Wejherowo

“It was a rainy night. It was the myth of a rainy night.”

Jack Kerouac

Saturday

Thunder and then lightning wakes me.

It is raining outside. There is nothing like rain outside and being in bed. I lay and listened to the rain and fell back asleep.

A longer drive today as we make our way to the German border. The German border. Just typing that makes me feel like I am in a John le Carré novel.

“What do you think spies are: priests, saints, and martyrs? They’re a squalid procession of vain fools, traitors too, yes; pansies, sadists, and drunkards, people who play cowboys and Indians to brighten their rotten lives. Do you think they sit like monks in London balancing the rights and wrongs? 

John le Carré

I need some breakfast. Starving.

Nothing is open.

We head to our nearest bakery, Piekarnia Gruzińska for some freshly baked wypełniony podplomyki, filled Polish flat bread. Mine is filled with kurczak i warzywa, chicken and vegetables. Shell goes with szpinak, spinach.

A classic cinnamon scroll for something sweet.

We take our breakfast to a nearby park and eat it from the brown paper.

These have been our favourite breakfasts when we travel. Hot, baked bread, sitting outside as the skies turn from grey to blue. The city is asleep, quiet. Perfection.

“Foucault’s Pendulum can be very comforting for people of my generation, who ate disappointment for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”

Umberto Eco

Our drive today is in three parts.

The first stop is Olsztyn for some much needed coffee at Bless Coffee Roasters Kawiarnia.

The second stop, two hours away is Malbork. Here we will find the world’s largest brick castle, Zamek w Malborku.

There are tourists in abundance when we arrive. There is only paid parking and it all seems like too much effort and we drive on.

With a pang of disappointment and no small amount of self loathing at our laziness, we cross the the Nogat River and Shell spots a parking space with views of the castle across the water.

Not an entirely wasted effort.

“What have we all got to expect that we allow ourselves to be so lined with disappointment?”

Graham Greene

Todays driving was one of the most scenic tours we have done.

Rolling fields of agriculture, wheat, corn and spinach gave way to looming forests that were absolutely stunning.

A cathedral of trees that swallow the road. So thick the light is blocked out. Natures church. Only a fool would seek the divine through man-made nonsense when nature provides the perfect example of sacred.

“The poetry of the earth is never dead.”

John Keats

A debate erupts over wheat. Shell insists that wheat grows above the knee. She argues the point until I have to stop the car, she gets out and demonstrates that the grain we see growing is too short to be wheat.

I concede it is very short. I suggest it is ‘Pygmy Wheat’?

Shell is satisfied with this outcome.

We stop at a grocery store for some dinner and head to our place for this evening.

A bungalow on a golf course.

There is a tournament on. The foyer is littered with prizes. First place looks to be a Lexus. Or maybe the event is sponsored by Lexus.

We make some dinner and relax for the evening.

Breakfast is included tomorrow.