June 24, 2015 (Warsaw, Poland)

We woke up fairly early this morning. We took a taxi to the train station for our train to Warsaw!  We left the pretty and fun city of Krakow and had a two and a half hour fast train ride to the central of Poland, Warsaw. When we arrived in Warsaw we had a little walk with our bags to the Marriott hotel. The Marriott hotel was built just after Poland had regained its independence from the Communist Soviet Union. It provided jobs for the people of Warsaw.

After we had chilled and dropped our bags off at the hotel we hopped on some city bikes and biked over to one of Kendall’s favorite restaurants in Warsaw, Manikin. Most of the food in Manikin had something to do with crepes, like my crepe spagetti. The restaurant was unique and was themed after a top hat wearing mannequin.

Later that day we biked to the Old Town where we simply walked around and Kendall ate some soft serve ice cream from one of the missionaries' favorite spots she used to visit when a missionary. In Old Town we visited the Mermaid statue. The Mermaid was a tall tale about a man who caught a mermaid and the mermaid told him if he let her back into the water he would be the leader of a new succesful city (Warsaw), so he trusted her. 

There are few original buildings in Warsaw, because during the Warsaw Uprising against the Nazis in 1944 the Nazis had leveled the city. The whole city had to be rebuilt. The money was donated to rebuild the city by the citizens.

We had also visited the Warsaw Uprising Memorial and then Chopin's museum. The Uprising Memorial was interesting and reminded me of superheroes, and how they showed bravery fighting for the city's freedom. The Chopin museum told about Frederick Chopin the famous  Polish composer's  life and how smart and talented he was. Chopin died at an early age of in his thirties in Paris. 

That night we ate dinner with an investigator of the LDS church named Honka who Kendall taught. She read the Book of Mormon but didn't come to church. She was very nice and reminded us of our friend Ruby. We chatted with her for a while, we saw her photo album of her grand kids and she told us she was coming to the church’s twenty five year reunion. She was really excited to see Kendall and meet our family. 

We tried renting city bikes to bike back to our hotel but there was no three city bikes that worked properly. So instead we road on the back of each others bike. After a little we returned the bikes and just walked. We walked to Stalin's Tower which looks like a very large Big Ben and was built during the communist times of Poland. We took an elevator all of the way to the top. There was a good view of the big city of Warsaw, and next to us was the “Super Man tower”, the name Kendall gave it. 

At the hotel we layed low for the rest of the night ordering room service and lying in bed.

In Warsaw headed to our hotel.

Lunch at one of Kendall's favorite restaurants Manekin.

Riding bikes around the city.

Inside a Catholic church dedicated to Mary. All the necklaces/rosaries on the wall are from people who had their prayers answered in this church and donate them back to St. Mary.

Outside an ice cream stand where Kendall used to go in the Old Town Square

Inside the Old Town Square

Along the old City Wall which was rebuilt and below is a statue of a child remembering the children that fought in the Uprising in 1944

The Uprising Monument

"Lunch" at around 5 p.m. with Mrs. Honka, one of the people Kendall taught on her mission. We learned about what it was like to live during times when the Communist times in Poland and how she had to wait for hours in lines to just get a stick of butter

We couldn't get 3 bikes that worked to ride back to our hotel so walked through this pretty park

Outside The Palace of Culture and Science which we went up and could see the whole city from, "A gift from Stalin"