Kazimierz Hotel

“ Kazimierz 1 is a nice quiet little hotel with great young staff, all of whom speak good English and are very helpful. Our room was on the top (5th) floor, in the 'attic' and was very clean and comfortable, albeit quite small for a twin bedded room. This, however, was outweighed by the fact that my friend and I are the pariahs of society and it was a 'smokers' room, whoo-hoo!. Also, the beds were more comfortable than the usual nightmare 'solid as a rock' type favoured by every hotel I've ever stayed in in Britain and I slept very well.

As all the previous reviews we read stated, there was plenty to eat for breakfast, but bear in mind it's a continental breakfast, so don't expect a full English fry-up, etc. The timing of breakfast was terribly civilised as it started at 7am and went on 'til 11am, meaning that you didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn after spending the previous evening sampling the delights of Polish vodka!

The hotel is in the Jewish quarter which is not as affluent an area as a lot of the old town, but it does have plenty of little local shops nearby, as well as bars and restaurants and it's less than a half-hour, (very leisurely,) wander from Wawel Castle and the central square in the old town, with it's innumerable cafe's, shops and horse drawn coaches, (or a 12 zloti taxi ride.)

I intend to go back to Krakow again in the future and I'll certainly stay here again.

“ Top Tip: Sadly I can't remember it's name, however if you turn right out of the Hotel, then first right again, towards the next junction, on the left is a bar/restaurant where we had 'Beef-steak in truffle sauce.' It was only served with a few boiled baby potatoes, (the Polish don't seen to go in for vegetables like we do,) but it was to die for! It was the best steak I have ever had, and I was, at one time, engaged to a butcher, so always had the best meat available. After that I decided to go for the 'Sweet Lasagne' for dessert. This consisted of 4 scoops of ice-cream, 2 chocolate, 1 strawberry and 1 vanilla, 4 sponge finger biscuits, cream, orange slices, chocolate sauce etc. and was, again, totally scrumptious. It was probably big enough for 2 to share, but I'm greedy! These were the most expensive items on the menu, at 43 zlotis for the steak and 14 zlotis for the dessert, but, when you consider that we got 435 zlotis to the £, my meal only cost £13-10!

Try and learn a few words of Polish, even if it's only 'good day, good-bye, please' and 'thank you. Polish is not an easy language to learn but those few words are genuinely appreciated and you're always rewarded with a beaming smile and the appropriate rejoinder.