Hello and welcome to today's independent travel podcast with me Simon Calder. It's Wednesday the 29th of April.

And a very different podcast today. You might recall if you were kind enough to listen yesterday to Travel Desk Tuesday that I was talking to my excellent colleague Annabel Grossman about Poland.

Well, it just so happens that a colleague of ours Maria Jolenska heard the podcast,

and as she comes from the fine city of Gdansk, she said, I'd like to talk to you about. And of course, I was delighted to listen.

We started by understanding what the city means to her. It means everything to me and I miss it every

day. I'm going to be honest with you. We have a beautiful community in Gdaisk. My friends are still there.

My family is still there. It's a beautiful community in Gdaisk. My friends are still there. My family is still there.

It's a beautiful town by the sea, beautiful charming old city, beautiful community. There is

loads, loads of history in my city. And yeah, we're very proud of it. If you speak to people

from Gdaisk, they're all very proud to be a part of the city. Let's talk about a couple of the

attractions.

We mentioned the solidarity presence there.

That clearly was a movement that was around long before you were born.

But is it of significance to people from the city now?

The European Solidarity Centre is an absolutely amazing museum, very modern, very informative.

I had a few foreign friends, my international friends coming to

visit me in Gdynesk, and they were all very impressed as well. So I'm very happy we have a museum

like that in our city as well. I had a pleasure to meet Lech Valenza a couple times as well. He's

very active in the city. For younger listeners, Lech VVoenzer was the legendary leader of the Solidarity

movement through the 1980s at the Lenin Shipyards. And the European Solidarity Centre that you

mention is most definitely worth visiting. And that's on the location of the old Lenin shipyards.

Yeah, absolutely. And it's

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