Unseasonable warmth continues

Warsaw's average December daytime temperature is -1C. Today it was +8C. After a week's early starts, I woke up this morning at 10:30, and after breakfast treated myself to a long solitary walk (Dawidy Bankowe, Zgorzała, Zamienie, Nowa Iwiczna and home via the rampa na kruszywo). Dressed for spring or autumn, I should, however, have taken wellingtons with me, due to the 'beastly mud and oomska' (to quote Withnail's Uncle Monty).

Outside Zgorzała on (yet another) building site, I found this wonderful example of a 'barakowóz', or literally a barrack on wheels. Towed from site to site, these provide builders, who are often from far-flung parts of Poland, with living quarters while they're working. In the distance on the far, flat horizon is the radio tower at Raszyn.

Just around the corner is where Warsaw ends and Zgorzała begins. The sign on the left bids farewell to the Lesznowola municipality. The photo (below) neatly encapsulates the mixture of old and new that is Poland today. The roadside cross, the discarded cabbage leaves, the racing readymix concrete truck, the logistics centre in the background and the new - but already dented - local authority sign elegantly made but bearing the medieval crest of Lesznowola.

Mazovian landmark from the air

Less than six miles/ten kilometres south-west from Jeziorki is an even higher structure than anything Warsaw can boast. Indeed, until 1962, this was the highest structure in Europe. This is the Raszyn radio transmitter, snapped through the early morning haze soon after take-off from Okecie. The radio mast is clearly visible on the flat Mazovian skyline from our neighbourhood. To the right of the picture is the main Warsaw-Krakow road that leads through Radom and Kielce. This part of it is still dual carriageway (!).