Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Historic sites
Grunwald
The Grunwald Battlefield (say "GROON-vahld") in northern Poland's Warmia-Masuria region is where, on July 15, 1410, the combined armies of the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania crushed the Teutonic Knights in one of the la…
Museums
Kraków
The Polonia Wax Museum at ul. Floriańska 32, on the route between the Main Market Square and St Florian's Gate, displays wax figures of politicians, clergy, athletes, actors and fictional characters. It has earned an unusual reputation: ma…
Museums
Łańcut
The Stables and Coach House at Łańcut Castle (say "WAHN-tsoot") hold one of Europe's most remarkable collections of horse-drawn carriages – and, unusually, it is still displayed in the very buildings where the Potocki family kept it. A sho…
Zoos
Władysławowo
The Bird House (Ptaszarnia) in the port of Władysławowo is the opposite of a typical parrot house. In a large covered tent at Hryniewieckiego 1, among tropical greenery, live more than a hundred small exotic birds – they do not land on you…
Landmarks
Gdańsk
The Main Town Hall in Gdańsk is the city's most recognizable landmark: a Gothic and Renaissance brick building whose slender tower, crowned by a gilded statue of King Sigismund Augustus, rises above Long Street and Long Market. Inside is t…
Museums
Bielsk Podlaski
The yellow town hall in the middle of the square in Bielsk Podlaski looks modest, but it has nearly 250 years and many lives behind it: it has been a court, a guardhouse, shops, offices and a library. Instead of the usual weather vane, a t…
Landmarks
Toruń
The Old Town Hall in Toruń (pronounced roughly "TOR-oon") is the Gothic heart of one of Poland's best-preserved medieval cities, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1997. For centuries this single brick building housed the city council, the…
Landmarks
Chełmno
The white town hall in the middle of a vast market square is Chełmno's calling card and one of the finest Renaissance buildings in northern Poland. On its west wall hangs an iron rod 432.5 centimetres long – the standard measure of length…
Landmarks
Lubin
The white town hall with a copper-clad tower is the most recognisable building in Lubin, a town now known mainly for its copper mines. Inside is the Historical Museum, where you can step into a recreated flat of a mining family from the co…
Landmarks
Siedlce
At the top of the Siedlce town hall tower stands Atlas carrying a golden globe, and for generations locals have simply called him "Jacek". The whole building goes by the same name – a late Baroque and Neoclassical town hall from 1763–1773,…
Landmarks
Środa Śląska
On the wall of a Gothic cell in the tower of Środa's town hall, a prisoner once scratched the date "1413". It is one of the reminders of the time when the tower, built in the first half of the 14th century, served as a prison and torture c…
Landmarks
Świebodzin
Every day at noon, the town bugle call composed by Edmund Wilgocki sounds from the tower of Świebodzin's town hall. The building stands in the very middle of the market square, and its pale, striped façade with battlements looks like a cas…
Landmarks
Szczytno
Szczytno Town Hall looks like a medieval stronghold, but it is a reinforced-concrete building from 1936–1937, partly erected on the ruins of a Teutonic castle. A 46-metre tower rises above the four-winged block with its inner courtyard, an…
Landmarks
Trzebnica
The town hall with its clock tower closes off Trzebnica's market square, a few hundred metres from the Basilica of St Hedwig. Built in 1868, it combines civic offices with a small regional museum, and its stepped gables are a handy landmar…
Landmarks
Zamość
Zamość Town Hall is the defining landmark of Zamość (say "ZAH-moshch"), the Renaissance planned town in southeastern Poland. Set into the north side of the Great Market Square, it rises to a 52-meter (170 ft) clock tower and is fronted by…
Landmarks
Wrocław
The Old Town Hall in Wrocław (say "VROTS-wahf") is the showpiece of the city's Market Square and one of the best-preserved medieval town halls in Central Europe. Built over roughly 250 years, its brick walls, lacy stone gables and slender…
Historic sites
Wiślica
Beneath and beside the Gothic collegiate church in Wiślica lie the foundations of three Romanesque churches, and in the crypt the Orants Slab – a gypsum floor with incised figures from around 1175–1177, unique worldwide. The relics are sho…
Museums
Poznań
Ulica ks. Posadzego on Poznań's Ostrów Tumski runs along the crest of a stronghold rampart from the time of Mieszko I, Poland's first historical ruler: its structure begins about a metre below the cobbles and reaches almost six metres down…
Museums
Częstochowa
Beside a viaduct on Aleja Pokoju in the Raków district lie people buried about 2,700 years ago – exactly where they were laid to rest. The Lusatian Culture Archaeological Reserve is a pavilion built directly over part of an ancient cemeter…
Museums
Poznań
The Croissant Museum in Poznań (Rogalowe Muzeum Poznania, roughly "ro-GAH-lo-veh moo-ZEH-oom") is a lively, hands-on show rather than a museum of display cases. Right on the Old Market Square, costumed hosts teach you how Poznań's famous S…
Churches & monasteries
Siewierz
In the cemetery in Siewierz stands the little stone Church of St John the Baptist – one of the oldest churches in Poland. It was probably built in 1144 or 1164, and the magnate Piotr Włostowic is regarded as its founder. The building measu…
Churches & monasteries
Ogrodzieniec
On a rise in the centre of Giebło, a village in the municipality of Ogrodzieniec, stands the Church of St James the Apostle – one of the oldest Romanesque village churches in Lesser Poland. The exact building date is unknown, but analysis…
Historic sites
Zamość
The Zamość Rotunda is a circular 19th-century gun battery that became a German Gestapo prison and execution site during World War II. Today it is the Mausoleum of the Martyrdom of the Zamość Region, a memorial museum surrounded by a vast c…
Historic sites
Gdańsk
The BHP Hall of the Gdańsk Shipyard (Sala BHP, pronounced "SAH-lah beh-hah-PEH") is a modest brick building inside the former shipyard where, on August 31, 1980, striking workers and the communist government signed the August Agreements –…