Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Waterfalls
Sopotnia Wielka
The largest waterfall in the Polish Beskids is not hidden deep in the mountains but right in the middle of the village, just below the bridge over the Sopotnia stream. The water drops 10–12 m down a rock slab tilted at about 30° into a poo…
Waterfalls
Wisła
In Wisła Czarne, on the road from the town centre towards Lake Czerniańskie, the Wisełka stream drops in a wide curtain from a stone weir into a concrete basin. The waterfall is about 8 metres high and was built in the 1950s as a piece of…
Ski resorts
Korbielów
Korbielów (say "kor-BYEH-loof") is a small village in Poland's Żywiec Beskids whose ski area climbs the northeastern flanks of Pilsko (1,557 m / 5,108 ft). Pilsko is the highest ski mountain in Poland outside the Tatras. The mountain strad…
Nature
Miasteczko Śląskie
In the woods near Żyglin, a district of Miasteczko Śląskie, a small scrap of an old dune has survived – a flattened patch measuring about 20 by 40 metres. The rest of the sand was dug out in the 20th century for the coal-mining industry, a…
Museums
Żarki
By the churchyard square of the Leśniów sanctuary, in a brick cellar with early 20th-century arched vaults, lies a slice of the Jurassic seabed. The Exhibition of Jurassic Fossils and Minerals displays around 1,000 original specimens, most…
Nature
Bytom
Between the housing estates of Bytom, Chorzów and Piekary Śląskie lies a patchwork of ponds and reed beds that hosts an unusually large population of the little bittern, Poland's smallest heron. Żabie Doły ("Frog Hollows") grew out of subs…
Technical monuments
Rudy
Rudy lies almost exactly halfway along the former 51 km narrow-gauge line from Gliwice to Racibórz – which is why the largest station on the whole line was built here, with workshops, an engine shed and a track triangle for turning steam l…
Amusement parks
Wisła
In Wisła, the town near the source of Poland's longest river, you can walk the river's entire course in a few minutes. Zabytkowy Park Przygód, roughly "Heritage Adventure Park", in Kopczyński Park is a set of 10 miniatures of the best-know…
Museums
Częstochowa
A white, single-storey house with a tall tiled roof and a wooden porch sits in Staszic Park below Jasna Góra, looking as if it had been moved here from a village. In fact it was never a farm: it is an exhibition pavilion from 1909, designe…
Zoos
Pszczyna
The European Bison Show Farm in Pszczyna (PSHCHI-nah) lets you get close to Europe's heaviest land mammal in the leafy historic park of a small Silesian town. Its animals belong to the famous Pszczyna line of lowland bison, which helped sa…
Lakes
gmina Pilica
A few steps from the market square in Pilica, right by the springs of the river of the same name, lies a small reservoir whose shore offers a view of the town's church towers. In summer it has a bathing area with marked swimming zones and…
Lakes
Poraj
Poraj Reservoir was built not for holidaymakers but for steelworkers: its job was to store industrial water for the Częstochowa steelworks. Yet the planners allowed for recreation from the start, and recreation won. According to Poraj muni…
Lakes
Rybnik
Rybnik Reservoir (Zalew Rybnicki), which locals call the "Rybnik Sea", is a dammed lake on the Ruda river in the northern part of Rybnik, built for the Rybnik power station. For half a century it was famous for its warm water, which did no…
Lakes
Jaworzno
Where the excavators of the Szczakowa sand mine finished work in the 1960s, there is now water. Sosina Reservoir covers about 50 hectares and is surrounded by another 30 hectares of woodland and meadows. In summer it is the main beach for…
Lakes
Mstów
Tasarki is a small artificial reservoir fed by springs, tucked into the Warta valley on the edge of Mstów, a village a dozen or so kilometres from Częstochowa. With a sandy beach, a wooden jetty and pine woods around it, it is where locals…
Lakes
Kalety
In Zielona, a forest district of Kalety about 5 km from the town centre, the Mała Panew river spreads into two linked reservoirs. The older one has medieval roots: it formed where local smiths dug ore out of the riverbed. Today it means ba…
Museums
Podzamcze
The Kraków-Częstochowa Upland has its share of spooky tales – of a black dog, of a white lady and of a water demon. In Podzamcze, right next to the ruins of Ogrodzieniec Castle, they have been gathered under one roof. The Castle of Legends…
Castles
Podzamcze
Netflix chose these ruins for the Battle of Sodden in "The Witcher", Andrzej Wajda filmed "Revenge" (Zemsta) here, and in 1984 Iron Maiden recorded a film insert for "Hallowed Be Thy Name". Ogrodzieniec Castle in Podzamcze stands on the hi…
Museums
Gliwice
Despite its name, Piast Castle was never a ducal residence. The building on Pod Murami Street in Gliwice grew out of two medieval town-wall towers, served for centuries as an arsenal, prison and farm, and today houses a branch of the Gliwi…
Castles
Bielsko-Biała
Above Bolesław Chrobry Square, on the edge of the Old Town, stands the oldest and largest historic building in Bielsko-Biała. From a distance it looks like a 19th-century palace with a crenellated tower, but its walls hide a medieval borde…
Castles
Zebrzydowice
On the road from Jastrzębie-Zdrój to Cieszyn, beside a pond in the village of Kończyce Małe, stands a building nicknamed the "Wawel of Cieszyn". It owes the name to its Renaissance arcaded courtyard, something no other noble residence in t…
Castles
Lubliniec
In 1655 Lubliniec Castle sheltered Poland's most precious painting. Fearing the Swedes would seize it, the Pauline monks moved the image of Our Lady of Częstochowa here from Jasna Góra, and for a short time it was hidden by the castle's ow…
Castles
Pszczyna
Pszczyna Castle (say "PSHCHI-na") is a former princely residence in southern Poland that now houses one of the country's best-preserved aristocratic interiors. Around 80% of its furnishings are originals from the days of the Hochberg princ…
Castles
Sławków
On ul. Staropocztowa in Sławków, low stone walls rise out of the grass – the remains of a castle built by the bishops of Kraków at the end of the 13th century. When it was built, its circuit of walls, roughly 124 × 90 m, made it one of the…