Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Landmarks
Banie Mazurskie
In the woods near the village of Rapa, between Banie Mazurskie and Gołdap, stands a stone pyramid 15.9 m high. It is the tomb of the Prussian barons von Fahrenheid, and the bodies laid inside became naturally mummified. So many legends hav…
Landmarks
Sandomierz
The Underground Tourist Route in Sandomierz (say "san-DOH-myesh") is a 470-meter (1,540-foot) walk through medieval and Renaissance merchants' cellars hidden beneath the town's Market Square, reaching 12 meters (40 feet) below the cobbles.…
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…
Landmarks
Malbork
Malbork is all about the castle, yet a few hundred metres from the Teutonic walls stands the town's other medieval landmark: a Gothic town hall dating from around 1380. It is one of only a handful of buildings from the old town that surviv…
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
Jawor
In 1895 Jawor's town hall burned almost to the ground – only the medieval tower survived. Within two years a new neo-Renaissance building rose around it, and its council chamber was fitted with stained-glass windows still regarded as the l…
Landmarks
Krotoszyn
Above Krotoszyn's market square rises a tower crowned by a baroque cupola with two lanterns, carrying a clock from 1897. The town hall was built in 1689, burned in a great town fire, came back in baroque form and at the end of the 19th cen…
Landmarks
Leszno
Leszno Town Hall (Leszno is pronounced roughly "LESH-no") stands in the middle of the market square of this small city in western Poland. With its tall clock tower and pale classical façades, it is the town's best-known landmark – a buildi…
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
Poznań
Poznań Town Hall (Ratusz, say "RAH-toosh") on the Old Market Square is one of the finest Renaissance town halls in Central Europe and the symbol of the city. Every day at noon two mechanical billy goats pop out above the clock and butt hea…
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
Stargard
The gable of Stargard's town hall looks like stone lace: stepped, divided by cornices into five tiers and filled with tracery of interlocking circles and pointed arches. Behind this façade stands one of the oldest monuments in town, whose…
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
Szczecinek
Every day at noon a bugle call rings out from the tower of Szczecinek Town Hall – an excerpt from Henryk Łabęda's song "Powróciłaś do nas ziemio" ("You Have Returned to Us, Land"), played from loudspeakers on all four sides of the tower si…
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
Szydłowiec
A white town hall with four corner turrets stands alone in the middle of the Main Market Square and can be seen from several kilometres away. Built of local stone between 1602 and 1629, it is one of the best-preserved late Renaissance town…
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
Wieluń
Wieluń has a town hall whose tower is a medieval city gate. In 1842 a late Neoclassical building designed by Henryk Marconi was added to the Gothic Kraków Gate – the only one of the town's old gates still standing. The clock on the tower h…
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
Zduny
The low, white town hall with a red roof and a little clock tower stands in the middle of the market square of the former town of Zduny Niemieckie ("German Zduny"). It was built in 1684, funded by Rafał Leszczyński, governor (voivode) of K…
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…
Landmarks
Świerklaniec
On a wooded hill east of Orzech, a village in the Świerklaniec municipality, stands a round stone tower that many take for the remains of a medieval castle. In fact it is an artificial ruin, most probably built in the 19th century as a gar…