Warsaw Poland

Likely to be most visitors' first experience of Poland, WARSAW makes an initial impression that is all too often negative. 

The years of Communist rule have left no great aesthetic glories, and there's sometimes a hollowness to the faithful reconstructions of earlier eras. However, as throughout Poland, the pace of social change is tangible and fascinating, as the openings provided by the post-Communist order turn the streets into a continuous marketplace, while the postwar dearth of nightlife and entertainments is gradually becoming a complaint of the past, as a plethora of new bars, restaurants and clubs establish themselves.
Warsaw became the capital of Poland in 1596, when King Zygmunt III moved his court here from Kraków. The city was badly damaged by the Swedes during the invasion of 1655 and was then extensively reconstructed by the Saxon kings in the late seventeenth century - the Saxon Gardens (Ogród Saski), right in the centre, date from this period. The Partitions abruptly terminated this golden age, as Warsaw was absorbed into Prussia in 1795. Napoleon's arrival in 1806 gave Varsovians brief hopes of liberation, but following the 1815 Congress of Vienna, the city was integrated into the Russian-controlled Congress Kingdom of Poland. It was only with the outbreak of World War I that Russian control began to crumble, and with the restoration of Polish independence in 1918, Warsaw reverted to its position as capital. Then, with the outbreak of World War II, came the progressive annihilation of the city. Hitler, infuriated by the Warsaw Uprising, ordered the elimination of Warsaw; by the end of the war 850,000 Varsovians - two-thirds of the city's 1939 population - were dead or missing. The task of rebuilding took ten years of ceaseless labour.
Wending its way north towards Gdansk and the Baltic Sea, the Wisla river divides Warsaw neatly in half: the main sights are located on the western bank, the eastern consisting predominantly of residential and business districts. Somewhat to the north of centre, the busy Old Town provides the historic focal point.