AUSCHWITZ & BIRKENAU – CRACOW LOCAL TOUR
How to visit Auschwitz & Birkenau Memorial Site?
Questions and answers concerning the tour:
Q: First, how can I get to the Memorial Site from Cracow?
A: Oświęcim, the city in which the former Nazi concentrationa and extermination camp was located, is about 65 km away from Cracow. You can take a direct bus that goes from MDA (Cracow’ s main bus station) to the Memorial Site. The bus goes approximately every 30 min and the journey takes around 1,5 hour. What’s worth remembering is that the stop near Auschwitz Memorial Site is only one of the stops the bus passes by. Therefore, the bus can be overcrowded. Ticket office in MDA area sells the tickets for the bus. When it comes to the train from Cracow to Oświęcim, it goes every 1,5hour and the journey lasts up to 2 hours. However, the train stops in the city centre (not near the Memorial Site) and you should take it into consideration.
Q: How can I get tickets to the Memorial Site and what are my options to visit Auschwitz & Birkenau?
A: Generally speaking, there are three options to visit this place and therefore three kinds of tickets to Auschwitz & Birkenau Memorial Site.
1. A regular tour with an organized group and a guide.
2. A tour without a guide.
3. A study tour with an extended expositions.
A regular tour with a guide ( available in 9 different languages, that is : English, German, French, Spanish, Slovakian, Italian, Russian, Czech and Polish) takes up to 3,5 hours and is led by a well-qualified Memorial Site’s employee, who speaks one of the language mentioned above. The group counts from 15 – 30 participants and the tickets for such tour can be found on visit.auschwitz.org website in a section: Visit for Individuals.
However, if you don’t want to do a group tour around the camp and you just want to see the place but without spending there 3,5 hours, the second option is for you – a tour without a guide. Such tour is, in fact, for free but in order to do that you need to get so-called “free entrance ticket”. The Memorial Site usually distributes such tickets in the moring (early morning hours in the Museum ticket office). The number of such free- entrance tickets is limited and even if you show up early enough to get them, you still can’t be sure that you’ll be given this ticket.
Especially in summer time, when foreign tourists storm the Museum, it is extremely difficult to get those free- entrance tickets, at the peak of the tourist season it is even hard to get a regular ticket.
The third option, seen as an extended one, takes around 6 hours and is much less popular than the other options. This kind of visit is recommended mostely for those who want to know thoroughly the history of Auschwitz & Birkenau camp.
Q: Is there a separate Museum of Auschwitz and Birkenau in the camp area?
A: When it comes to the terms: Museum, Memorial Site, Auschwitz& Birkenau Camps, they all refer to the same place, whose full name is: Memorial and Museum Auschwitz & Birkenau former German Nazi Concentration and Extermination Camp. There is no separate museum in the camp area. The Camps itself are museums as well as Memorial Sites so by booking Auschwitz & Birkenau tickets you book the entrance to Auschwitz &Birkenau museum.
If, you don’t want to struggle with booking the entrance and getting the tickets for the bus, we recommend going for a tour with us – Legendary Kraków. We orgaznize tours to Auschwitz & Birkenau all year long and what’s included in such tour is a hotel pick-up (from Cracow), both way transport and the tickets to enter the museum for a regular 3,5h tour ( different languages available). Check here for our tours: Auschwitz Birkenau Tour
We hope that you, dear reader, will find this Q&A even a bit helpful while planning your tour to Auschwitz Birkenau. These were only three questions about the tour, but we have chose them because they seem to be the most important ones and knowing their answers is really helpful while planning the tour. If you have any questions concerning our tour to Auschwitz &Birkenau, do not hesitate do ask
Answers provided by Legendary Kraków team