Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Zoos
Warszawa
During the war, people hid in the empty cages and the director's villa at Warsaw Zoo. Jan and Antonina Żabiński saved several hundred Jews this way, were honoured as Righteous Among the Nations, and their story is told in the film "The Zoo…
Zoos
Kraków
Kraków Zoo is not in a city park but on Pustelnik Hill in the middle of Wolski Forest, about 8 km from the Main Market Square. Its 20 hectares are home to around 1,500 animals from more than 270 species, over a hundred of them classed as e…
Hidden gemZoos
Opole
Opole Zoo has opened three times: before the war, after the war, when the menagerie had to be rebuilt from scratch, and after the great flood of 1997, which nearly sealed its fate. Today more than 1,000 animals of over 200 species live on…
Hidden gemZoos
Chorzów
In the 1950s one of Poland's largest zoos grew up on former mining wasteland between Chorzów and Katowice. The Silesian Zoological Garden covers about 47.5 ha of the Silesian Park, and for half a century its trademark has been a rocky holl…
Zoos
Hel
The Hel Seal Sanctuary (Fokarium, roughly "foh-KAH-ryoom") is a small seal center at the tip of the Hel Peninsula on Poland's Baltic coast, run by the University of Gdańsk Marine Station. Here you can watch Baltic grey seals up close and l…
Zoos
Wrocław
The Afrykarium in Wrocław (say af-rih-KAR-yum, VROTS-wahv) is Poland's first oceanarium devoted entirely to Africa and the star attraction of Wrocław Zoo, one of the country's most visited sights. Inside a vast, partly underground building…
Zoos
Poczesna
Alpakarnia Poczesna in Nowa Wieś (Poczesna municipality), just outside Częstochowa, started out as an alpaca farm and has grown into a family park with a mini zoo and playground. According to the operator it is home to around 100 tame alpa…
Zoos
Bałtów
Every European bison born in Bałtów gets a name starting with "Po-": Polesław, Pojata, Pompon, Poezja. It is a Polish naming tradition for the species, and the herd is the pride of the Bałtów Animal Park (Zwierzyniec Bałtowski) – a safari…
Zoos
Sosnowiec
The Egzotarium in Sosnowiec (pronounced roughly "sos-NO-vyets") is a combined zoo and botanical garden housed in a striking glass building in southern Poland. Officially the Ecological Education Center – Egzotarium, it brings together aqua…
Zoos
Wicko
The maize here grows almost 3 metres tall, and the paths of the maze, laid out over more than 4 hectares of field, change every year. Farma Alexa in Charbrowo near Łeba calls itself Poland's first agricultural education and amusement park:…
Zoos
Gdańsk
Gdańsk Zoo in Oliwa (Gdański Ogród Zoologiczny, roughly "guh-DAHN-skee OH-groot zoh-oh-loh-GEECH-nee") is the largest zoo in Poland by area, set in the forested Leśny Młyn valley inside the Tricity Landscape Park on the edge of Gdańsk. You…
Zoos
Ustroń
The Forest Park of Surprises (Leśny Park Niespodzianek, pronounced roughly "LESH-nih park nyeh-spo-DZYAH-nek") in Ustroń is a small woodland zoo on a mountainside in the Silesian Beskids, famous for its free-flight shows with birds of prey…
Zoos
Leszno
The Leszno Mini Zoo is a small, free zoological garden in Millennium Park on 17 Stycznia Street, with a domestic animal enclosure and paddocks tucked among old trees. The history of Leszno's menageries goes back to 1903, and the zoo has oc…
Zoos
Dębki
A tropical greenhouse a few steps from the beach, filled with hundreds of exotic butterflies that fly freely and land on visitors' hands, clothes and bags. The seasonal butterfly house at ul. Spacerowa 3a in Dębki opens only in the summer…
Zoos
Władysławowo
In the port of Władysławowo, on ul. Hryniewieckiego, a tropical microclimate reigns in summer, and hundreds of butterflies from all over the world fly freely among exotic plants. There are no display cases or terrariums – the insects settl…
Zoos
Poznań
Poznań New Zoo (Nowe Zoo) is a woodland zoo on the eastern edge of central Poznań, opened in 1974 and covering about 120 hectares of hilly forest with six ponds. It is Poland's second-largest zoo by area. Instead of compact cages you get b…
Zoos
Międzyzdroje
The Międzyzdroje Oceanarium (roughly "myen-dzy-ZDRO-yeh") is an indoor public aquarium in the heart of Poland's best-known resort on Wolin Island, a short walk from the beach and the pier. Across some 3,000 m² you'll see sharks, moray eels…
Zoos
Gdynia
The map of the Baltic seabed in the Baltic Hall dates back to the opening of this place in 1971, and some of the wall displays from that time are still up to date. Gdynia Aquarium — the official name since 2003 of what visitors often call…
Zoos
Toruń
The Toruń Zoological and Botanical Garden is a small, friendly zoo set inside a historic botanical garden on Bydgoska Street, about 1 km west of the Old Town. On less than 4 hectares you'll find around 50 animal species — European bison, m…
Zoos
Bydgoszcz
Bydgoszcz Zoo sits in the middle of Myślęcinek Forest Park on the northern edge of Bydgoszcz (say "BID-gosh"), a city in north-central Poland. Founded as a "Garden of Polish Fauna", it still focuses on animals native to Poland, such as Eur…
Zoos
Zamość
The Stefan Miler Zoo in Zamość (say "ZAH-moshch") is the only zoo in Poland's Lublin region and one of its most popular family attractions, with about 200,000 visitors a year. It sits just 1 km from the Renaissance market square of this UN…
Zoos
Władysławowo
The Bird House (Ptaszarnia) in the port of Władysławowo is the opposite of a typical parrot house. In a large covered tent at Hryniewieckiego 1, among tropical greenery, live more than a hundred small exotic birds – they do not land on you…
Zoos
Poznań
Poznań's zoo began as a birthday joke. In 1871 the regulars of a restaurant by the railway station, members of a skittles club, decided to celebrate their president's fiftieth birthday by giving him… animals. From a goat, a sheep, a peacoc…
Zoos
Zakopane
Below the Wielka Krokiew ski jump, at ul. Piłsudskiego 38, you can see an Alpine marmot up close without setting foot on a trail. The Tatra Educational Park is a 1.5-hectare enclosure home to 14 species of animals, from red deer and fallow…