Today started a bit lazily after yesterday’s fairly early morning. I had my bread already so I had breakfast and then I walked across the river to see the dragon in daylight. Next stop, the old town square and since it was damp and I was lazy and had a 48-hour transport pass which I wasn’t getting the most use out of, I took the tram all of two stops. The square is interesting but the rain was getting heavier by the moment. I explored the kiosks in the Cloth Hall and watched some miserable wet pigeons but then I decided the best thing to do in the rain is a boat trip. Tram back to near the river, walk down to the river itself, get a ticket, get told boat goes “around 12pm” and offered to sit in the covered restaurant to wait. Boat arrives nearer 12.30 but that’s fine, it’s raining and I’m carrying all my luggage.

It was a good boat trip. Our boat felt more like a lounge, with white leather seats on both sides facing in but there were also more seats at the back, next to an open window that folds outwards to create its own umbrella. Perfect! The only issue is that the only thing that’s really interesting to see from the boat is Vavek Hill, which you can see from the riverbank. Still, it got me out the rain for another hour.

By the time I got back to dry land, the weather was improving, so I went back to the old town square for a slightly better look and then I decided to go to the Owl Cave. I’d seen it on Google Maps but reviews about whether you could go in were inconclusive. The man standing in the entrance with an owl seemed to confirm it both existed and was open so in I went. It only opened 5 weeks ago and he’s still figuring things out but in short, we got a presentation on falconry and birds of prey and I got to hold 5 birds – an African Spotted Eagle Ow who doesn’t like painted nails, the cutest cat-like European barn owl (more orange than the British variety), who just wanted to hop around on the table and attack gloves and feathers, an undersized runt of a male kestrel, a grumpy Harris Hawk and a peregrine falcon. It’s an odd thing to do in central Krakow but it gets you out of the rain and where else do you get to hold large hunting birds?

Then I went to the airport. Lots of things not right here. A lot of coaches parked right outside. A lot of people inside. A departure board showing flights up to 4:45 and no later, when it was 4:35, with a lot of flights cancelled, delayed or diverted to Katowice. My flight was still showing on the website as “check in at desks 22-29” but I was wary of going through security, certain I was going to get turned back, especially when they announced that all the 20-something desks were closed for operational reasons. Well, that’s fine, I’m already checked in, I’m with Ryanair, but something clearly wasn’t right. No email. Desks missing from the website! On a whim, I checked Bournemouth Airport’s arrivals for the night – my flight was marked cancelled! I went back to my emails. Delayed from 7.20pm on Sunday to 7.30am on Monday! Still no idea what was happening but it turns out Twitter knows everything. A plane from Turkey had overshot the runway earlier in the afternoon and while there were no injuries, it had messed things up. The airport had been closed for a couple of hours but now they were deciding to close the airport for the rest of the evening.

So I rebooked my boat, having checked how early the airport bus ran in the morning, and got the bus back to Krakow. I dropped my luggage, which I’d been carrying around all day, back on the boat (the reception laughed when I checked back in) and went back to the old square, since the rain had stopped. I was heading for the underground McDonalds – perhap not the proper appreciation of Polish cuisine but it has a proper old-fashioned cave-like downstairs!

When I came back out, there were three fire engines and two police cars parked outside St Mary’s. The fire engines had been there when I passed by earlier. There was no sign of fire or emergency and one of the fireman had been taking photos of the fire engine with the square in the background so I hadn’t worried. But now there were two police cars too and it had been at least half an hour and yet there was still no sign of anything happening. Well, I went back to the boat and it began to rain on the way. I had some snacks so I ate some crisps and drank some blackcurrant juice and then I went on Facebook and remembered it was Rosa Patrol’s Rebel Cup Zoom meeting, where there would be points on offer for number of attendees and number of countries they were in. Well, there probably wouldn’t be anyone else in Poland. I failed at the scavenger hunt, not having random Rebel items with me in my personal item but at least I gave them an extra country.

I went to bed after that. However, a little after midnight, to judge by the church bonging on the other side of the river, my next door neighbours came in and they yelled and had showers on the other side of the paper-thin wall – not appreciated by someone with an alarm set for 4am…