110 attractions in Masovia, including Józef Piłsudski Museum in Sulejówek, Nadbużański Landscape Park and Iłża Castle.
Hidden gemMuseums
Sulejówek
The Józef Piłsudski Museum in Sulejówek (say "soo-leh-YOO-vek") is a striking modern museum and a historic family home on the eastern edge of Warsaw. It tells the life story of Marshal Józef Piłsudski, the founding father of independent Po…
Landscape parks
gmina Stoczek
Introduction The Bug is not a river that stays neatly in place. Across the Nadbużański Landscape Park it still bends through broad meanders, cuts into sandy banks, creates islands and sandbars and leaves old channels behind as oxbow lakes.…
Hidden gemCastles
Iłża
The upper castle at Iłża was built on a plan shaped like a heart – one of very few such cases in Poland. For several centuries it was the stronghold and residence of the Bishops of Kraków, hosting kings Władysław Jagiełło, Sigismund the Ol…
Churches & monasteries
Siedlce
The two brick towers of Siedlce Cathedral are 75 m high and the tallest structure in town, visible from far across the flat landscape of eastern Mazovia. The Neo-Gothic Church of the Immaculate Conception was built in 1906–1912 and became…
Monuments & mounds
Warszawa
This 31-metre hill in Czerniaków was piled up from the rubble of destroyed Warsaw, and for years maps simply called it "Rubbish Hill". Today the Warsaw Uprising Mound (Kopiec Powstania Warszawskiego), crowned by a giant Fighting Poland anc…
Gardens
Warszawa
The University of Warsaw Botanic Garden on Aleje Ujazdowskie is the third-oldest botanic garden in Poland and a green enclave in the centre of the capital, right next to the Royal Łazienki. On about 5 hectares grow some 5,000 plant species…
Palaces
Siedlce
The Ogiński Palace in Siedlce is a classicist residence with a white columned portico, set in Aleksandria Park – the town's most important historic monument. In the 18th century Princess Aleksandra Ogińska turned Siedlce into a centre of E…
Fortifications
Warszawa
The Warsaw Barbican (Barbakan, pronounced "bar-BAH-kahn") is a red-brick fortified gateway from the mid-16th century that links the Old Town and the New Town in the heart of Poland's capital. Almost every walk through the Old Town passes t…
Churches & monasteries
Pułtusk
The Collegiate Basilica of the Annunciation in Pułtusk (pronounced "poo-WTOOSK") is one of Mazovia's finest churches and an official Polish "Monument of History". The Gothic and Renaissance building is famous for the "Pułtusk vault", a Ren…
Palaces
Warszawa
The name comes from the Italian "belvedere", a beautiful view: the palace stands on the highest stretch of the Warsaw escarpment, above Łazienki Park. Grand Duke Konstantin lived at Belweder, insurgents stormed it on the November Night of…
Historic sites
Warszawa
On the night of 19–20 August 1944 insurgents captured this building with the help of a fire pump: they forced thousands of litres of a crude oil and petrol mixture inside and set it alight. The PAST building at Zielna 39 is one of Europe's…
Cities & towns
Warszawa
The Vistula Boulevards in Warsaw (Bulwary Wiślane, roughly "bool-VAH-rih vish-LAH-neh") are a riverside promenade stretching several kilometers along the left bank of the Vistula in central Warsaw, from below the Old Town past the Powiśle…
Museums
Orońsko
On the former estate of the painter Józef Brandt, in a park dotted with more than 100 sculptures, artists from around the world have been working since 1965. The Centre of Polish Sculpture in Orońsko is a landscape park, contemporary art g…
Landmarks
Węgrów
At the end of Ewangelicka Street in Węgrów stands a larch-wood church which — according to a tradition still alive today — was built in a single day. Around it lies the old Protestant cemetery with late 17th-century gravestones of Scottish…
Historic sites
Palmiry
The Palmiry Cemetery and Museum - Memorial Site (Cmentarz i Muzeum - Miejsce Pamięci Palmiry) is one of the most important memorials to the victims of German terror in 1939-1943 near Warsaw. Deep in Kampinos National Park, in the Czosnów m…
Historic sites
Ossów
At Ossów, in August 1920, the fate of Warsaw hung in the balance. On the field where Polish soldiers – many of them only 16 to 18 years old – stopped the advance of the Red Army, there is now a cemetery with eight mass graves and the Chape…
Historic sites
Warszawa
The Jewish Cemetery on Okopowa Street in Warsaw (pronounced "oh-ko-POH-vah") is one of the largest Jewish burial grounds in Europe and one of the most moving places to visit in Poland's capital. Founded in 1806, it covers about 33 hectares…
Historic sites
Szydłowiec
No two headstones are alike in the Jewish cemetery of Szydłowiec. Local stonemasons, working the same sandstone used for the town hall and the parish church, carved candles, lions, deer, birds feeding their young and hands raised in blessi…
Fortifications
Warszawa
The Warsaw Citadel (Cytadela Warszawska, "tsi-ta-DEL-ah") is a 19th-century fortress in the Żoliborz district, built by the Russian Empire to control Warsaw after the failed November Uprising. For decades it was a symbol of tsarist repress…
Old towns & squares
Radom
In most historic towns life revolves around the market square, but in Radom the heart of the city is a street — the pedestrian promenade on ul. Stefana Żeromskiego, the old road to Lublin. At number 51 there was once Stanisław Wierzbicki's…
Landmarks
Węgrów
The wavy, two-storey gable crowned with a star can be seen from the far end of St Mary's Market Square. The Gdańsk House, a Baroque inn from the mid-18th century, recalls the days when Węgrów lived off the grain trade and competed with nei…
Museums
Żelazowa Wola
Frédéric Chopin's Birthplace in Żelazowa Wola (say "zheh-lah-ZO-vah VO-lah") is the modest whitewashed manor annex where the composer was born in 1810, set in a romantic landscaped park about 50 km (30 miles) west of Warsaw. Run as a branc…
Amusement parks
Piaseczno
A DeLorean of "Back to the Future" fame, a "Harry Potter"-style car, a Chevrolet Camaro and Thomas the Tank Engine — in Zalesie Górne near Warsaw there is a collection of more than 50 cars from films and cartoons. Dzielnica Filmowa (Film D…
Amusement parks
Mościska
Farma Iluzji ("Illusion Farm"; say "FAR-mah ee-LOO-zee") in the village of Mościska is a family amusement park in the forest of eastern Mazovia, roughly halfway between Warsaw and Lublin. Its 6 hectares hold more than 70 attractions: optic…