Trip 38 — Usedom Walk

Day 1: Świnoujście Centrum to Świnoujście Beach
Sunday, 12 November 2023

Today: 5868 steps/4.77 km/2.96 mi/50m

There are a few ways to get from Berlin to Świnoujście, the Polish city at Usedom's southeastern end. All involve picking a direction to round the Szczecin Lagoon, which eats into Europe from the Baltic Sea and becomes the Oder River, part of the border between Germany and Poland.

Deutsche Bahn offered me most of the options. One was to head west and round the lagoon counterclockwise, but that would have meant traversing most of Usedom by train, and I didn't want to see the island before I walked it. Another had me heading northeast and entering Poland outside of Szczecin city, but much of the trip would be by bus — not an issue but I prefer trains when they're available. Or I could have taken a bus all the way from Berlin to Szczecin, and caught a train from there, but the timing would have been very tight after my morning flight arrival.

It wasn't until I did a Polish timetable search that I found the best option: a train to KÜstrin-Kietz on the German side of the Oder, right over the border from Kostrzyn nad Odrą on the Polish side, and then another train up to Świnoujście.

Germany has a wonderful subscription ticket: €49 — about $10 less than just one round-trip peak fare between New York City and the Hamptons on the Long Island Rail Road — gets you an entire calendar month of regional transportation in all of Germany, as long as you manage your subscription a few weeks in advance. That turned out to be cheaper than two singles on the German parts of the journeys between Berlin and Świnoujście, and it would cover all of my local transportation in Berlin as well.

Normally trains from Berlin continue the five kilometers between KÜstrin-Kietz and Kostrzyn. But the railway bridge over the Oder is being rebuilt, so a shuttle bus travels the short segment, departing KÜstrin-Kietz a few minutes after the train arrives (or just before, as I read in one traveler's account — the bus apparently leaves on time even if the train is late!) and bringing people to Kostrzyn just in time for them to catch the northbound service. I wasn't sure whether the subscription ticket would cover the shuttle bus; perhaps it would be free, or at most, it would probably be a couple of euros. Deutsche Bahn's site wouldn't price it, but I found it hard to believe that they would charge a full international fare of €30 or so.

But the more I thought about it, the more I didn't want to rush my arrival into Poland that way. As the grandson of pogrom-fleeing Polish Jews, one of which had a cousin who managed to get out of Poland just before Germany invaded, I decided my first entry into Poland should be taken with more reverence than a hasty connection on a shuttle bus. I could take a later train up to Świnoujście. I wanted to walk into Poland.

Before the 1940s, the town across the Oder had been a thriving German town that included a castle and fortress from the mid-16th century. The entire town was destroyed during World War II, and the Germans left when the town became part of Poland.

This old part of Kostrzyn nad Odrą is now in ruins, and it's a lovely, solemn park where one strolls the stone street grid and grassy expanses to find the rubble of cellars, brick foundations, floor tiles, and stairs to nowhere, all given over to trees and weeds. It was particularly beautiful in mid-November, with leaves of bright yellow hanging on until the last moment and leaves of warm autumn hues squishing under my feet. The day was chilly but comfortable.

The church and market square are little more than outlines. Part of the fortress and the gates have been restored, and there's a museum occupying one of the buildings of the now-defunct border control, but I missed its seasonal opening by a couple of weeks. More on the old town

The Polish left the ruins as a testament to history and built a new town a kilometer away. Its market area advertised alcohol and cigarettes above all else, but smoked fish and sausages aroused my nose, and suddenly I decided I was hungry. I entered one of the rustic-looking cafeterias, pointed to a pork knuckle and Brussels sprouts, and grabbed the first beer I saw in the fridge.

The place didn't take credit cards but I'd gotten Polish money at the entrance to the new town. The cashier stuck the food into the microwave oven, and then she punched a few buttons on the calculator and showed me the result: 12. That seemed strikingly low — 12 złotych are about $3 — but I knew that Poland was generally cheaper than Germany. Why else would people cross the border to stock up on products to abuse their liver and lungs?

I handed her a 20-złotych note.

"What, złoty?" she said, insulted. "Euro."

"Oh! I'm sorry." Twelve euros still seemed quite reasonable. I exchanged euros for hot food, slathered some mustard on the side, collected plastic utensils, and picked a table for my first meal in Poland. On the way out I noticed that the cafeteria charged two złote to use the toilet, so perhaps my assumption that prices were in local currency wasn't so far out of line.

I walked a few of the market lanes, which were mostly empty on a Sunday afternoon. There were clocks, but of the charmless, mass-produced kind. There were winter jackets that mostly looked alike. And there was a stall with various garden-pest-diminishing and male-organ-augmenting products.

I exited and realized that the Świnoujście train was due to leave in 12 minutes and I was still a kilometer away and ticketless. I jogged and saw the train enter the station. There were people at the ticket window. I waited a moment and heard the conductor blow the whistle. Could I buy a ticket on the train, even with a penalty? I rushed to the platform to see the train leaving, the conductor standing at the doorway shooing me away.

I live up to my Instagram and Twitter handle, @duffilled! In Paul Theroux's "The Great Railway Bazaar," a traveler with the last name Duffill hesitates on the platform and misses his train. Then Paul argues over a visa requirement and is "duffilled" himself when he watches his train pull away...in Poland!

I got back in line and bought the ticket. It indicated a journey for the train that had just departed, which I found odd, but I thought not much of it, since I was pretty sure all the trains were the same price and seats were unreserved.

Maybe, subconsciously, just as I didn't want to rush into Poland, I didn't want to rush through it either. The next train would come in 75 minutes, albeit a slower one, and I'd have to change in Szczecin. But the upper platforms of the Kostrzyn station were pretty in the late-afternoon clouds, especially with a train waiting to head somewhere else, and the brick station building echoed the architecture of the fortress in the old town.

I watched a few trains depart and then the local to Szczecin arrived. It was crowded but I found a seat. The conductor scanned my ticket and looked quizzically at it. Then he started a rapid-fire interrogation in Polish.

I didn't understand a word, but I knew what he was talking about. I couldn't use the ticket after all. I should have questioned the woman in the ticket booth.

The person next to me spoke perfect English, and he translated. The ticket couldn't be used because this was a regional train and I had a ticket for an InterCity train — it was like trying to use a New Jersey Transit ticket on Amtrak — so the money wouldn't be going to the right place. I'd have to buy another ticket from him just to Szczecin and sort out the rest there. He did understand the absurdity of the seller giving me a ticket for the train that had just gone through, and he printed a note that was supposed to convince the ticket office in Szczecin that they should refund the InterCity ticket. He was very pleasant about it all.

The passenger who translated was Dominik, and he was a violinist from the nearby rural area who had been studying, teaching, and performing in London for five years. He enjoyed the fast-paced city life but needed a break, so he was going home for a few weeks at least. He asked, in much politer terms, what the hell an American was doing on the way to Świnoujście, of all places in Poland to choose. He was intrigued by the Abecedarian Walks.

I left the train one stop before Dominik; he offered to help if I needed any more assistance. I approached the ticket windows in Szczecin Dąbie and found the gates down. The windows had closed...seven minutes before I'd gotten there. But I checked the schedule and saw that an InterCity train was coming before the local. Maybe I could make up some time.

No one stopped me from boarding it, so I took a seat and prepared a Google Translate elaboration of why I was boarding in Szczecin with a ticket for an earlier train from Kostrzyn to Świnoujście. It started with "May I use this ticket?"

The conductor read it all, shrugged his shoulders, and said what I'm sure was the equivalent of "You have a ticket to Świnoujście; what's the issue?"

Świnoujście spans a few landmasses, and I needed to take a free ferry to reach Usedom. Since the car tunnel opened about four months ago, the ferry now takes walkers and cyclists only; but it's the same vessel, with the people awkwardly relegated to the sides, and I barely recognized it as a boat. It left at 7:30, just as the local train pulled in. I thought that cruel, but it made me very happy that I'd found the InterCity.

The crossing took less than ten minutes. I followed the island around the coast, between the marina and a large park, then through the fort area and along the wide beach (this is Poland's widest) to the main hotel area. The walk was extremely dark, but my phone's flashlight was sufficient, and with the occasional biker on the path or jogger on the beach, it did not seem dangerous.

Having not rushed in to Polish Usedom, I'm making a point of not rushing out to the German side either. I'll take an extra day in Świnoujście to see it in the daylight. Besides, the Museum of Sea Fisheries won't be open until Tuesday morning, and I wouldn't want to miss that, would I?

Go on to day 2