Krakow Poland -recommendations for car & English speaking driver
 

Planning a fall trip to Poland and will have 3 days in Krakow. My ancestors come from Nowy Sacz, Stary Sacz, Grybow & Niemieczka Dabrowka (?). I looking for recommendations on hiring a car with English speaking driver to take me to those towns. Or is there a better way to go? I'll be looking for ancestry records, cemetaries, and just the feel of the land.

nowociju,

you will undoubtedly enjoy Krakow, and in normal circumstances there would most probably be no need for a driver. We were there for 3 days and managed to get around very well, with hardly a word of Polish, and those we knew we probably mispronounced.

However with your specialist needs i can see that it would be useful. i would have thought that the tourist information office would be the place to start.

incidentally, have you only 3 days for the whole stay in that area, or are you researches and explorations to be in additional time? 3 days is barely enough to explore Krakow alone, let alone to do the exploring that you want to do.

I would start my contacts with Marta and her husband. She is a guide and he is a driver.
If you want an informational tour while you travel Marta is someone I have used and I very much enjoyed my time with her.
She has her own sort of mini van and is also a liscensed tour guide in Poland. She speaks wonderful English.
[email protected].

I found her name in a Rick Steves guide but do not hold that against her if you are not a fan of his. She is a wonderful guide.

I think you should have a guide, not only a driver since a driver may or may not point out interesting sights along the way. If you do hire only a driver make sure he/she will help you access the records; generally a driver only takes you to a place, nothing more and you need to do the rest yourself. If you do not speak Polish you'll have a problem as people in rural areas will not speak English.

I agree with Sher - I used Marta twice while in Krakow and was very pleased.

Thanks, great advice. I will contact Marta & see what she can do for me.

Just tried to send an email to Marta but it bounced back as undeliverable.

[email protected] <[email protected]>; is this the correct email?
Thanks again.

This is the latest email I have for Marta. I guess she changed her email address and I didn't notice the address sher used.

[email protected]

nowociju. Sorry, I have both addresses but I guess the one I gave you is no longer valid.

I hope you get in touch with her. I really like her.

Just wondering: .pt is the domain name for <b>Portugal</b>. Could it be .pl (for Poland)?

Gordon - the gmail address I gave above is correct. And you are correct as to the "PL" rather than "PT."

You can also visit her web page which shows both email addresses:

http://www.privateguideinkrakow.com/

Thank you, I have sent an email.

Hi nowociju, while in Krakow, you could also go to Wieliczka salt mine - it's near Krakow and very worth visiting.

And you need only about 3 hours for it.

See the official site: www.kopalnia.pl


By the way, I think that one of the places of your roots is written Dabrowka Niemiecka (which means "German Dabrowka"), not "Niemieczka" :)

PS
I'm using the profile of the tour company I work for, but if you had any further questions about Krakow itself - I'm in the city, so just send me a private message at: kam.mucha[at]gmail.com