Picturesque, colorful, magnificent, transporting. These words try to, but cannot, capture the sheer delight you feel as you stroll around Wroclaw’s Market Square. Krakow’s and Prague’s market squares come closest in my experience and are indeed grand, must-sees for travelers in Europe, but Wroclaw, while still large feels a bit more intimate, a bit more colorful, and a bit more joyful somehow.

Like those two and other beautiful squares, you will find plenty of bars and restaurants (not the best in town), food and craft stalls, museums, striking architecture, and lots of tourists, but Wroclaw’s feels somehow a little different. Maybe it was the fire breather illuminating the night sky one evening on our after-dinner stroll. Maybe it was the colorful buildings chockablock along the borders (not so different from other main squares, but somehow cuter with the way their roofs are cut out to reveal the bright blue sky). You’ll also find some of Wroclaw’s famous gnomes playing along the sidewalks.

I can’t be certain of why I feel this way, but I am certain that when you are in Wroclaw you must visit the Rynek twice. Once by day for the sheer bounty of visual delights, fairy tale architecture, and town bustle and once at night for the shadow and light interplay and the evening street performers at their most dramatic.