Trip to Boleslaweic Poland for Polish Pottery

When my friend Whitney asked me if I wanted to go to Boleslawiec, Poland to buy Polish potter, of course I said yes! I will not turn down an excuse to shop or a trip anywhere!  I didn't really know what to expect of this Polish Pottery, I figured I'd go and buy something, because why not. I thought that Polish pottery was that typical white and blue pattern.

I had heard from multiple people about how cheap & just how great this pottery was, so of course I was excited!

Boleslawiec is a very small town in Poland that is known for the Pottery making. They have lots of pottery stores to visit.
      

Stores to shop

There are many stores to shop at for Pottery in Boleslawiec. The two that I would recommend are

*Andy’s
www.andypolishpottery.com

Tomaszow Boleslawiecki 110
59-720 Tomaszow Boleslawiecki


*Henry’s

ul.Masarka 1
59-700 Boleslawiec

We went into a few others but those two are the most popular, have very good prices and have a wide selection of patterns as well as pottery to choose from.

How the pottery is made

 At Andy’s they had a room where we got to see the pottery before it is able to be sold. We saw the raw unpainted pottery as well as some that had been painted that was ready for its final firing which took place before it was able to be sold. In the room there were also workers who were painting the pottery. Some of the patterns were hand painted on while others were done by a stamp.                                                                

Restaurants

Opalkowa Chata, Restauracja

Cieszkowskiego 17
Boleslawiec 
www.opalkowachata.pl

I would recommend eating here we ate dinner here after a long day of shopping it was all delicious. While in Poland you have to try Pierogi’s. We got some at Opalkowa Chata they were potato with cheese and bacon they were absolutely delicious. They also make dessert ones but I stuck with the traditional ones.

Hotels

Boleslawiec being a small place there are only a few hotels to choose from.

Protea Hotel is a very good choice, I had been recommended it and I would recommend it to anyone. We had a 4 person room and it was nice and spacious. The price was also very good for the weekend and it included breakfast as well.


The start of my collection

Here are some photos of the collection that I have started. I am already wanting to plan a trip back for more!

 

xoxo Alyssa



2014 Christmas Markets

Happy 2015! Although we are only 21 days into the new year I still can't believe 2015 is here. 2014 was a great year and so far 2015 may even be better! Today's post is about the Christmas Markets we went to in 2014!
 
I know this is alittle late, we have been pretty busy and it doesn't seem to be slowing down! We are travelling like crazy & don't worry I will share it all with you :)

Gluhwein, Bratwurst, Frites & Beer are the staples to any Christmas Market (at least to Josh & I they are!) Every Christmas Market we went to we got all four, they are that delicious! We visited a total of 5 Christmas markets, I wanted to see so many more but so much to do so little time & there is always next year!

Although German Christmas Markets are the most common the first Christmas Market we visited was in The Netherlands.

Valkenburg

Valkenburg is a Christmas Market in a cave! Sounds super cool right?! Well it wasn't what I was expecting but it was a very cute town. The cave was cool but the market wasn't really that Christmasy. There were only maybe 3 or 4 stands that had Christmas stuff. It was a good trip though.

 

This is the cave and entrance to the Christmas market it was a small crowded area so it was hard to get a good picture.

Here is the inside of the cave where the market was.

  It was a nice little town and area, I'm not sure I would put it at the top of my list to visit again but it was fun!

Dudeldorf

 Dudeldorf is a cute little town right near Spangdahlem. It is a small, small town and now I understand why they only have their Christmas market Saturday & Sunday right after thanksgiving and that's it. I had been wanting to go there since my friend Whitney had said it was one of her favorites. I can now understand why she liked it so much!

 This Christmas market was a little bit different with how they had everything laid out to look at and buy. Many of those who were selling things was from their garage or even their basements. I have been told that, this was the way they used to do it before Christmas market became commercialized and there were the "famous stalls" put up. I liked it and thought it added a little German charm.
Here is what I mean this was someone garage.

 

 Here is large area of the market.



 Do we look frozen? It was FREEZING!!! I'm pretty sure it took a while to thaw out after that!

 

 Despite being FROZEN it didn't deter from us having a good time:) Our last stop before Whitney & I literally ran to the car was to this..... wait for it......

 




  Deliciousness!!!! YUMMY! It was this hot fire and you got a stick with meat on it. Doesn't sound too appetizing but it was pretty delish. :) The whole thing w as swinging around the fire and the guy you can kind of see in the picture was rotating each one so they were evenly cooked. If I could have that right now, I would, it was so good!

 Cologne
 Cologne was the next Christmas market we visited and it is one of the larger markets. In 2014 there were 7 markets scattered throughout the city each with their own theme. Sadly we didn't make it to all of them we made it to 2.

 The first market we went to was right next to the Cathedral. Here was the entrance to this one. SO many people!

 

First stop..... you guessed it Gluhwein!

Me & my Gluhwein! Waiting in line for a Bratwurst! :) After our pitstops we walked around the very crowded market.

 

 

We found lots of cute things to look at and some to buy.

 

We decided to walk to another market, we stumbled upon the Gnome themed market, which was my favorite and adorable. There were Gnomes everywhere...well duh!

 

 Here are the gnomes skiing on top of a building:)

First stop was........

You guessed it some beer for Josh & some Gluhwein for me:)

We found a nice little spot right near the ice skating rink and sat there a little bit and watched other skate, while drinking our beer and Gluhwein of course.

 

 After relaxing for a bit we decided to look around some more before we left Cologne! But we made our last stop at Dunkin Donuts for some donuts. Yummy!

 

Aachen

Aachen was the last Christmas market we made it to before Christmas. Here is the entrance to the market it was a small market but it was really cute & I liked it a lot.

After researching about the Aachen Christmas market I learned that Printen, its kind of like a gingerbread was exclusive to Aachen and it originated here so I wanted to get some for sure!

 

I got some plain Printen with a frosting on it, Josh got a mix of different ones. It is a soft gingerbread like cookie. I really liked it :)

 

We then of course needed to eat! I got a bratwurst.. shocker! Josh got something different we haven't had before it was called Reibekuchen, it is a potato fritter. I had some and it was pretty delicious. This is how they were cooking it and how it looked.

After eating we walked around and shopped. I liked this market the prices weren't bad and they had some really cute things.

These little German house are so adorable & I love them they are my favorite things to look at, at the Christmas markets along with Nutcrackers. We ended up getting a little Brauerei, Gluhwein stand and a Bratwurst stand, as a little German village!

 

Ghent

Ghent was our last Christmas market :( We went to Ghent after Christmas, some of the Christmas markets are open after Christmas. We hadn't been to a Christmas market in Belgium yet so I figured why not!

 

Ghent is a cute little area and we for sure want to visit again! The Christmas market was ALOT bigger than I had thought there were different areas of it if the centrum, we walked through the whole thing.

 

 I liked the market a lot it was very big so it didn't feel congested like some of the smaller ones, I would for sure go back next year!

Before we left we stopped at this cute little pub for some drinks, because after walking around it was pretty cold!

A Prosecco and Josh's favorite Belgian beer!

 

 

Overall we had a great time at all the Christmas markets we went to! I can't wait for next years! There is just something about them that get you in the festive Christmas spirit!

 

 

 

 

 xoxo Alyssa

 



First Throwback Thursday!!

Hey everyone!
 Well this is my first official post about travelling on here! Yay! Well as I was thinking about our travels I wanted to include all of them past travels included. So I decided that every Thursday I would do " Throwback Thursday" where I would share our past travels in order starting from when we first moved to Turkey!  So here is the First Throwback Thursday!

We started living overseas in February of 2012, right now that seems like it was a long time ago but it was almost 3 years ago funny how time flies when your having fun! 

Our first trip was around the Adana Turkey area which is where we lived. Adana is the fifth most populous city in Turkey. It is a mostly industrial area but there are still many historical areas.

Our First stop was Sabanci Merkez Camii it Is one the largest Mosques in Turkey (some people say it is the biggest, but others say the Blue Mosque is) and was right in the town we lived in. I remember the first time we drove into downtown Adana and BAM its right there in the middle of everything & it is massive.

 This picture doesn't do it justice.

Next we headed to Tarsus which is about 30-45 minutes away from Adana it is a very historical area. Our First stop was St. Paul The Apostle's church it is a former Greek Orthodox Church. The original structure was built in about 1102 and the present structure that we visited was built around 1862. Saint Paul was a resident of Tarsus. He was born and lived in Tarsus as a Jew named Saul and after converting, made a number of missionary journeys during which he was arrested and beheaded by emperor Nero of Roman Empire in AD 64 or 67 on the 29th of June. After Saint Paul's death, Tarsus continued as an important city of the area. It became a part of the Byzantine Empire, the Abbasid Empire, the Seljuk Empire, the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, the Ramadanids and the Ottoman Empire.

Here is the church & the inside. 

Sadly there wasn't much to see inside except for the picture shown it is a very small chuch.
Next in Tarsus we went to St. Paul's well. Which is believe to be where his house once was.

 Also in the Tarsus area tucked away is the Berdan Waterfall. It is  pretty sight to see. I know we had tried to go back after this trip and we kept driving around & around looking for it until finally we did, but it is well worth it.

It was a best kept secret, when they first took us there we didn't think it would be this pretty. I will give credit to Josh he took this picture( normally I am the picture taker) but he captured it pretty well. :)

 After making a quick stop at Cleopatra's gate, which is where they say she met Mark Antony.

 We then made it to Kizkalesi which is where the Mediterranean is & the beach! Although it was February it was nice to see the beach and know that is was close unlike living in Minot where it does not exist! 

Driving in Turkey there always seems to be ruins of something everywhere. The first ruin we stopped at was a 2nd Century Theatre that only had 23 rows of seats.

 Our next stop was not too far way it was to the Kings Castle & The Maiden's castle or  Kizkalesi as it is called. The King's castle was on land and the Maiden's castle is in the middle of the ocean.  Literally!

Here is the King's Castle.

 Here is the Maiden's castle.

 The story we were told as to why it is in the middle of the ocean on its own little island is because the King was told from a fortune teller that his daughter was going to be poisoned by a snake. So the King built the castle and sent his daughter to live there since no snakes could get there so that she could live. But when a grape basket was brought to the king's daughter from the main land it poisoned and killed the King's daughter like the fortune teller had said. We were also told a similar story about a small building in the middle of the water in Istanbul, but that is for another post !

 The castle for being in the middle of the ocean has held up pretty well, not this trip but our second & almost every trip after to Kizkalesi we took a paddle boat to the castle and explored! More on that later too! 

Finally we made our way to our last & final stop on the trip which was Heaven Hollow & Hell Hollow. There wasn't too much to see at Hell Hollow

 

 This is what it looked like, just straight down.

Heaven Hollow was a long trek down as well but it was 455 stairs, going down obviously wasn't as bad as coming back up. Ugh that was not fun, the whole way down I kept saying this better be worth it ( it kind of was) eh not really but it was interesting to see. I also kept thinking if these little old Turkish woman can do this than I can too! LOL.

 

Here is the opening od the cave there was still a lot of stairs left. Then finally we made it into the cave.

 This was taken at the back of the cave, it was pretty massive. To give you a sense of how massive it was this next picture Josh is standing in the middle with a yellow shirt & jeans on see if you can spot him!

 He looks so small compared to the cave!

Overall for our first experience travelling overseas, even though it was a day trip, we enjoyed it and showed us there was a lot more things to see & do not only in Turkey but in Europe! It started the travel itch for sure!:)

<3Alyssa

Welcome

Welcome to my blog! This is where I will share everything… well almost everything. You'll find information on our travels, fashion, makeup, diy, recipes and everything in between. I wanted a place where I could share these things.

This blog has been something I have wanted to do for the last 2 1/2 years since moving overseas. I have finally done it and look forward to sharing our past, present and future adventures & everything else in between! Enjoy! :)