Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Hidden gemLandmarks
Lanckorona
On the wooded summit of Lanckorońska Góra in 1771, Polish insurgents of the Bar Confederation stopped none other than Alexander Suvorov — the Russian corps suffered heavy losses here and had to retreat. All that remains of King Casimir the…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Prudnik
In this forest monastery near Prudnik, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński spent a year as a prisoner of Poland's communist authorities — and it was here, reading Sienkiewicz's historical novel "The Deluge", that he came up with the idea of renewing…
Hidden gemChurches & monasteries
Różanystok
The Różanystok Sanctuary (say “roo-ZHAH-nee-stok”) is a late-Baroque minor basilica and one of the main Catholic pilgrimage sites in Podlasie, Poland's quiet north-eastern corner near the borders with Belarus and Lithuania. Its twin-towere…
Hidden gemMuseums
Chabówka
At Chabówka near Rabka, more than 100 historic railway vehicles stand on the tracks, and some of them still run. It is the largest collection of heritage rolling stock in Poland and one of the few places where you don't just look at steam…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Brenna
The name has nothing to do with the shape of the mountain. On its western summit the boundaries of three communities meet – Wisła, Ustroń and Brenna – and the shepherds and settlers of old marked them with mounds of piled stones ("kopce").…
Hidden gemOld towns & squares
Gdańsk
Mariacka Street (St Mary's Street) in Gdańsk is the most atmospheric lane in the Main Town: cobbled, car-free and lined with stone terraces, gargoyle drainpipes and amber workshops. It runs about 185 m from St Mary's Basilica down to St Ma…
Hidden gemNature
Sandomierz
Queen Jadwiga’s Ravine (Wąwóz Królowej Jadwigi, roughly “VON-voos kroo-LOH-vey yad-VEE-gee”) in Sandomierz is the town’s largest loess ravine: a sunken green corridor about half a kilometer long, with earthen walls several stories high and…
Hidden gemMountains & peaks
Rościszów
In May 1904 the rotten stairs of the first tower on Wielka Sowa gave way under two tourists from Wrocław – both fell to the floor below and escaped unhurt, and the wooden structure was pulled down that autumn. Two years later a solid 25-me…
Hidden gemMuseums
gmina Łubowo
This is more than a collection of old farmhouses. The open-air museum in Dziekanowice, on Lake Lednica, was designed to recreate the structure of a traditional Wielkopolska village: farmsteads gathered around a village square, a wooden chu…
Hidden gemViewpoints
Cieszyn
Of the four towers that once defended the castle of the Dukes of Cieszyn, only one survives. Climb the 120 steps of the Piast Tower and you reach a terrace overlooking two towns on either side of the Olza River — Polish Cieszyn and Czech Č…
Hidden gemWaterfalls
Przesieka
In 2007 this waterfall came close to losing most of its water to a small hydroelectric plant. Today Podgórna Falls in Przesieka still roars into its granite pool and is the third-highest waterfall in the Polish part of the Giant Mountains…
Hidden gemLakes
Kamień Pomorski
From the waterfront in Kamień Pomorski you look out over flat water, reed beds and a green island – and in the shallows off that island lies a granite giant carried here from Sweden by an ice sheet. Kamień Lagoon (Zalew Kamieński) is a wid…
Hidden gemCastles
Opole
Opole once had two castles, and of the second, "upper" one, a single Gothic tower survives, now embedded in school buildings. It was built at the end of the 14th century by Duke Władysław II of Opole – a prince who served as Palatine of Hu…
Hidden gemCastles
Ścinawka Górna
Just over a decade ago, Sarny Castle was a ruin that the state was unable to sell, and even the then Prince Charles took an interest in it. Today this Renaissance and Baroque residence on a bluff above the Włodzica River is one of the most…
Hidden gemCastles
Wałbrzych
For most of the 20th century Old Książ (Stary Książ) was thought to be a sham ruin – a folly invented for the Hochberg family's romantic park. Only archaeological research in the 1990s confirmed that beneath the 18th-century "stage set" li…
Hidden gemCastles
Świecie
The ruins on a gneiss crag above the village of Świecie near Leśna are not the castle on the Vistula of the same name, but one of three strongholds of the old Queis District (Okręg Kwisy) on the border between Silesia and Lusatia. Over the…
Hidden gemCastles
Uniejów
The Archbishops of Gniezno once kept their cathedral's treasury and archive in Uniejów — today hotel guests sleep within the same walls, warmed by geothermal water from beneath the town. Built in 1360–1365 on the Warta River, the castle is…
Hidden gemCastles
Chudów
The ruin at Chudów looks like a romantic relic of war, but much of it is the product of 19th-century fashion: after a fire in 1875 the owner had only part of the walls secured and the rest pulled down to create a "picturesque ruin". Today…
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…
Hidden gemCastles
Kazimierz Dolny
Kazimierz Dolny Castle is a 14th-century royal stronghold in ruins on a hill above the Vistula, together with an even older round watchtower that once guarded a river crossing. Climbing up from the Market Square takes only a short walk, an…
Hidden gemCastles
Kętrzyn
Kętrzyn Castle is a Gothic Teutonic Order stronghold built around 1360–1374, the oldest monument of the former Rastenburg and today home to the Wojciech Kętrzyński Museum and the town library. The three-winged brick building tells the stor…
Hidden gemCastles
Międzylesie
Above the Renaissance portal of Międzylesie Castle runs a frieze of sixteen coats of arms of Silesian and Bohemian noble families – a pedigree carved in stone. Behind it stands a building that shows three eras at once: the medieval Black T…
Hidden gemCastles
Niemodlin
"Stained-glass windows" made of coloured foil still hang in the cloisters, and in the courtyard you can see monks' cell frames painted on plywood – souvenirs of the film "Jasminum", which Jan Jakub Kolski shot in the then-ruined castle. Ni…
Hidden gemCastles
Tarnowskie Góry
For decades under communism, the Renaissance castle of the Wrochem family in Tarnowice Stare served as the headquarters of a state farm and decayed so badly that the town struggled for years to find a buyer. In 2000 it was bought by Krysty…