What Does Boruta Do in Piątek on a Sunday?

On Sunday I set off with a friend to the area around Łęczyca. The weather was just perfect for cycling. After our last trip around the Zelów area, this time we planned the route a little better. A little, because the destination was Piątek, and along the way the plans changed.

The route began at the Royal Castle in Łęczyca. Supposedly the Devil Boruta lived in the dungeons of this castle, whose traces we'll come across again near Tum. Boruta liked to get drunk with Rokita in the taverns of the Łódź region. In the castle courtyard I met none of them. There were, however, wooden stocks.

At the castle you can have yourself locked in the stocks, sometimes called a pillory. Once closed, the two parts are nailed together or fastened with a padlock. Being locked up for a longer time was used as a punishment. For speeding on my bike, I was locked up for 5 minutes in the castle courtyard.

From Łęczyca, I rode along side roads to Piątek. The route ran through Tum and Góra Świętej Małgorzaty. Riding through meadows and fields, you could come across plenty of storks in their nests.

In the village of Tum it's worth stopping for a moment and looking at the Archcollegiate Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St Alexius in Tum. It's right here that we can come across the traces of the devil Boruta himself. As the legend goes, he once fell in love with a beautiful maiden from Tum. To win her heart, the devil fulfilled the girl's every whim. One day she asked him to bring the biggest stones from the area to build a tavern.

From the gathered boulders and stones, the villagers began to build a church. When the fiend realised how he'd been tricked, in anger he swiped his claw, wanting to destroy the church. In memory of this event, on one of the walls you can see the marks left by his claw.

Just behind the church we can see an early-Piast stronghold. The finds indicate that the stronghold had exceptional significance in our history. They suspect that for a time it even served as the country's capital. I'll take their word for it, because to me it looked like a piece of field surrounded by a mound of earth.

Further on, the road leads through the very old village of Góra Świętej Małgorzaty (St Margaret's Hill). The village owes its name to a legend, which tells of Margaret, who heaped up the hill on which the church was built. For a woman, the hill turned out quite sizeable. Riding down from it, we reach the village of Piątek. There you'll find the geometric centre of Poland.

From Piątek we head back to Łęczyca in a straight line. The next destination is Besiekiery. A small village, known for the ruins of a castle dating from around 1500. Here too we can come across Boruta. The legend goes that a knight made a bet with the devil that he would build a castle without using an axe (siekiera). And so the knight did, but he didn't know that one of the peasants who hauled stone for the construction was named Siekierka. The devil won the bet, and the castle was then named Besiekiery.

After touring the castle, we rode to Uniejów. This was supposed to be the way home, but we found an interesting trail that began and ended in Uniejów. At the end of the day it was just perfect. The route ran through quiet villages and fields.

We returned to town at sunset. The Warta flowed slowly through the town, and we loaded the bikes onto the roof of the car. The day was drawing to a close.

Both cycling routes can be viewed on Endomondo:

• Łęczyca - Tum - Piątek - Łęczyca
• Green trail near Uniejów

It was a very pleasant day.