Discover places worth seeing — from historic sites to mountain trails.
Museums
Racibórz
Before she was born, her parents asked the oracle of the goddess Amaunet about their child's fate and were told: "she will live". That is the meaning of the name Djed-Amaunet-ius-ankh – an Egyptian woman who died around 2,800 years ago age…
Museums
Tarnowskie Góry
In August 1683, on his way to relieve Vienna, King Jan III Sobieski stopped in Tarnowskie Góry and said goodbye to Queen Marie Casimire here. Memorabilia of that episode, a painted 17th-century ceiling and a collection of old European pain…
Other
Katowice
The NOSPR building in Katowice, home of the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, is one of Europe's finest modern concert halls and the most striking piece of architecture in the city. Clad in dark brick with vivid red recesses, it st…
Palaces
Świerklaniec
The palace in Nakło Śląskie looks as if it had been lifted from the English countryside: Tudor-style neo-Gothic, stepped gables and a slender tower raised in 1891. It was built by one of Upper Silesia's richest industrialists, Count Hugo I…
Palaces
Będzin
Not far from Będzin Castle, in the Gzichów district, stands a palace whose drawing rooms revealed ancient commanders – Hannibal, Pompey and Scipio Africanus – only during restoration work in the late 20th century. The Mieroszewski Palace o…
Palaces
Koszęcin
Koszęcin Palace (pronounced roughly "ko-SHEN-cheen") is a large late-neoclassical palace in a landscaped park in Silesia, southern Poland, and since 1953 the home of the Śląsk Song and Dance Ensemble – one of Poland's best-known folk ensem…
Gardens
Gliwice
The Gliwice Palm House (Palmiarnia Miejska, roughly "pahl-MYAR-nya") is a large botanical glasshouse in Chopin Park in the center of Gliwice, a city in Poland's Upper Silesian industrial region. Its five pavilions hold palms brought here i…
Other
Ustroń
Ustroń is the only town in the Silesian Beskids with official spa status, yet for a long time it had no pump room of its own. Today a glazed pavilion stands in the Spa Park in Zawodzie, on ul. Sanatoryjna, its shape echoing Ustroń's famous…
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…
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…
Museums
Częstochowa
In 1661 King John Casimir received Cossack envoys in this hall, and the next day the ambassadors of the Tsar – for a few days a monastery room became the throne room of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Knights' Hall on the first flo…
Churches & monasteries
Żarki
According to tradition, in 1382 Duke Władysław of Opole, who was carrying the Black Madonna icon to Jasna Góra, stopped in the forest near Żarki and prayed for water – and a spring gushed from beneath a stone. The Shrine of Our Lady of Leś…
Churches & monasteries
Korbielów
The brick church with a red roof in the centre of Korbielów holds a painting that has travelled a long way: from Bohorodczany in Poland's former eastern borderlands, now in Ukraine, to this village below Pilsko. Since 1974 the image of the…
Churches & monasteries
Zawiercie
In Skarżyce, a separate village until 1977 and now part of Zawiercie, stands a church you could not mistake for any other in the Jura. Three white chapel rotundas, symbolising the Holy Trinity, adjoin a 12th-century stone tower. The Church…
Churches & monasteries
gmina Pilica
The painting before which pilgrims pray in Pilica-Biskupice measures just 37.5 × 25 cm, and according to tradition it was found in a roadside inn by a bishop who stumbled upon two boards that together formed an image of the Virgin. Today t…
Churches & monasteries
Częstochowa
Pauline monks have lived on this limestone hill in Częstochowa since 1382, when Duke Władysław of Opole brought them from Hungary. The monastery holds the icon of the Black Madonna of Częstochowa. It is the most important pilgrimage site f…
Churches & monasteries
Przyrów
On the traditional pilgrim route to Jasna Góra, about 35 km east of Częstochowa, a late Gothic wooden figure of St Anne with the Virgin and Child has been venerated for more than five hundred years. Around it grew a Baroque monastery compl…
Churches & monasteries
Koziegłowy
The image of St Anthony in Koziegłówki was painted in Rome and blessed by Pope Pius V in 1568. It reached this village in the Kraków-Częstochowa Upland in the 17th century and now hangs in a church that looks more like an Italian basilica…
Fortifications
Węgierska Górka
The concrete walls of this bunker still bear the marks of shells from September 1939. "Wędrowiec" was the heart of the defence of Węgierska Górka: Captain Tadeusz Semik commanded from here, and the crew surrendered only after three days of…
Mountains & peaks
Brenna
On the ridge of Grabowa, archaeologists have found traces of Middle Palaeolithic early humans, probably of the Mousterian culture. Today, right next to the summit of this mountain (907 m), stands Chata Grabowa — a lodge in highland style,…
Museums
Katowice
In the Brynów district of Katowice stands the red-brick former clothing store of the Wujek coal mine. On 16 December 1981, three days after martial law was declared in communist Poland, a special riot-police (ZOMO) platoon fired on strikin…
Museums
Pszczyna
The ducal horses of Pszczyna lived in a Gothic Revival hall with rib vaults resting on cast-iron columns, each in one of 36 stalls – the interior looks more like a church than a stable block. The Ducal Stables on ul. Basztowa, a few steps…
Museums
Milówka
The Old Cottage (Stara Chałupa) at 1 Piastowska Street in Milówka is a timber house built in 1739, one of the oldest surviving examples of folk architecture in the Żywiec region. Today it houses a small museum run by the municipal cultural…