Held to find the city’s best hidden attractions, the latest installment of the Pearls of Warsaw competition has concluded.

Seeking to “emphasize the unique character of the town’s different districts”, the winner was decided by a public vote on Facebook.

In third was a walk around the hidden spots of the center, and in second a tour of historic Płatnicza street in Bielany (pictured above).

Topping the poll, however, was a walk around the wartime leftovers found in Mokotów. Including a bullet-shredded gate and shrapnel-scarred buildings, the tour route was authored by local resident Łukasz Ostoja-Kasprzycki.

Beginning in Dreszera Park, it is here that Soviet air drops were made at night with planes identifying their drop zones courtesy of the electric lights that had been installed specifically to signal to them.

“The drops were made without using parachutes, so the huge bags of food simply burst open when hitting the ground, meaning people would have to collect the food from the ground with their hands,” writes Ostoja-Kasprzycki.

Later, the park became a makeshift cemetery – the bodies were only exhumed in the 1950s.

This, though, is not the only point of interest with the route also stopping at a gateway close to the intersection of Krasickiego and Naruszewicza streets. Covered in bullet scars and grenade blasts, it was behind this shattered looking gate that an insurgent took cover whilst being fired at by German. Miraculously, he is reputed to have survived.  

Close by, the tenement on the corner of Naruszewicza and Tyniecka is to this day riddled with bullet holes; haunting as it is, it is also heartening to see such landmarks exist given the number that have been covered (or demolished entirely) in recent years.

For the full (Polish-language) tour, CLICK HERE!

(Photos: UM Warszawa)