- T R A V E L O G -: Salt Mine Wieliczka

General info about the mine:
1. Sightseeing is allowed only with a guide
2. Individual tourist don't need prior reservations but organized groups required
3. Temperature in the mine is approximately 14-16℃
4. A fee of 10 zl for photo taking in the mine

Visiting hours for English language individual tourists: 10am, 12noon, 2pm, 4pm & 6 pm.
Note also the mine are closed on these days - 1 Jan, 1st day of Easter holiday (open only until 2pm), 1 Nov, 24 & 25 Dec, 31 Dec (open open only until 2pm)

The museum from the outside

entrance ticket excluding fee for photo taking which cost 10slz where they would give you a sticker

Our guide introduce the first type of salt to us - coliflower!

The salt mine is located in a small town approximately half hour drive from Krakow main city, in a little village called Wieliczka. To get to the mine museum, you can catch a train from Krakow main train station (Krakow Glowny) to Wieliczka at 5zl one way and it takes about 20 mins. Get down only at the final station from the line, don't make a mistake by hopping down from one of the station that's alo called Wel...somoething. The mine is then 15 mins walking distance where you can find sign board alont the way.

A guided tour at the mine takes about 2 hours and begins with long descent into the mine on foot, it takes you down about 130m (427ft) but the mine itself is much deeper at some 300m (984 ft) down under.

Salt in Wieliczka has been mined for over a thousand years and the oldest shafts dated from the 13th century. Salt was highly sought-after during the middle age and Krakow was finance by these white powder. However as time passed commercial mining has since been abandoned and the only salt extracted here now is sold to mine visitors/tourists.

Duringthe tour in the mines, you can expects to see hundreds of statues carved by miners; using salt! in the mine there is also this very beautiful lake (unlike those ordinary ones we see outside, this one has no tree!), ornate chambers and chapels which are all built by these miners over the years, and the most impressive chapel would nontheless be the St Kinga.

in this picture is Irene who is very excited with one ofcoliflower

Mine workers rare horses in the mine to help them work, the guide told us that horses lives a good life here cos they gets the best food and breath the best air, but I think is rather not true cos they are rare because their owners need them to work

behind these carving there are plenty of romantic stories about princess Kinga

Few of my colleagues trying out the equipment that's used by the mine workers to transport salt from the bottom level in the mine

this water is very salty, like sea water and probably more salty

first chapel we saw everything sculpture were made of salt, including the very shiny floor you see in this picture

chapel from the above pic

St Kinga - this massive chapel consist of many different sculptures from the bible stories and all of them are hand carved using salt

the little orangey sculpture at the top of this picture is a sculpture carving of little baby Jesus which is carved using a different grade of salt compare to the rest - my guess for this is so to mark this precious birth of Jesus :)