Have you ever wondered how many of our phrases contain salt? In everyday life, we often use terms like rubbed salt into the wound, above the salt or salt of the earth, but we may not know their origins. Why do they give so much attention to salt? Instead of act like a linguist, I rather find out where the salt came from and why it is such a valuable treasure.
Salt, on the one hand, is the symbol of strength and permanence from ancient times. Even in the Bible, persistent, everlasting relationships (e.g. between the Lord and Israel and David) are referred to as salt covenants. According to the book of Moses, the sacrifices that came down the altar had to be salted, but it was customary to wash newborns with saltwater.
On the other hand, salt has always been of value and used to serve as a currency. Moorish merchants paid with salt, of which one gram was worth exactly as much as a gram of gold. The Greeks gave the slaves salt in return. Hence the saying that someone is not worth its salt comes from the price meaning. Thirdly, we also love salt because it is an essential spice for the flavoring of our food. If the food is unsalted, it significantly reduces the enjoyment value of eating, but is it too salty, is the chef really in love with it?
Everything in one: without salt, life is not a life. So I had to visit Wieliczka, one of the world’s most beautiful and oldest salt mines, that became Poland’s first UNESCO World Heritage Site. Wieliczka is 15 km from Krakow and is easily accessible by train. Upon landing at the train station we found ourselves in a sleepy little town, from where we reached the salt mine with a 5-minute walk. There’s nothing impressive about it on the outside, it looks like an ordinary factory building.
I also looked around a little disappointed to see if we were in the right place, but we still bought our ticket and waited patiently for the tour. The mine can only be visited by a guide. Individually, the careless tourist can easily get lost in the squeaky-dinghied maze. We didn’t have to wait long, a guide in a miner uniform appeared and with a Ladies and gentlemen, please follow me! saying we started our descent into the deep earth. For long minutes we were just going down and down the wooden stairs, by the end, I was dizzy from walking around.
After 380 steps, we stopped at level 60, and I finally started to feel like something exciting. I’ve been underwater many times, but being underground at almost 65 meters is another category. At the end of the corridors, the doors opened and a fabulous world opened to us, which exceeded all our expectations. Instead of words, however, let the pictures speak of the legendary Wieliczka salt mine.
The salt mine lies 327 m underground and has nine levels. Just for illustration, it’s so deep that the Eiffel Tower could fit in it.
Its total length is 287 km, of which only 1% are allowed to be visited by the tourists. If you go on unknown routes than signed for the tour, you can easily get lost in the dark.
Everything is covered with salt: the walls, the wooden beams, and even the tiles are made of salt. 12 million years ago, there was a sea in the area of the mine. The evaporation resulted in a huge supply of salt. You can even taste and test how salty the wall is during the walking tour. There’s a photo of me licking the wall, but I don’t show it to you.
Visitors can explore the mine on a convenient, built-up route by 2 hours walking. In the old days, however, there were no modern stairs. The picture shows the original staircase, on which walking up and down was a breakneck stunt.
There are a total of 2,000 chambers in the mine. During this tour we covered 22 wonderful rooms. The first of them, the famous Polish astronomer Copernicus, commemorates. The statue, of course, like everything in the mine, is made of salt.
According to legend, st. Kinga of Árpád dynasty was responsible for the discovery of the Wieliczka salt mine. On the occasion of her marriage, she did not ask for gold or gems, but salt blocks from the Transylvanian salt mine. She took the salt blocks to her new polish homeland. Arriving, she poked a place and asked to start digging here. The legend says miners and diggers found immediately a block of salt undergrand with Kinga’s wedding ring in the middle.
In honor of Kinga, one of the most beautiful chapels of the salt mine is named after her. The Kinga Chapel, situated at a depth of 101 m, is breathtaking, not only because of its size, but also because of the detail of the decorative elements. In addition to protocol events, it is also a venue for weddings.
The altar is something quite amazing, with the statue of St. Kinga, St. Joseph and St. Clement. Created by Józef Markowski. And yes, like everything, it’s made of salt.
In the chapel, scenes of the New Testament can be seen on reliefs carved into salt walls. The most beautiful of them is the Last Supper, which occupies a prominent position on the left side of the altar.
Pope John Paul II, originally known as Karol Józef Wojtyła, greets visitors at the end of the Kinga Hall. Polish people are very religious. There are a lot of believers in the city of Krakow, as well as masses. We also attended a service during our trip to Poland, which was a really uplifting experience.
The mine attracts about 1.2 million tourists a year. Well-built stairs lead up to a depth of 135 m. Meanwhile, there is still an additional 200 m of mining area, but this is not accessible.
The Michalowice room looks fantastic with its wood-beamed finish and huge chandelier made of salt. Yes, chandeliers are made of salt crystals either. This chapel is also a fascinating sight, that’s the a reason concerts are held here.
Salt extraction was aided by 100 horses in the old times. The road was one-way, the horses spent their whole lives in the mine, often in total darkness. The last mining horse served in Wieliczka until 2002.
Passing through the halls of the salt mine, we occasionally found lakes with clear water. You can’t dive in it , you just float on the surface of the water because of its extremely high salinity
It is unfortunate that, despite of this fact, some Russian soldiers drowned in it in 1915. Although according to the narrative, this is more owned to the alcohol and not the salt.
We can see beautiful salt sculptures everywhere in the mine. Most of them came out of the hands of artists. But there are some that the miners themselves carved and left to posterity.
Smurfs in the mine. They have no symbolic significance, they were mostly made for the entertaining the children.
The miners’ lives were hard, but they had a great social respect. They had their own tools and the salt they extracted was bought by the king himself.
The mine currently only welcomes visitors, as salt production was suspended in 2006. Today, instead of heavy, physical work, they extract salt from the water by distilling.
A sóbánya 327 m mélyen fekszik a föld alatt és kilenc szintje van. Csak szemléltetésként, olyan mély, hogy az Eiffel-torony is elférne benne.
Teljes hossza 287 km, amelyből a turisták mindössze 1%-ot érintenek túravezetés során. Nem szívesen vesznék el benne, az már biztos.
A látogatók közel 2 órás túra keretében kényelmes, kiépített útvonalon fedezhetik fel a bányát. A régi időkben azonban nem voltak még modern lépcsők. A képen az eredeti lépcsősor található, amelyeken a le-föl sétálás bizony nyaktörő mutatvány volt.
Mindent só borít: a falakat, a fagerendákat, sőt még a járólapok is sóból vannak. 12 millió évvel ezelőtt egy tenger volt a bánya területén, amelynek elpárolgásából keletkezett ez a hatalmas sókészlet. Menet közben lehet kóstolni és tesztelni, mennyire sós a fal. Készült róla fotó is, de inkább a folyosót mutatom.
A bányában összesen 2000 kamra található. Ebből a túra során 22 csodálatos termet érintettünk. Közülük az első, a híres lengyel csillagásznak, Kopernikusznak állít emléket. A szobor természetesen, mint ahogy minden a bányában, sóból készült.
A legenda szerint Árpád-házi Szent Kinga nevéhez fűződik a wieliczkai sóbánya felfedezése. Házasságkötése alkalmából ugyanis nem aranyat, vagy drágakövet kért, hanem sótömböket a Máramarosi sóbányából. Ezeket új, lengyel hazájába vitette. Megérkezve, rábökött egy helyre és kérte, hogy itt kezdjenek el ásni. A föld alatt egy sótömbre bukkantak, benne Kinga jegygyűrűjével.
Kinga tiszteletére a sóbánya egyik legszebb kápolnáját róla nevezték el. A 101 m mélyen fekvő Kinga-kápolna nemcsak a nagysága okán lélegzetelállító, hanem a benne lévő díszítőelemek részletgazdagsága miatt is. Protokolláris rendezvények mellett esküvők helyszínéül is szolgál.
Az oltár valami egészen elképesztő, fókuszban Szent Kinga, Szent József és Szent Kelemen szobrával. Józef Markowski alkotása. És igen, ahogy minden, ez is sóból készült.
A kápolnában az Újszövetség jelenetei láthatóak sófalakba vájt domborműveken. Közülük a legszebb az Utolsó vacsora, amely kiemelt helyet foglal el az oltár bal oldalán.
II. János Pál pápa, eredeti nevén, Karol Józef Wojtyła szobra a Kinga-terem végében fogadja a látogatókat. A lengyelek nagyon vallásosak. Lépten nyomon találkozni apácákkal Krakkó városában, valamint a miséken is rengeteg a hívő. A lengyelországi kirándulás során mi is részt vettünk istentiszteleten, ami igazán felemelő élmény volt.
A bánya évente mintegy 1,2 millió turistát vonz. Jól kiépített lépcsők vezetnek egészen 135 m mélységig. Ezalatt még van további 200 m bányaterület, azonban ez nem látogatható.
A Michalowice terem fantasztikusan mutat fagerendás borításával és sóból készült, hatalmas csillárjával. Igen, a csillárok is sókristályokból készültek. Lenyűgöző látvány ez a kápolna is, nem véletlenül rendeznek itt időnként koncerteket.
A sókitermelést régen 100 ló segítette. Az út egyirányú volt, a lovak egész életüket a bányában töltötték, gyakran teljes sötétségben. A legutolsó bányaló 2002-ig szolgált Wieliczkában.
A sóbánya termein áthaladva időnként tiszta vizű tavakra bukkantunk, amelyek sótartalma extrém magas. Olyannyira, hogy nem lehet lemerülni benne, csak lebeg az ember a víz felszínén.
Sajnálatos eset, hogy ennek ellenére 1915-ben néhány orosz katona mégis megfulladt benne. Bár az elbeszélések szerint ez inkább az elfogyasztott alkoholnak köszönhető.
A bányászok élete nehéz munka volt, viszont nagy társadalmi megbecsüléssel járt. Saját szerszámaik voltak és az általuk kitermelt sót maga a király vásárolta meg.
A bányában lépten nyomon gyönyörű sószobrokkal találkozunk. Legtöbbjük művészek kezei alól kerültek ki. Ám akadnak olyanok, is, amelyeket maguk a bányászok faragtak és hagyták rá az utókorra.
A bánya jelenleg csak látogatókat fogad, a sókitermelést 2006-ban felfüggesztették. Ma már nehéz, fizikai munka helyett, lepárlással nyerik ki a vízből a sót.
Passing through the nice salt halls, time flies back to the past and the visitor becomes part of the history of the nearly 700-year-old mine. We learn how salt extraction used to work and we understand by the end of the tour why salt is such a valuable asset. Visitors can also wander, besides the legend of Kinga, how Hungarians contributed to the operation of the mine. Because there are plenty of Hungarian inventions in the Wieliczka mine. It is enough to think of the Hungarian dog, the little car on which people packed the barrels full of salt and towed it on the tracks.
However, all this wonderful, salt-crystal-enclosed underground world, would not have been possible without the miners. Their lives were far from glamour and splendor, as the tourist experiences the mine during the guided for. Unfortunately, every 10th miner gave their lives to produce us the salt of our life. A statue and the following religious inscription written in old Polish language are commemorated at the exit of the mine and remind us, how important mineworkers were in Wieliczka salt mine.
Kedves Látogató! Tájékoztatjuk, hogy a honlap felhasználói élmény fokozásának érdekében sütiket alkalmazunk. A honlapunk használatával ön a tájékoztatásunkat tudomásul veszi.Elfogadom
