Walking - and wandering - in Łazienki Park

We spent almost the entire day today in Łazienki Park. What a beautiful day, and a wonderful place to spend it.

When we moved to Warsaw, we were told that we would live "a 15 minute walk from the largest, most beautiful park in the city." And it was true.

Wide paths through trees; palaces and amphitheaters; museums and cafes. Throughout the winter we walked in the park every day. On Sundays we went to chamber music concerts in the "Palace on the Water," one of the old royal summer palaces. In unheated rooms we sat on hard clear plastic chairs, gazing at the bas-relief decorations on the walls and the statues crouching near huge fireplaces. While young musicians treated us to Schubert and Chopin and Shostakovich, we tried not to rustle with the plastic shoe coverings we had put on our feet to protect the parquet floors.

Then the snows came. We discovered hot chocolate at the cafe next to the palace, and we continued to walk in the park, crunching along the whitened paths. One day I poked my head around virtually every building in every corner of the park, searching for the Stara Pomarańczarnia, the Old Orangery, where they were holding noon poetry salons, but as in many cases, the signage for the building was lacking.

I was trying to go to hear a salon devoted to the Russian poet Okudzhava, and I did finally get there. Of course, I was late, but in the process I discovered Agricola (the "young people's sports center"), the Center for Contemporary Art in Ujazdowski Palace, the Warsaw University Botanical Gardens... The park is huge, and there is always something new around the corner.

Beautiful ducks, peacocks shouting at the tops of their lungs, bird houses nailed to trees.

On my walks, I encountered runners, and thought that there was no way I would ever start running. It seemed that the snows would never end, and I didn't trust my footing on the ice. But finally it was spring, and I began to run through Łazienki Park -- in the morning, the afternoon. Not fast, not far, but a nice ritual and a way to watch the park change. Certain elements began to undergo renovation, grass grew in and trees budded out, children and old people emerged in greater numbers, and the quantity of tourists increased noticeably.

And the cafes began to expand. Umbrellas went up, outdoor tables and chairs appeared, even lawn chairs. The restaurant at the Belvedere Palace opened up, and the tent outside began to be populated by crowds.

Today we went up to the Chopin monument, hoping to find an outdoor concert on this holiday afternoon, but we had read the poster wrong: the concerts outdoors are also on Sundays, and there will be one on 30 June, not 30 May (which is today). There were benches everywhere and so many people enjoying the area around the statue that I almost thought some event was about to happen.

Instead of Chopin, we went to Qchnia, a fancy restaurant in the Ujazdowski Palace. We sat on the patio and had a beer and a gourmet soup, looking out over the hill to the water elements, and it felt like we too were royalty.

View from the Qchnia terrace (not my picture, but you get the idea - a truly wonderful view)

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