Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Pińczów
The Old Synagogue in Pińczów is a stone synagogue built in 1594–1609, one of the oldest surviving Jewish houses of prayer in Poland and the only well-preserved trace of the once large Jewish community of the Ponidzie region. It stands on K…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Szydłów
From the outside it looks like a small fortress: stone walls about 2 metres thick, heavy buttresses and an attic parapet resembling battlements. Szydłów Synagogue, built in the 16th century within the town walls, is the oldest surviving sy…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Bielsko-Biała
Szyndzielnia takes its name from the local dialect word szyndzioł, meaning a wooden roof shingle: villagers from Kamienica and Olszówka made shingles for the town of Bielsko from timber felled on its slopes. Today you ride up the mountain…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Soblówka
Wielka Rycerzowa (1,226 m) is a border peak in a remote corner of the Żywiec Beskids, where water running off one slope ends up in the Baltic and off the other in the Black Sea. The summit itself is partly wooded, but right next to it lies…
Hidden gemLandmarks
Siedlęcin
The Ducal Tower in Siedlęcin (say "shed-WEN-cheen") is a 14th-century residential tower on the Bóbr River, a few kilometers northwest of Jelenia Góra in Lower Silesia. It is among the largest medieval tower houses in Central Europe, but it…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
gmina Mirsk
The highest peak of the Izera Mountains has neither a tower nor a mountain hut — instead it has a gentle, treeless dome covered in meadows, which shows clearly what happened to the forests of the Sudetes in the 1980s. Wysoka Kopa (1,126 m,…
Hidden gemCastles
Proszówka
The castle is said to take its name from a large griffin once painted on the chapel wall. Gryf, Greiffenstein in German, was for almost four centuries the family seat of the Schaffgotsch dynasty — one of the most powerful families in Siles…
Hidden gemCastles
Świny
Świny near Bolków is one of the oldest strongholds in Lower Silesia and the oldest privately owned castle in present-day Poland. The chronicler Cosmas first mentions it under the year 1108, and for five centuries it was the seat of the Świ…
Hidden gemCastles
Bydlin
For years the ruin on a wooded hill in Bydlin divided scholars: some considered it a castle, others a church from start to finish. The question was settled only by excavations in 1989, which uncovered the foundations of a gate tower and a…
Hidden gemCastles
Dębno
Dębno Castle near Brzesko is a rare case of a medieval magnate's residence that has survived almost unchanged. Built in 1470–1480 for the Crown Chancellor Jakub Dębiński (Jakub of Dębno), it still has its brick body with turrets, Gothic or…
Hidden gemCastles
Głogówek
Głogówek Castle (say "gwo-GOO-vek") is the former seat of the Oppersdorff counts in a small town in Poland's Opole Province, and the place where Ludwig van Beethoven stayed in 1806. He dedicated his Symphony No. 4 in B-flat major, Op. 60 t…
Hidden gemCastles
Janowiec
Janowiec Castle (say "yah-NOH-vyets") is a Renaissance magnate residence perched on a cliff above the Vistula River, directly across from the popular little town of Kazimierz Dolny in eastern Poland. Part ruin, part carefully rebuilt museu…
Hidden gemCastles
Stary Wiśnicz
Wiśnicz Castle (say "VEESH-neech") is a Baroque hilltop residence of the powerful Lubomirski family, ringed by star-shaped bastion fortifications, near the town of Nowy Wiśnicz about 50 km southeast of Kraków. Run by the Museum of the Wiśn…
Hidden gemCastles
Ojców
King Casimir the Great is said to have named his new stronghold "Ociec" (an old form of "father") in memory of his father, Władysław the Elbow-high, who according to tradition hid in the nearby caves while fighting for the Kraków throne. T…
Hidden gemCastles
Racibórz
Piast Castle in Racibórz was the seat of the dukes of Racibórz and Opole-Racibórz and is one of the oldest castles in Upper Silesia, standing on the Oder right next to the old town. After a thorough restoration it houses a museum with exhi…
Hidden gemCastles
Ząbkowice Śląskie
In 1467 the citizens of Wrocław besieged the castle at Ząbkowice Śląskie, but their stone cannonballs made no impression on walls almost 3 metres thick. They took the fortress only with the help of the "great gun" — a cannon weighing 80 hu…
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…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Bochnia
The wall paintings in St Kinga's Chapel were designed by Jan Matejko, Poland's great history painter, and the rebuilding of the church after the fire of 1655 was funded by King John Casimir in this salt-mining town. The Basilica of St Nich…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Piekary Śląskie
In 1680 Emperor Leopold I asked for the image of Our Lady of Piekary to be brought to plague-stricken Prague, where it was carried in procession through the streets. Three years later King John III Sobieski prayed before it on his way to t…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Wisła
Cieślar is the most common surname in Wisła: as early as 1621, just after the village was founded, four Cieślar families lived here. They gave their name to this grassy summit on the Czech border, about 920 m above sea level (sources give…
Hidden gemGardens
Rudy
The ponds, dykes, forests and road layout around Rudy are largely the work of monks who arrived here in 1258. The Cistercian Landscape Compositions of Rudy Wielkie Landscape Park protects not only nature but also a landscape designed by Ci…
Hidden gemNature
Wólka Piaseczna
Czerwone Bagno, the Red Marsh, is one of the wildest places in Central Europe: raised bogs with stunted pines and birches, bog forest and old dunes roamed by moose and wolves. It has been protected for almost a hundred years and is now a 2…
Hidden gemNature
Zakopane
Gąsienicowa Valley (roughly gon-sheh-nee-TSOH-vah) is one of the most rewarding day hikes in Poland's Tatra Mountains, rising above the resort town of Zakopane inside Tatra National Park. At its heart lies the high pasture of Hala Gąsienic…
Nature
Brzegi
The Valley of the Five Polish Ponds is a high mountain basin in the High Tatras, home to the largest and deepest lake in the Tatra Mountains. Despite the name there are actually six lakes, and above the Front Pond stands Poland's highest m…