Before I left Warsaw I just HAD to visit on of the city's institutions...E. Wedel's Chocolate House. I had the most heavely chocolate gateau....melt in the mouth chocolate mousse on a base of crunchy macaroon, encosed in a thin shell of dark bitter choc, and topped with an alcohol soaked cherry, all served with whipped cream! And to drink with it Hot Chocolate like you have never drunk before..not powdered stuff in milk...this was REAL chocolate melted into it's liquid base and blended with just a touch of cinnamon. Heavenly overdose!!!!!
But now I'm sitting in one of Gdank's most up-to-date and fashionable clubs,
right in the centre of what was once the Lenin Shipyard...the one where in 1980 90% of the workforce formed a trade union called Solidarity, and a worker in his mid 30's became the leader of a movement that led to the downfall of the Soviet machine.
At the main gates I found that there was a small bus about to leave on a tour of the shipyard past and present, and decided to join....
The tour took us through the debris and decay that is now most of what is left of Gdank's once thriving shipyards.
It's just waiting to be razed to the ground and redeveloped (but there are problems, and serious quistions about the stability of the ground and whether it can bear the weight of the shyscrapers they want to put there) It's not all doom and gloom though, having accepted financial help from the EU, part of the shipyard is still active...
and as well as shipbuilding it is planned that the Gdansk shipyard will be of of the main european centres for the manufacture of giant wind turbines for use in coastal waters. They are also holding on to the history of Solidarity, and one of the places preserved as a monument is Lech Walensa's workshop (he was the shipyard worker who led the union, and eventually became president of Poland).
I'll be finding out more about Solidarity over the next few days, getting my laundery done, swimming in the sea, and visiting Hell (sorry, Hel...a small holiday resort near here).
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