Finding Paul's house
Finding Paul's house
Seen on the way... true !
Looking for "Lerchenfeld"...
Skowronków !
Paul's house
Paul's house
This is not exactly a biking trip account, but a nice uncommon story related to a bike trip and somehow closely related to MBPost. An internet tale as some call it.
This happened during the bike excursion to Biskupia Kopa.
Few weeks before going, an English man of German descendance, Paul, wrote me after having Googled the MBPost page of the Czarna Góra trail, after the keyword "Konradów" present in the page (trailhead). Paul was trying to identify where exactly in Poland was located the house of his father, in this region that belonged formerly to pre-war Germany, in a village named Lerchenfeld (names have changed when the region went into the hands of communist Poland following Staline's post-war border changes). With, as only clue, two black and white photos, one showing a little white house, the other a hilly panorama...
It turned out that the Polish Sudetes own two Konradów, the other being located near Biskupia Kopa. Another detail focused my attention, Lerchenfeld (that comes from "larks") corresponds to "Skowron" in Polish. But both Konradów own a neighbouring locality called so ! Skowronki for the first, Skowronków for the second.
Since the black and white picture showed a bit of flat terrain in the distance, we both agreed that Skowronków had stronger chances to be the right, and I promised Paul to hunt for his father's house as soon as I would bike Biskupia Kopa, Skowronków being located almost on the mountain itself.
Which I did few weeks after. But as I rode down, finding "Skowronków" was harder than expected, this locality being absorbed by the larger Konradów and not being indicated. However, asking few inhabitants helped me to spot the settlement, and after wandering in some streets, the little white house came in sight. I was fearing a tricky welcome, but both occupants, old retired peasants, were pleased to hear about this story and told me to message Paul that he was welcome for a pilgrimage when he wanted. I informed Paul by mail as soon as I came back, he was very happy, and felt extremely proud of this achievement.
I eventually found out that this Skowronków, quite close to the border, was indeed in Czechoslovakia during the 50s and named then "Skřivánkov", before a slight border change that placed it in Poland afterwhile. This explains why it was so hard to spot on the map, and possibly why Paul's father migrated to England (Post-war Czechoslovakia had the most brutal repression towards the remaining German dispora after the war).
Lerchenfeld Here we are !
Images
 |  | |||||