still around Stary Sacz

It sounds too sexy for not to visit. At first I enter the accountant’s department or something similar. An English-speaking young lady is called, she points towards the museum and wishes me a nice day.

A noisy crowd of children are entering the museum. They are of a small and difficult to control kind. I sneak in with them but the museum seems to be meant for beginners and kids. So I sneak back out. Outside one can photograph strangely shaped beehives. The shop is luckily closed and I cannot buy any strange items for the beekeepers at home. The restaurant is open. I get coffee and honey cake.

Following the directions of Google maps I drive through a river. Of course, the 2 km shorter route should have arisen some doubts. Technical tools should still be approached with healthy suspicion.

The Church of St. Michael the Archangel in Binarowa is on the UNESCO list. Two phone numbers on the notice board. The first number is an answering machine. On the second one answers a lady who does not seem to hear me very well. She calls back twice. I make a test call to a friend to find out if it is possible to hear me at all. It is but I use up all the network with the testing. I send an SMS, no answer.

In Libusza I don’t see the church. Well, I do see the new one. Usually the new one is close to the old church. After locating the place with coordinates it is obvious why the church didn’t show. I came too late. One of the most beautiful wooden churches in Poland lies around the church floor as piles of charred logs. All the carbon that had been kept for many hundred years was released in one go. Maybe that’s why the fire departments as addresses. Later internet says that the church burned already in 2016. Suspects are faulty electrical cables and arson. There was arson in 1986 but then more was left. Last year the ministry of culture decided that the church will not be built up again. Only 20% of it remained.

In Sękowa at the church of St. Philip and St. Jacob I have better luck. On the door is a phone number and a vigorous sounding woman answers. I submit the question I have prepared in Polish. Yes, it is possible to see the church, I’ll be there in five minutes, is the answer. Wow, she understood what I was saying! This church is also listed with UNESCO. The roof broadens below like a bellflower. Inside is rather humble but as the guide says: what do you want from a 500 hundred years old church anyway. Or that is how I interpret her comment. Tylko po polsku.

Then follow Ropica Górna, Skwirtne and Kwiatoń. Sun comes out and in this light all the churches look pleasant. Only the one in Skwirtne is behind a cow. In Kwiatoń I sit for a while on the bench in the sun. Nice and warm. Bird sings, manure smells. People who are interested in icons should come here in summer. The churches are open from 20^th of June until 30^th of September. I was more interested in architecture and in what condition the churches are and whether they are still being used. They are being used and with some exceptions (Libusza!) also is good shape.

If this trip to Poland was a dinner then I have now finished with appetizer and main course and it is time for dessert.