Wieliczka Salt Mine

The old Salt Wieliczka Salt Mine works were recommended.   At one time salt was essential for preserving meat over winter and was amazingly valuable, ranking with silver and gold weight for weight.  Now of course, it is one of the least expensive of commodities. 

At the works here there is a multipronged solution to declining profits:

• First among these is a bit of classic product differentiation: claiming that natural salt, with all its additional chemical contamination, is better for you.
• Second the mine itself is a tourist attraction, boosted by the historical enthusiasm of the miners and others for carving salt sculptures, à la Disney. 
  It is said to attract 1.2 million visitors a year and, like Jenolan Caves in Australia, has its own resort Hotel on site.

Down the Salt Mine - a la Disney

It is certainty an interesting experience, akin to large limestone caves, with the additional real prospect of a methane, also known as firedamp, explosion. 

As an additional hazard large sections of the roof have fallen in, in the not so distant past.

From and engineering point of view there is an interesting array of ancient and modern roof support technologies and separate ventilation zones, with air locks, as a means of fire and explosion suppression. 

Roof Bolting and Timber Roof Supports

Water management is also interesting.  The considerable quantity of water in the mine is supersaturated and so dissolves no more salt.  But who knows what fresh rainwater has seeped in above or from the adjoining water table. This is continuously dissolving away more salt within any strata into which the fresh water has been seeping. 

Is a large volume of water about to burst through the walls or roof I wondered? 

I have since discovered that commercial mining ceased here in 1996 due to the mine flooding in just one such incident.

Water management

The tourist entrance we used is via wooden stairs spiralling down a very deep shaft. 

If you've ever been involved in a building evacuation drill from the 20th floor or higher, imagine doing it in a half sized stairwell.  This one's a pretty good approximation of a chimney - loosely packed with wood and nice fatty bodies covered in flammable fabrics.  A fire starting near the bottom would be certain death for everyone on the stairs. 

I had fun thinking about this during the frequent stops while some less fit below recovered their breaths.

In the chimney - I mean the entrance shaft
The second photo is about half way down - looking back up the central void towards the top

Fortunately I'm neither claustrophobic nor prone to panic but I have met people who are. 

Once, while on a plane waiting to take-off, I made innocent conversation with a colleague about the obvious poor state of the aircraft's repair, pointing to some loose fittings, and exposed wires.  This caused him to throw-up. 

I should've known better.  Years earlier, on a Laker flight from London to New York, I'd complained to a hostess about luggage being stacked against the emergency exits and made some disparaging remarks about a broken seat and the plane's obvious poor state of repair.  The fellow next to me went white and once we were in the air swore that if he got off this plane alive he would never fly again.  As he was an Englishman, flying for the first time to the US and Canada on a business trip, I wondered how he would get home. Maybe he was obliged to emigrate?  On the bright side he'd ordered a meal that came in a paper bag, like a school lunch, that he was unable to eat and gave to me so I had two.

Anyway, I'd learnt my lesson and held my tongue on this occasion.  I decided that someone 'freaking out' in this tight space could be unpleasant, so it might not be wise to voice my observations within hearing of our other 'English-speaking-group' companions.

Once underground it's huge, like a small town.  Unsurprisingly, given the obvious dangers the miners faced, there are frequent places to pray. 

Chapel and Church

Led by our guide, we wondered around sometimes slippery paths, learning about the history of salt and about myths and misunderstandings that once governed people's lives and actions.  Then we had a late lunch in the café before queuing to get out.  This ended up taking a lot longer than to get in.  It involved queuing several times and being formed into groups as attendants managed the flow of visitors through the caverns.

The way up is via a the original mineshaft elevator to which a multilevel car has been fitted into which people are packed like sardines - very tightly - I mean squeezed together - in separate little cans.  By mid-afternoon there was a very large number of people in the mine.  I did a little sum.  The guide said they get 1.2 million visitors a year.  That's an average of around 4,000 visitors a day, give or take a thousand, depending on the season and day of the week.

When we were waiting our turn, we noticed that they lift out around 34 people each ride on about a four minute cycle. That'll take around eight hours to lift 4,000.   So that's why they schedule the people entering according to how many they have in the mine and have guides controlling the flow.  They must start lifting people out well before midday, on a peak day, to avoid having people still waiting to leave after 8 at night.  At any one time they must have close to a thousand visitors in the mine.

If the elevator or air supply or electricity fails or there is some disaster, like a fire, flood or explosion, they are going to have a lot of trouble getting all those people out.

As a result, I doubt if this place could operate like this, for the general public, almost anywhere else in the World.   

So you can only see/experience it in Poland. 

The drive from the city interesting and, notwithstanding its obvious OH&S/public safety shortcomings, the salt mine was most unusual and informative too - and a nice girl gave me some bath salts for participating in a marketing survey. 

During the drive back we both agreed, we had had a great day.  But if you think this is a recommendation, be aware that you have been warned.  It's a disaster waiting to happen.