Two Wheel Travel Mapping the bicycle travel revolution
Bicycle touring to Gogłów, the home of my great grandparents in southern Poland
Going Home
T and I were looking for cycling ideas for the weekend and decided to combine it with something I promised to do while I lived in this country— visit the village where my great-grandparents emigrated from in 1900, Gogołów.
We took the *fast* train from Warsaw to Krakow (160 km in 3 hours) and then the local train from Krakow to Tarnów. From there our ride through gently rolling countryside and farming villages began.
Bicycle touring to Gogłów, the home of my great grandparents in southern Poland
Thanks to this website for giving me the info (a distant relative I never met) and this picture of my great-grandfather’s sister.
Gogołów has two claims to fame: St. Catherine’s Church from 1672, built in the wooden style famous to the region, and a small ski slope above the town.
My favorite views were definitely up on the hill, looking into the valley, and had an eerie feeling of walking in the footsteps of my forefathers (and mothers!).
A quaint farming community— I could see why my great-grandparents felt at home in the hills of Western Massachusetts—and why they continued to be farmers. But reading the history of Galicia, I knew why they left as part of the mass exodus beginning in 1890.
It was mysterious feeling of being home in that valley, even though I had never been there before.
