Off to the cathedral of Gdansk

Oliwa Cathedral had a strange background. It has 5 patron saints the Trinity, Mary Magdalene and Saint Bernard. It was built by a group of monks that professed poverty. But as Tomas told us when business is good it's hard to stay poor. They poured their money into developing this area 10 km north of Gdansk. They spent their money building this Monumental Church.  It originally had a great pipe organ and a lot of gilded areas. When the Swedish army came through one of the Swedish shoulders scraped all the gold off and made 50 crowns. However he did a hundred fifty thousand crowns worth of damage. The Swedish soldiers even took the pipes from the Oregon and melted them down to make bullets. After that one of the monks went to Austria to learn how to make a pipe organ. It took him 20 years and he had it about half done and then another hundred years to finish it and it has 8,000 organ-pipes now. It was Catholic and a mass was going on while we were there. We were respectful and quiet and when the mass let out we could inspect the altar area. It was located within a park. There were handicrafts and gardens  English Gardens, French Gardens, Japanese Gardens, so on. We enjoyed walking through that area on our way back to the car.  We passed the new soccer stadium on our way back.

Okowa Cathedral

 very impressive

A mass was going on while we were in there so we tried to be very respectful and stick to the exterior regions

The ceiling

The pipe organ was magnificent. They were playing it while we were inside

One of the stained glass panels

Additional islands of pipes for the organ were found all around

A grotto off to the side of the church

Details of the grotto

Small satellite areas of seating and worship are along the edges

All of them is intricately designed in carved as the main altar

When you have 8000 pipes you have to put them everywhere

 another side Grotto

A place for everyone to worship

Old grave markers

A very elaborate shrine

This stained glass lid in lots of light with color just around the edges

The amount of effort and work going into each one of these is amazing

Celestial beings

 an illuminated side Grotto

An elaborate doorway

An incredible Dome

Pope John Paul 

The confessional

Possibly more pipes

The pulpit

The main altar area

Looking into the main altar area

A very large Chandelier

The King was fond of bees and I believe there's a beehive in and amongst the finery

Outside they had naive altar carvings

This one doubles as a beehive

The windows are open to let the beautiful day inside

A fine building in front of the French Gardens

Looking back from the French Gardens

All three of us enjoying the gardens

These trees would take shape easily having leaves both in the Sun and in the shade and made this immense hedge

The soccer stadium on the way back to the ship

The local soccer team is quite happy to have such a great facility

Even the highway has the same design motif