Krakow is an unique place on the map of Poland. It is not only second biggest city, but definitely a most attractive for students and tourist, due to its rich nightlife. It is also a historical pearl, combining many architectonical and historical influences in the single place. Often called a small Vienna, has its own feeling going far beyond that simplification. When visiting it, it can be observed In many fields, one of which is gastronomy. The old capital of Poland may be a home to many great foreign restaurants, but it is mainly a place to try and enjoy typical polish cuisine, with the southern feeling in it. Below, there are plenty of good places to verify it by yourself.

CK Browar

This inspiring place is a very definition of everything we mentioned above. Located near the main market and famous Bagatela Theater, CK Browar fills up a large, old basement created during many years of the city’s growth. It is decorated in the very distinctive manner, and the unique blend of smells welcomes you upon arriving, way before waiters do. You enter the world of good beer beverages and according dishes to meet them. While at first glance it may be viewed as a very German, it is in fact different, and actually combines Austrian and Poland cooking traditions, as it derives from the times, this part of Poland was a part of Austro-Hungarian Empire. Served beer is created at the place (hence “browar” – polish equivalent of “brewery”) and the huge variety of delicious polish dishes are filling the experience. It may not be the most typical way of serving polish cuisine, but it is a must-do in Krakow.

Kompania Kuflowa

Another, more traditionally oriented polish restaurant is located in two places of Krakow: near Sukiennice on the main market and around Wawel Castle. While CK Browar was a tribute to unique feeling of the city, Kompania Kuflowa, does a great job in bringing on huge variety of polish food to a table. You can enjoy some the most known soups here, eat meat or polish dumplings (known as “pierogi”). Similar to previous place, this one is also serving a lot of local beer and brings a very friendly atmosphere, for which Poland is generally known. You can listen to a good live music here further immersing you in the climate of the city, or have long conversations under the stars of main square.

Miodova

Kazimierz is an old Jewish district in Krakow and is known for a lot of places to visit. Including restaurants. One of them serving good polish food is Miodova, located at the very heart of Kazimierz. Here, you can taste a lot of additional dishes coming from the tradition of those parts of the city, near Vistula river. While served beverages may be not as outstanding as in the two places mentioned before, but there is plenty of unique tastes in Miodova, so it may appeal to much more people or make you visit it more than once. It’s beautiful, modern interior will make a good impression during business trips, so it is also recommended as a first place, during such travels. You will also try arguably the best handmade polish dumplings here, so there are overall many reasons to show up.

Krakow is a city of many little secrets to discover, so we leave you to do it on your own. Listed places are a great places to start, as they lure you into the most beautiful places in this gorgeous city. From there you can go and just explore it for yourself, with guaranteed good memories during any season.

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Artykuł Visiting Krakow – what to eat? pochodzi z serwisu Free time in Cracow.

Krakow is widely known for many interesting places. From quite common shooting ranges or racing tracks, to a more innovative clubs like Bad Axe or cthulu pubs, you can have a great evening just by randomly visiting places on the main market. One of most common places to be, are surely board games cafes. While many people are rather used to playing in board games shop, like it was very popular in 90s, in United States of America, such cafes are a great way to improve this experience and maybe bring some casual friends to share it. Here, we list the best such places to visit in Krakow when it rains.

Hex – where it all started

If you were to ask around about tabletop related locales, you would probably first bump into the name “Hex”. This board game café started it all few years ago, opening a small locale between the main market and Kazimierz district. While it was not the richest in terms of furniture, it had a lot of good board games, and great food/drinks to it. Combined with growing popularity of board games in Poland at those times, Hex was literally overrun by people. You had to make reservations with week or two in advance, reaching month, when it came to a weekend date. You were very lucky, when you took some friends and found yourself a large table. People were also coming alone and looking for a group to join. Hex quickly became an extraordinary, yet very effective place to meet people, so it was natural that many official meetings and tournaments made its way to this café, instead of a dull board game shop.

Boardowa – new and shiny

After the peak of popularity was reached in Hex it was only natural, that many other locales would follow with either opening of a new place, or rearranging existing ones to have at least some degree of board games support. While many of those were simply bad, offering a Monopoly and maybe a Talisman to their burgers, some of those places were created with great planning and ideas. One of those was Boardowa. Opened not long ago, near main station in Krakow, Boardowa is a very comfortable and friendly place, where you get to try some great tastes of local beer and food, combined with growing library of board and RPG games. This place has not only opened its doors to dedicated players, but right away started with events and parties involving tabletop games. You can throw a company party here, order a location-based game or make yourself a very nice birthday. It is a place where you can get ready for a Cyberpunk or play some Star Wars Destiny, with one of the biggest communities in Poland. Thanks to big tables, people are also starting to bring some miniature wargames here.

R’lyeh – thematically enriched pub

If you want some more immersion you can also visit some thematically enriched locales, for example R’lyeh, which is also one of the closest places to the main station, so you can even try it out in between journeys. Such places are filled up with climatic decorations, music and people willing to meet up. RPG sessions are more dominant here, including Live Actions Role Playing (LARP) games, however there are also board games in most of such places. So whether you want some tabletop action further immersed within the rooms of such a place, or you want to go all in into meetings with equally crazy people, those pubs are a way to go. And you will find a lot of those in Krakow.

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Artykuł Places to visit in Krakow – board games locales pochodzi z serwisu Free time in Cracow.

One of the many reasons why you should visit Krakow is surely a bunch of extraordinary locales, including thematically arranged pubs and cafes. Nowadays, such places are largely visited by people who want to enjoy a good board game beside a local beer. It even came to the situation, that you literally have to reserve yourself a place there in advance. At a peak moment it could be even a month before a given date. Let’s dive into the subject of best such places in the Krakow.

Board game locales

First and foremost, Krakow has plenty of good tabletop cafes and pubs. In here, everything started around few years ago with increased popularity of pub named Hex, where you had to reserve yourself a place way before you wanted to come with your friends, or you would just stand around or maybe get a smallest table, if you were lucky. Up until today, this place makes a lot of people show up every day, with bunch of official tournaments, premiere gatherings (for example for Game of Thrones watching) or meet-ups with known persons. Not long after, many new places came and go, including Boardowa in city center or AFK near AGH UST. Such places were a great alternative to shops, since you could eat and drink there and they were opened for a much longer time, than typical board game shop. While such meeting was a bit more expensive it was very much worth it. Especially, that most of those locales were very climatic and filled up with people to play with. It was its own category in terms of meeting new people.

Activities clubs

Krakow is a city also known for many action-packed clubs and societies, ranging from historical reconstruction up to modern, throwing axe clubs like Bad Axe. Whether you prefer to prepare your medieval cosplay for hours to meet standards, or you just want to make yourself a great Instagram pictures, everything was here for the taking. You could learn a lot of techniques and skills, including traditional polish fighting techniques or shooting multiple kinds of firearms in different situations or places. Krakow is a one kind of a city in this region, providing people with both casual and professional approach to such entertainment. It is easily visible, when you move to this city from around Poland and meet people. Everyone has an extraordinary hobby, so cool it would make a nice story. And on top of that, Poland is a country in which it is relatively easy to talk in English, as people are very opened and kind to newcomers. Therefore, you probably will have a great time sharing those exercises in the international groups of such activities. It is much easier to do it, than in many countries, especially outside of Europe.

Main square

The old capital of Poland combines all of those features in one major place – its main market square. You will find most of those places around it, scattered in the beautiful buildings. It is both climatic and comfortable, as you can go straight from your hobby activities for a pub around, or enjoy a dinner under the stars, looking at the Sukiennice building. Additionally, you will enjoy a seasonal events, including music shows, parades and market expansions, where you can enjoy traditional craft and food for every major part of the year. Nothing is really better than a hot beverage, among people during Christmas here.

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Artykuł Extraordinary places to visit in Krakow pochodzi z serwisu Free time in Cracow.

There are (unsurprisingly) plenty of places, where you can read about the rich nightlife in Krakow. Your time in here will never be sufficient to visit everything, this city has to offer. Attractions in Krakow are no scarce and include many extraordinary places, suitable for anything you want to do. Literally anything.

However, with every clubs or pubs around, we should mention, that Krakow has also a great deal of similar, yet very different places to visit. You can still meet a lot of people or drink there, but in the manner of doing something a little bit different. So buckle up as I will be bring some good examples, worth your visit.
 

Board games

Tabletop and board games are recently back, making more and more people immersed in playing something more complicated than chess, or poker. Krakow has actually many climatic places to visit in order to meet & play. Places like Hex or Boardowa have a lot of space, good, local beer to enjoy and most importantly, many board games to choose. You can not only play popular titles like Game of Thrones or Talisman, but also immerse yourself in the titles hard to find, including Starcraft or Discworld. You can meet up in many shops, and play popular card games including Magic the Gathering, Star Wars Destiny or Pokemon TCG in places like Vanaheim or Shop Gracz. Those shops are similar to those in United States, offering comfy rooms with drinks and sometimes snacks to buy. There are also plenty of accessories to buy there.
 

Climatic bars

Sometimes you want to go step further, truly feeling the nerdy climate of Krakow. Here, in this city, there are plenty of old-time basements, which are large and often rearranged into climatic locales. It may be a cinema, it may be a pub with specific decorations. You can enjoy an evening of RPG session or just a beer with cthulu geeks, like in R’lyeh café near main station. There is a steampunk bar in Kazimierz or old games pubs. Everything to enjoy in the single city, where party never stops! Even one with people, who do love Arcanum a little bit too much.

Action-packed clubs

On top of everything, you can jump straight into some action, with clubs focuses around so called “men” activities. There are plenty of shooting ranges, including Cracow Shooting Academy, which is offering a lot of courses and scenarios to play out, while learning proper shooting. You can also go more casual, for example for Viking cosplay and throwing axes in the exclusive tracks, where there is almost no boring theory and just straight action and competition with friends. Everything combined with photos, eating and drinking, for anyone willing to do so. There is no better idea to kick-start a good stag do, or just bring your friends together for a crazy evening. Especially if it is thrown party, to conclude something like a week in Krakow, trying all those attractions that I have mentioned above.

To conclude, you should not be asking: “what to do in Krakow?”, but rather: “what should I do first in this colorful city?” It is equally beautiful and interesting city, where you will easily find something new to do, and then you can always enjoy one of countless clubs to follow it during the night. There is nothing more cheerful than night at main market, especially when it’s warmer and people are all around the place, singing and dancing, enjoying their life.

Know what? You should too!

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Artykuł Nerdy evenings in Krakow pochodzi z serwisu Free time in Cracow.

Polish people do have a reputation for many things, including crazy ideas. I remember being invited for many international courses during my studies on Jagiellonian University and introducing myself as a Pole always got me some attention from others. You can’t be really surprised. We sing loud, we drink a lot, we fear nothing and we are reasonably bright while doing so. Therefore when you hear, that a popular thing to do in Cracow for a stag night would be to go for throwing axes, it should not strike you that much.

Although it does a bit, isn’t it?

But here we are, in the center of an old capital of Poland, when you can team up with your friends, colleagues or even your beautiful bride-to-be and smash some wood by throwing axes at it. All nordic-style like new Thor movie.

There is (almost) nothing more satisfying than starting your evening with this kind of interesting sport and go for a pub crawling later on. That is why, it is a good stag do idea, especially for men, who sometimes need to unmask a little, within their pack of friends. However it is completely fine to do it, as a part of visiting Krakow, and a good reason to actually do so, so if you are interested here are the few useful details that might help you doing something actually interesting during your stay in Krakow.

Where to find it?

Bad Axe club is located right outside the old city center, near Music School and Modern Studios hotel. You can find it walking from the famous Bagatela Theater by going near the street in the direction of main station. It is arguably the best place, as it’s near main station and many hotels, one of which you might be staying.

How does such an evening looks like?

Throwing axes clubs are pretty straightforward when it comes to the form of the evening. You are here to mainly enjoy your day, blowing off some steam and otherwise have fun. At the beginning you are greeted by an instructor, who will teach you what to do and how to doing it properly and in satisfying way. In no time you will be sticking those axes like it’s no business! And it’s not any less satisfying. Then you have a certain amount of given time to compete with friends on who is the best, or simply who will make the better throw. During that, you are free to dress up like a Viking, do a photoshoot and eat or drink while doing so. It is the simple, yet immersively satisfying way of spending your time.

Should I join it with something?

Definitely yes! I highly recommend planning a day around that activity. Starting your afternoon with good, unique lunch at some place with traditional Polish food is a very good idea. Especially with CK Browar around to provide the unique feeling this city has. After the game at Bad Axe (or any other similar club for that matter) you can go for a typical pub crawl on the main square or visit your hotel and then move for some clubbing. Both options are extremely popular in Krakow, which is considered a better city for parties than Warsaw. The approach presented here is typical for a hen or stag nights and it is highly recommended. Throwing axes makes you thirsty for some more fun later on, helping when your friends tend to go to sleep early. After such activities you and they will just want more. And maybe you will find a new hobby in it? Historical activities combined with cosplay are surely a returning fashion now.

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Artykuł A Viking playground in Kraków pochodzi z serwisu Free time in Cracow.