Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Hidden gemLakes
Ścibórz
A broad expanse of water on the Nysa Kłodzka River, with the Sudetes on the horizon — Lake Otmuchów is an artificial reservoir built in 1928–1933 between Otmuchów and Paczków. It combines flood protection and power generation with fishing,…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Prudnik
Biskupia Kopa (say "bees-KOO-pya KOH-pa"; 890 m) is the highest peak of the Opawskie Mountains, a small range of the eastern Sudetes on the Poland–Czech border, and one of the peaks of the Crown of Polish Mountains. Beech forests, a mounta…
Hidden gemCastles
Strzelce Opolskie
Empty windows, ivy on the walls and a pale tower above the park — this is how the former seat of the dukes of Strzelce, and later of the Colonna and Renard counts, has looked since 21 January 1945. Strzelce Opolskie Castle burned down toge…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Brzeg
The nave here rises 30 metres, one of the tallest in Silesia, and St Nicholas' is counted among the largest Gothic churches in the region. It was the burghers' parish church of Brzeg, served Lutherans for four centuries, burned out in 1945…
Hidden gemTechnical monuments
Ozimek
The Ozimek Suspension Bridge (Ozimek is pronounced roughly "oh-ZEE-mek") is the oldest surviving all-iron chain suspension bridge in continental Europe. Opened on September 12, 1827 over the Mała Panew River in southern Poland's Opole regi…
Hidden gemOld towns & squares
Głogówek
From the tower of this town hall a watchman once announced the hours and important news with a trumpet, and in 1625 soldiers passing through the town shot the ball on its tip through in three places. The Renaissance town hall in Głogówek,…
Hidden gemLandscape parks
gmina Lubsza
Almost 80 per cent of the park is forest, mostly pine growing on sandy dunes, while the Oder valley holds riverside woods, oak-hornbeam forest and oxbow lakes covered with water chestnut. Stobrawa Landscape Park is one of the largest lands…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Paczków
St. John the Evangelist's Church in Paczków (say “PATCH-koof”) is a Gothic church that was turned into a fortress in the 16th century, and it still looks the part: a brick hall crowned by a white Renaissance parapet with swallowtail merlon…
Hidden gemOld towns & squares
Brzeg
Brzeg Town Hall (say "BZHEG") is one of the finest Renaissance town halls in Poland and, together with the Piast castle a few streets away, the reason to stop in this small Silesian town on the Oder. Built in 1569-1577 by the Italian maste…
Historic sites
Góra Świętej Anny
Stone terraces cut into a former limestone quarry were meant to hold 7,000 seated and 20,000 standing spectators. The amphitheatre on Góra Świętej Anny was built by the Nazis in the 1930s as a stage for propaganda rallies, with a mausoleum…
Fortifications
Byczyna
Piaskowa (Sand) Tower, also called the South Tower, closes off from the south one of the best-preserved rings of town walls in Poland. Inside, the vault over a former starvation dungeon has survived, and during the 2023–2024 restoration th…
Fortifications
Byczyna
The German Gate, Byczyna's western gate tower, is the first thing you see when you enter the old town from national road 11. The lower part of the tower is built of rubble stone, the upper part of brick, and its name comes from the fact th…
Fortifications
Niemodlin
In the forest near Niemodlin two brick piers with arched openings stand on their own, as if someone forgot the rest of the building. This is the Niemodlin Gate, also called the Black Gate – one of five gates of the former deer park of the…
Fortifications
Byczyna
According to local historians, it was beneath this gate in 1588 that Archduke Maximilian of Habsburg – a claimant to the Polish throne defeated by Hetman Jan Zamoyski – surrendered. Byczyna's eastern gate tower, known as the Polish Gate, s…
Fortifications
Grodków
Grodków once had four town gates with towers. Two survive, and the Ziębice Gate, on the western side of the former ring of walls, is the one you can still walk through under a Gothic arch. The tower mixes two styles: the lower part is medi…
Historic sites
Łambinowice
On a former military training ground near Łambinowice – Lamsdorf in German – one camp followed another for more than seventy years: for French prisoners in 1870, for Entente soldiers in the First World War, and in the Second World War one…
Churches & monasteries
Głogówek
The Loreto House in Głogówek is a copy of the Holy House (Santa Casa) of Loreto, completed in 1630 at the expense of Count Georg III von Oppersdorff and enclosed within the Franciscan church at 3 Klasztorna Street. It is a "church within a…
Churches & monasteries
Byczyna
At the western end of the village of Biskupice, on the north side of the road, stands a dark, weatherboarded church with a tall timber-frame tower. The name of the carpenter who built it and the names of its founders can still be read on t…
Landmarks
Nysa
The Romans inscribed S.P.Q.R. – "the Senate and People of Rome" – on their buildings. In 1701 the burghers of Nysa carved S.P.Q.N., "the Senate and People of Nysa", on their fountain, and there is hardly better proof that the town known as…
Nature
Góra Świętej Anny
St Anne's Mountain (Góra Świętej Anny), known for its sanctuary and Calvary, is also a former volcano. Some 27 million years ago a cone of lava and tuff rose here, and the dark rock on which the monastery stands is what remains of it. Sinc…
Lakes
Nysa
Lake Nysa (Jezioro Nyskie, say "yeh-ZHOR-oh NIS-kyeh") is a large reservoir on the Nysa Kłodzka river, right on the western edge of the town of Nysa in southwest Poland. Covering about 20 km², it has sandy beaches on its northern shore, ma…
Lakes
Turawa
Lake Turawa (Jezioro Turawskie, roughly "too-RAHV-skyeh") is the largest body of water in Poland's Opole region: a reservoir of about 21 km² (8 sq miles) on the Mała Panew River, ringed by pine forest, sandy beaches and holiday resorts. Ly…
Churches & monasteries
Opole
Opole Cathedral, officially the Cathedral of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, is the main church of the Opole region and the tallest building in the city: its two neo-Gothic spires rise to about 73 meters. The red-brick Gothic hall church…
Churches & monasteries
Góra Świętej Anny
St. Anne's Mountain (Góra Świętej Anny, roughly "GOO-rah shvyen-TAY AH-nee") is a Franciscan pilgrimage shrine with a baroque basilica, a monastery and a hillside Calvary, set on top of an extinct volcano in Poland's Opole region. It is th…