New Year’s 2005 was just after our wedding, and we decided that, since it was to be our last New Year’s in Poland for the foreseeable future, we’d go a little crazy. We lived at just about the southernmost tip of the country, in the mountains on the border of Slovakia; we spent that last New Year’s with friends from Warsaw in Hel, just about the northernmost part of the country.

Platform at Krakow Glowny train station

Getting there was quite the adventure in itself. We first had to take a bus two hours to the north to Krakow, where we hopped on an overnight train headed to Gdynia.

Sleeping on a train is to sleeping what running in waist-deep water is to jogging: it’s more tiring that it’s worth. The reason is simple: unless you spend a fortune to get a private sleeping compartment (and we were always thrifty travelers), you share a sleeping birth with others.

Third-class sleeping birth

Six to a compartment. And these people get on the train at various points in the journey, which means various times in the evening. And they’re never really all that concerned about your sleeping, so they make noise, turn on the lights, rustle about a bit. You never really sleep, in other words.

When we arrived, then, we were already exhausted. Ironically, we made it to the bed and breakfast where we were staying with our friends before they did, which is ironic since they had less than half the distance to travel.

Our attic room

So we did the logical thing: we took a nap. I think. That’s what the 46-year-old Mr. Scott would do; did the 31-year-old Mr. Scott do that? I don’t really remember. It was 15 years ago — about all I remember was going for walks. Walks, walks, and more walks.

And New Year’s Eve? We spent the evening in our room with our friends, playing cards and talking.