Job Discussion Forums

Deano1979 · Joined: 02 Mar 2007 Posts: 34

Hi guys

I have a 6 day holiday planned for Warsaw (maybe Kracow if time permits) Exclding accomodation, is a budget of $50-$60 a day enough to get me by. This would be just to grab something to eat, maybe entrance to the odd museum or gallery and a few drinks.

Im curious to know how expensive the place is

Richfilth · Joined: 24 Sep 2007 Posts: 225 Location: Warszawa

I can't imagine anyone spending 6 days in Warsaw just for pleasure (it's hardly a tourist destination) but here's a breakdown for you. All prices are per person.

7-day city transport ticket (all buses and trams): 24zl
Morning coffee: 12zl
Lunch in a businessman's cafe/bar: 15zl
Three course dinner in a semi-decent restaurant: 75-100zl
Beer: 8-15zl, depending on how much the barman hates you
Museum entry: 15-30zl
International newspaper: 25zl
Taxi: 2zl/km
Tourist map: 10zl

That works out at about 150-180zl a day, which at today's frightening exchange rate is $70-80. Of course, you don't have to eat in the tourist traps, drink overmilked overpriced oversugared coffee or take a night-taxi view of the city whilst drunk, but don't be fooled into thinking Warsaw is a cheap Eastern European capital - it ain't. Live frugally during the day and you'll still blow your cash in Cinammon or Underground (nightclubs) in the evening.

Krakow isn't really any cheaper, but the train from Warsaw to there takes 3 hours and costs about 100zl.

simon_porter00 · Joined: 09 Nov 2005 Posts: 505 Location: Warsaw, Poland

A quickie about museums, the fantastic warsaw uprising museum costs 4zl a ticket and has free admission on Sunday. Although you'll really want to avoid going there on Sunday liek the plague as there are thousand of little baskets running amok. Allow yourself a good 3 hours for this, it really is a fascinating museum.

If steam trains are your thing, (they are the nearest thing to Ecstasy for my Dad) the equally good railway museum is 6zl a ticket and if you wish to take photos that's an extra 7zl Shocked

Phamplets cost whatever the guy deems is the correct price for the day. Although, absolutley sod all of the displays are in English, save one or to badly worded attempts for a few exhibits.

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

I was in Poland last week, sadly now back on the moon. I must say, I hadn't been there in over a year and god did I get a shock in Poznan. I've been going there regularly since 95 and know the place well. So, here we go; the cheapest room I could find was $55 a night and it really was a shack. There were a couple of hostels but room sharing isn't my thing. Beer cost between $4 and $6.50 depending on where you drank. Burger and chips in the Rynek $12, coffee and a mineral water about $8, a paperback book about $30, a no frills meal with my girlfriend $60, a vodka and apple juice $6, a hotdog $1.50, a kebab $4, average taxi about $7. I was there 10 days and excluding what I spent on my son and some clothes I bought, I spent 3,600zl or about $1,800 and I only got drunk twice and didn't go near the bordels. Can't afford the nights of mayhem at those prices and at that exchange rate.

I've got a friend who's an estate agent in the UK and he told me that Polish flats are now about the same as the UK/metre, (outside London of course). The place has gone mad and every Pole I know is still poor. That bubble will burst. $160,000 for a tiny flat...you're having a laugh.

scottie1113 · Joined: 25 Oct 2004 Posts: 375 Location: Gdansk

biffenbridge, I'm continually stunned by the prices you quote in your posts. Where do you go to spend so much money? I'm going out tonight to an excellent pub where the beer is 5 zl. Zl, not dollars. I don't know what you consider a no frills meal but I know of several restauarants in Old Town Gdansk where I can get an excellent dinner for 30-40 zl and there are lots of places where I can eat a decent meal for a whole lot less.

Sure, there are more expensive places but my point is it doesn't have to cost an arm and a leg to have a good time in Poland. I spent five weeks in Warsaw last summer and never saw anything like those prices either. The most I ever paid paid for a beer was 7 zl and in most places it was 6.

I could live quite well on a recreational budget of $50 a day even with the falling dollar and today's exchange rates.

ratsareeatingmybrain · Joined: 19 Jul 2007 Posts: 35 Location: lisbon

Krakow
Beer 7zl everywhere but the posh joints. Less in some places.
Good coffee near rynek 6zl.
You can eat a good, tasty meal and i'm not talking about in a milkyway bar for 20zl no problem if you just spend 5 minutes walking about and you aren't looking for steak or the fish in orange sauce or sumat. If you want, you can eat perfectly reasonably for less than 10 if you just want to kill the hunger, without insulting your taste buds.

Can't comment on Warsaw or Poznan prices but are they really that much more expensive than Krakow? That's a real question, not just rhetoric. Otherwise it would suggest that, like was said, some obviously have either expensive tastes or can't be bothered to look very far.

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

It's not about being bothered to look. Poznan has 20 plus trade fair a year. Consequently the whole place is set up for business visitors and there is a lack of accommodation.

Dragon, the most popular student bar sells Tyskie at 6.5 Zl a pint and that is the cheapest place you'll find. A pizza in Tivoli is 25 Zl, which I think you all know is a cheap pizzeria. So, you and your girl have a pizza and 2 beers each and a coffee, without a starter/ garlic bread/sweet your looking at 100 Zl with the tip...ie 22GBP, which is $44. Go Mexican, Chinese, Indian and you're looking at $60. I don't live on hotdgogs, kebabs and hamburgers. The only decent Polish restaurant in the centre is Stary Ratuszowa and that's bloody expensive.

Poznan, unlike Warsaw is a very centralised place and everything is on or very near the Rynek. ( 9 Zl is the going rate for a Polish beer in the beer gardens of the square). Clothes and electrical goods are the same price as the UK. Children's stuff can be crazy if you want good quality.

'Mamdom', a Polish real estate website, had Poznan at the top of the list for price hikes last year.

I could never afford to live there again on a teaching salary...but then again, I guess most people on this forum don't have kids. 500 Zl/ month school, 1,200 Zl rent, bills, clothes, shopping, medication......already that's a normal salary gone and no-one's gone out yet.

dynow · Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1080

again biff, it comes down to you, not them.

there are millions of people living in poland on much less than that, with kids, bills, rent, etc.

not to mention, who goes out these days when you have kids anyway? even when i lived in the states, my parents rarely went out, and neither do my older sisters whom both have two kids each.

that's life, bud. unless of course you're loaded.

scot47 · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Posts: 15343

Biffo has been led into temptation by earning all those petrodollars. They have given him ideas above his station in life !

dynow · Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 1080

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

Thank god I'm earnig petrodollars again now. Unlike Scott47 though I get 18 weeks holiday and 6 return flights a year.

For those of you in Poland....just go to Poznan and you'll see. I consider pizza to be 'no frills', even the milk bar on Plac Wolnosci does fish and mash at about 22 ZL....if canteen slop is your game.

So for the last time; shorts,(other than voddy), will set you back between 15 and 25 Zl...beer ZL and a room, not less than 120 Zl and that's for a dump. All the brand name hotels start at about 50-60 Euros a night and go upwards. The Merkure, which was 140 Zl a night in 2006 is now 150 Euros a night.

Get this: Poznan is a trade fair city.

As for Warsaw...I pint of Guiness is around the 20 Zl mark......I like Guiness, it's not about being above my station Scott. I also like enjoying life, which you can't do on planet man where you are.

Harry from NWE · Joined: 13 Sep 2007 Posts: 283

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

Ray, the owner of Coxy's is a mate of mine...his bar is extremely cheap as it's just off the Rynek on Wosna and it's a new set up so he's trying to win over the expats.
Murphy's in Faxe is 15 Zl, which equals 7 Dollars at the current exchange rate.
A Guiness at the Irish Bar near Zamek, ie the nearest bar to my old flat in Warsaw, was 18ZL in 2006...that is 9 Dollars in U.S. money.
Even Lizard King, which is a bit duff and used to be cheap sells Zywiec at 9 Zl.....
Room 55 starts at 9Zl.
The only bar you'll find selling cheap beer IN THE RYNEK is an empty, ie krap bar.
As for the hotels, just go there you'll see.
Nuff said.

Harry from NWE · Joined: 13 Sep 2007 Posts: 283

biffinbridge · Joined: 05 May 2003 Posts: 701 Location: Frank's Wild Years

Not gonna argue...you've clearly lived in Poznan for much of the past 13 years...
Back to the op...60$ a day isn't enough if you're paying for your room. Cheapest place is Hotelik, which is fully booked and the Frolicking Goat swill let you have a room for about 100zl if you share.
I drink Guiness and Cider, Zubrowka and apple juice if I'm going for it. Guiness is 15ZL ming mong and Zubrowka is between 12 and 15Zl. A Sphinx plate is 42 Zl and that's a shittee grill bar, but one of the oldest, owned by the same people that own Sioux and Lizard King, which are all on the Rynek..
Warsaw...can't stand the place just happened to live there for a while.

Methinks the forum is dominated by cheapskates.