Zalipie

May 24, 2025: Miechowice Wielkie – Rytwiany – 71kms – Rytwiany Hotel

Ruth: During the planning stages of this trip our Polish friend Ewa sent a photo of a little painted house and suggested we visit the town of Zalipie. Yesterday we took a cable ferry and a small detour to check it out. The women of the town have been decorating their log houses since shortly after their construction in the 1880’s. In the early years, before the houses had chimneys, the whitewash and painted flowers were an attempt to cover up the black soot that coated everything. I wasn’t able to find out where the smoke from the massive stoves actually went, before chimneys were used. After their installation the painting traditional continued with an annual completion. The results from this community of female artists are delightful.

We live in a world of Instagram and Google images which sets up certain expectations. As we approached the village, instead of finding a tight cluster of painted houses around a church, as I anticipated, Zalipie is a hamlet of houses (painted and not) spread over a five km area.

We visited a cluster of tiny log houses now made into an open air museum. We joined a tour, in Polish, with a nun and her mother. The older lady reacted with utter delight and familiarity to each room that we entered. I finally used Google translate to ask if she grew up in a house like this. “Tak, Tak,” she responded, nodding and smiling. She held out ten finger to respond to my question asking how many people lived in the tiny three room house shared with the animals. In one house she again broke into a smile and proceeded to pet the cow statue set up in the rooms reserved for the animals. Oh, I wished I could speak Polish and hear her stories.