Wieliczka WIELICZKA SALT MINE - TOURIST ROUTE For literally hundreds of years, tourists have enjoyed the underground wonders of Wieliczka’s Salt Mine, and the most popular way to visit begins at the Daniłowicza Shaft, located just a short walk up ul. Daniłowicza from the Wieliczka train station; buy your ticket from the adjacent ticket office and check the outside display for the time of the next guided tour in your language (tours are offered in Polish, English, Russian, French, Italian, Spanish and German). Your ticket is valid for two parts of the salt mine: the Tourist Route, which comprises the first 2 hours, and the Underground Museum which takes an additional hour to visit. In between there’s an opportunity to take a break, use the restrooms and even get something to eat (or escape if that’s your preference). However, be aware that the tour does not end at the restaurant as many tour guides suggest it does to foreign groups; in fact, they are obliged to escort you to and through the Underground Museum (which you have already paid for) as well. Be prepared to do a lot of walking (comfortable shoes, people) and bear in mind that the mine is a constant 15 degrees Centigrade. Your tour begins in earnest by descending 380 wooden stairs to the first level 64m underground; don’t worry, you won’t have to climb them, but just descending will give your calves a work-out. Of nine levels, the tour only takes you to the first three (a max depth of 135m), with the 3.5km covered during the 3 hour tour (including both parts) comprising a mere 1% of this underground realm. While wandering the timber-reinforced tunnels you’ll gain insight from your guide into the history of the site, the techniques used to extract the salt and the lives of the men who worked there. There’s the opportunity to not only operate a medieval winch used for moving massive blocks of salt, but also to lick the walls (bring some tequila). The tour visits numerous ancient chambers and chapels in which almost everything around you is made from rock salt, including the tiled floors, chandeliers, sculptures and stringy stalactites that hang down. The highlight of the tour is the magnificent 22,000m³ St. Kinga’s Chapel dating from the 17th century. Known for its amazing acoustics, the chapel features bas-relief wall carvings from the New Testament done
Detail from a bas-relief in St. Kinga’s Chapel, Tourist Route.
HISTORY About 20 million years ago, Kraków and the surrounding area apparently lay at the bottom of a shallow, salty sea. Unfortunately for those of us here today, the beaches are gone, but left behind were some enormous salt deposits, shifted hundreds of metres underground by tectonic movements. Though cheap and universally accessible today, salt was an extremely valuable commodity centuries ago due to its ability to preserve food, especially meat. An ancient sign of wealth, salt was used as currency before there was money; Roman soldiers who ably performed their duties were said to be ‘worth their salt’ and the word ‘salary’ comes from the Latin word ‘salarium’ used to describe their salty wages. Salt extraction by boiling water from briny surface pools in the regions surrounding Kraków can be traced back to the middle Neolithic era (3500 BC), but it was the discovery of underground rock salt in the 13th century that led to the rapid development of the area. Underground extraction began in nearby Bochnia in 1252 and was established on an industrial scale in Wieliczka by the 1280s; soon both cities had earned municipal rights and by the end of the 13th century the Cracow Saltworks was established to manage both mines, with its headquarters in the Wieliczka castle complex. One of the first companies in Europe, the Cracow Saltworks brought vast wealth to the Polish crown for the next 500 years until the first partition of Poland in the 18th century. Its heyday was the 16th and 17th centuries when it employed some 2,000 people, production exceeded 30,000 tonnes and the Saltworks accounted for one third of the revenue of the state treasury. Under Austrian occupation (1772-1918) production was further increased by mechanising the mining works with steam and later electric machinery, and the first tourist route was opened. By the 20th century however, over-exploitation and neglect of necessary protection works had begun to destabilise the mine’s condition and the market value of salt no longer made it a viable enterprise. In 1964 the extraction of rock salt was halted in Wieliczka and in 1996 exploitation of the salt deposit was stopped altogether. Despite the significant hazards of the day (flooding, cave-ins, explosive gas), over the course of seven centuries 26 access shafts and 180 fore-shafts connecting individual levels had been drilled in Wieliczka. 2,350 chambers had been excavated with over 240km of tunnels reaching a maximum depth of 327m underground. Due to its unique saline microclimate and innovative engineering, the mine has been well preserved and is today used for historical, medicinal and tourist purposes.
Alexander Baxevanis, CC BY 2.0
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