Day 4 Warsaw, Poland

This morning we checked out of the hotel and headed to the beautiful and enormous Berlin train station to board our Express train to Warsaw. The journey took a little over five hours. We were broken into compartments with six people to a compartment. It was a bit cozy with all of our luggage, but it resulted in some quality bonding time! We were able to see a lot of the Polish countryside, which was a sharp contrast to the city. When we arrived in Warsaw, it was snowing big giant flakes, which added to the atmosphere. After dropping off our bags on the bus, we had a quick walking tour of the Old Town (est. 1200s) and the New Town (est. 1400s). Warsaw is much more westernized then we had imagined- they have everything from TJ Maxx to Dewalt drills, and kids were in awe of the red and white soccer stadium, newly constructed for the European soccer championship this year. The architecture in the city is absolutely beautiful (however most of it has been reconstructed due to WWII damage) and the students seemed excited to explore some more tomorrow. "The best chocolate in the entire world" was had at a cafe in the Old Town-however, the cold, wind and efforts to dodge plow trucks (they take their snow cleanup seriously!) we're beginning to get to us, so we headed to our hotel to check in a little after 6 pm. We had a late dinner at the hotel (soup, gnocchi, carrotts, cauliflower, pork roast and a chocolate/vanilla cherry cake) and everyone is headed to bed shortly. Tomorrow we have a tour of the Warsaw ghetto and more exploring time. Our EF cphone cards are not working at the hotel (but we do have wifi) so if you were expecting to hear from your child but didn't, that is why.