Genealogy Tours

 

 

The ultimate experience in your genealogical adventure.

 


If you wish to receive a tailor-made offer please fill out the PO Genealogy Tour request form 

Download the booklet about preparations for Genealogy Tour

We invite you to contact us by email: [email protected]

phone: 0048 664 407 089 (6.00 AM – 4.00 PM EST)


PolishOrigins organized its first Genealogy Tour in 2004. Since then it has become our core competence, and our biggest source of pride, and passion.

Read a few comments from our guests:

“I can’t emphasize enough, to anyone considering a trip to Poland, how it will excite and change you. Just beware that once you go, you may want to return many, many more times. My third visit is already planned out.”

“Something magic  or spiritual  comes into play that makes it unlike other journeys.”

“This was a trip of a lifetime and the gift of family was more than I could have hoped for from this trip.”

And how about you? Have you ever dreamed about visiting places where your ancestors were born, raised, experienced drudgery as well as the joys of their everyday life?  Have you ever wondered if is it still possible to find living relatives in Poland and meet them personally? How many questions about your family history are still without answers?

We are here to help you in realizing these dreams and finding answers to many family history questions.

Here is the basic information about our Genealogy Tours:

Where?

We organize Genealogy tours in the whole territory of today’s Poland, as well as Western Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, and Slovakia. All our guides speak fluent English and can read and interpret old records in Polish, Latin, Russian and German (of course, this is dependent on your ancestral area and guide’s specialization).

When?

We would love to write to you: “anytime you wish”, however there are some small limitations. We do not recommend to schedule your Genealogy Tour for July and especially for August, as this are the summer vacation months, and many archives have restricted opening hours, and many priests are leaving for vacation, the research is more difficult (of course it is still possible if you do not have a choice, especially to the fact more and more records is available on-line).

If you come to Poland for only a couple of days, be aware that a genealogy tour should be done on weekdays. During the weekend you do not have a chance to visit the archives at all.

May and September are our busiest months (and also the best for traveling, and also the airline tickets prices are lower), so the sooner you will book the tour for these months, the better.

 

What is included?

Each tour is a unique and very personal experience but there are some core components of our service that we will always provide for you:

Make a plan:  You will have access to our tour management team, and your plan is made together with you,  on the basis of your expectations,  and the information provided by you before the start of the tour. You don’t have to know everything about your family history.  The Tour will allow you to see, touch, smell and walk in the places of your grandparents and hear their language spoken. It may not only be a great adventure, but possibly the only opportunity to discover so much more about your past, by doing on-site research and even find living relatives. The minimum information should be the places where you forefathers might have lived and the time period when they emigrated. All the information can be usually obtained from Passenger Arrival Records which can be found in the online databases (Ellis Island, Family Search, Ancestry.com and others).

Preparation for the research: analysis of your documents, concerning your family, and preparation to begin search by locating the correct parishes and consecutively, places where the research can be performed during your visit). Most places, where we can perform the research during your visit include: church parish offices, civil registry offices in borough seats, state archives, diocesan archives, historical societies, databases available on-line and of course interviews with local people. We do not perform any actual research on the spot before the tour, unless together we agree to do that.

Genealogy guide service throughout the tour.

  • Contacting, negotiating and establishing relationships with local civil and church officials to perform genealogy research as well as learn about the local history of the places.
  • Research of family records in different kinds of institutions like parish offices, diocese archives, state archives, civil registers, cemeteries and digital resources.
  • Searching for living relatives, based on information we may be able to discover and conversations with local people
  • Doing oral and written translations of your family documents, letters, photo inscriptions, and of course during meetings with your relatives (if we’re able to find them). See an example of what we can do and what can happen during PO Genealogy Tour (part 1) and the next day (part2)

 

Remember that if there is a need or desire, together we can usually change our plans within minutes or hours. Unscheduled stops and side trips along the way are always welcome and often add to the excitement of the tour, especially when it leads to an ancestral home site or the discovery of relatives. You are NOT able to ask for this on big group, ready-made trips, where itineraries are strictly followed.

Driving and guiding you throughout the journey, very often in rural areas – all our guides are also your drivers. You will have the passenger car for your disposal during the tour. We do not recommend driving on your own during the tour.  Polish roads might be in very poor condition, not paved or dirt. Also, the roads in the countryside are not always well marked. Be aware that most of the cars in Poland have manual gearbox (with shift stick)… and last, but not least,  you will have to pay attention to driving instead of focusing on the whole experience of your ancestral land and people.

 

 

Accommodation: We include the accommodation in our offer: in bigger cities we can offer the tourist class (3* hotels) or more exclusive, luxurious (4 and 5* hotels) – depending on your budget. We recommend and cooperate with smaller, boutique hotels rather than big, international hotel chains.  

In smaller towns and villages we advise to stay in small Inns, B&B’s and agritourism houses, where you can see everyday life in Poland, and where you will have the opportunity to experience real Polish hospitality.

Other services as per your individual needs: We are always flexible and open to your suggestions and expectation, and we can also add to the itinerary some local tourist attractions, local tour guides, and other services. This is your Tour!

 

Of course, creating and preparation of your itinerary is free of charge. All costs will apply to the services in Poland, which we will provide, such as accommodations, transportation, guide service etc. You will receive the price of the trip and all of the details prior to your arrival in Poland. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us.

If you would like to combine your genealogy research with tourism, we have competencies to plan your whole holidays. Find out more about our other PolishOrigins Tours offers here.

Blog

Click here to check the status of the previous Tours described in our Blog!

If you want to record and relate your Tour we would be happy to do this together with you on our Blog. Clients who have blogged their tours have found it to be a unique way to express their thoughts during their trip, rather than waiting until they return home. Blogging also gives friends and relatives a daily update of your tour.

Of course, you may not want to write a Blog. This is not obligatory in any way and it doesn’t influence any other terms of the core service. You can always do this after your tour is completed.

Costs

The total price of the tour depends of course on the specific itinerary of the tour. Fill in the PO Genealogy Tours request form to receive a tailor made offer. Our fees, as well as all prices in Poland, are in Polish zlotys (PLN). The current exchange rate of Polish zloty currency can be found here. If you are our returning guests you are entitled to 5% discount of the final price. Discounts do not combine.

You can always contact us by email: [email protected], or by phone: 0048 664 407 089 (between 6.00 AM – 4.00 PM EST) to ask additional questions.

To have a better picture of what you can experience and expect to see, read an watch some of our guests Testimonials and Blog or ask a question in our Forum.