Spa Park in Goczałkowice-Zdrój

The Spa Park in Goczałkowice-Zdrój is the green heart of one of only two spa resorts in the Silesian Voivodeship (the other is Ustroń). Historic pavilions from the second half of the 19th century stand along its paths, and the most valuable of them – the timber Old Pump Room of 1862 – has recently been restored to look as it did in the resort's heyday, and once again serves healing water.

History: brine instead of salt

It all began with a geological miss. In 1856 the Prussian authorities were drilling for rock salt here, but at a depth of 616 m they struck brine instead. The deposit was bought by a company whose partners included the builder Wilhelm Czech and the Pszczyna merchant Heinrich Schiller, and Adolf Babel became the spa's first physician. Between 1860 and 1862 the Old Spa House, a bathhouse, the pump room and a guesthouse were built, and the first treatment season opened in June 1862. Babel pushed for further investment: hotels, a steam bath, a music pavilion, a bowling alley and, of course, the spa park. The numbers show the result: in 1863 the resort treated 262 patients, and by 1895 it was 1,841. The suffix "Zdrój" (spa) was officially added to the municipality's name on 1 April 1932.

What to see

• The Old Pump Room (formerly Maria Quelle and Altes Badehaus) – a park pavilion with a timber frame, large polygonal windows and a hipped roof. According to the spa, it was once decorated with mother-of-pearl inlays and housed a marble basin on stone pedestals, from which guests could draw brine freely.
• The historic spa ensemble – the pump room, the "Górnik" and "Wrzos" pavilions and the administration building have been jointly listed as heritage monuments since 1992.
• Features added in the 2010–2015 revitalisation (around PLN 2.5 million): openwork gazebos, a sundial, chess tables, an outdoor gym and a brine graduation tower.
• The spa's inhalatorium with a graduation tower where, besides the classic blackthorn brushwood, brine aerosol generators are at work – according to the spa, the first hybrid facility of its kind in Poland.

Did you know

Restoration of the Old Pump Room began in mid-2022 and cost more than PLN 1 million. The conservators relied on stratigraphic tests and archival research, brought back the building's original colours, recreated the decorative boarding at ground level and laid a new floor. The project won first place in the national "Modernisation of the Year" competition in the "Small is Beautiful" category. Today the pump room offers crenotherapy – drinking cures with medicinal waters, five of which are available: Józef, Jan, Stefan, Helena and Józefina – and sells the local Goczała mineral water.

Tripto tips

• The resort mainly treats musculoskeletal, rheumatic and neurological conditions, so most people you meet in the park are spa patients. More than 10,000 come each year, so in season the paths get busy between treatment slots.
• Allow about an hour for a walk and a stop at the pump room. If you use the graduation tower in the inhalatorium, do not stay longer than 30 minutes and check the contraindications first.
• Goczałkowice-Zdrój has a station on the Katowice – Zwardoń railway line, and the park lies along Uzdrowiskowa Street. A walk here combines easily with a visit to the castle in nearby Pszczyna.