
This is the Old Town Hall Tower. The Old Town Hall is gone, but the tower remains. You can climb the 271 steps to the top for a great view. Emphasis on: You can. I choose not to.
Which leads us to ...
Eros Bendato, or Eros Bound. It is a large disembodied head laying on its side.
It unexpectedly became a major hit when it was temporarily (now permanently) placed in the Market Square. It's hollow, so lots of people like to take a crawl inside.
At the center of the square in the Cloth Hall.
For centuries this was the main market for selling the woolen cloth made in the area. Now it is a huge souvenir marketplace.
Also on the Market Square is Bazylika Mariacka, the ornate St. Mary's Basilica:
And this is the Krakow statue of a gentleman we met in Warsaw: Adam Mickiewicz.
He is Poland's national poet. And here is another sighting of Poland's most popular native son:
John Paul II. And this is the Fontanna - Pomnik Żaka. It's a fountain. Of Pomnik Żaka. I've told you everything I know about this.
Let's get out of the rain for a bit and have a look inside St. Mary's Basilica.
I should have come just before noon because they open up the altar piece to show one of the most lavish, detailed, ornate wooden altar pieces from medieval Europe.
But, for now, it lays safely hidden.
And here we have another John Paul II sighting.
I'm a fan. I enjoy seeing all these John Paul II homages about town.
Back out into the elements for another look at the Cloth Hall.
The museum with the da Vinci is on the north side of the Old Town. And so is Krakow's Barbican:
And, near the Barbican, they have a Thorvaldsen:
This is a carving by the renowned Danish sculpture Bertel Thorvaldsen. I'm a fan of his, so this was an unexpected find.
And then I found the Czartoryskich Museum:
Krakow has a da Vinci. They have "Lady with Ermine," which might be the most famous da Vinci painting after the Big Two of the Last Supper and the Mona Lisa. It's in Krakow because it was bought by a Polish prince many many years ago.
The museum collection had the standard array of royal portraiture:
Giant room-sized paintings that wouldn't fit in my house or yours:
They had some works by Dutch Masters -- nothing major -- and this one:
An Italian work called "Battle of the Cupids." I liked the idea of wrestling cupids.
And then you end up in a dark room. Just you. The da Vinci. And a dozen or so of your fellow tourists.
Google "Lady with Ermine" to get better pictures. My little camera wouldn't do her justice even I moved closer.
Da Vinci left us with only 17 or 18 paintings. This is one of the more significant ones. We have a hard time in modern times understanding what is so special about these works because da Vinci fundamentally changed painting in general and portraiture in particular. Nothing looked like this before da Vinci and, afterwards, nothing ever looked like it did before.
What was really interesting to me, seeing this live, was the ermine. It really jumped off the canvas, like it was 3-D. Oh, and the Lady, the one with the ermine, she definitely had a case of man hands, although I think that was da Vinci experimenting with perspective. The hands were closer to the viewer, thus larger in the painting.
What can you do next after seeing one of the major da Vincis in a small museum in Krakow.
Walk back to the hotel, in the rain, to dry off and warm up.
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