Wielka Racza

Wielka Racza (1,236 m) is the highest summit of the Wielka Racza group in the Żywiec-Kysuce Beskids and one of the best viewpoints on the Polish–Slovak border. The forest ends abruptly and gives way to a grassy summit meadow with a viewing tower and a PTTK mountain hut that has survived war, shelling and years of neglect since 1934. From the car park in Rycerka Górna it is roughly a two-hour walk to the top.

A mountain on the border

The main ridge of the Żywiec-Kysuce Beskids runs across the summit, carrying both the Poland–Slovakia border and the European watershed. At Wielka Racza the ridge changes direction, and a long side arm branches off westwards into Slovakia. The Polish slopes belong to the village of Rycerka Górna in the Rajcza municipality, while the Slovak side drops towards Oščadnica. With a topographic prominence of 391 m – a lot by Beskid standards – the summit offers a remarkably wide panorama.

Interestingly, the summit meadow was not cleared by shepherds. It is a natural grassland, even though the natural tree line in this part of the Beskids lies about 150 m higher, and it is fringed by a stunted beech forest that is natural too. On the Slovak side the Veľká Rača nature reserve (313 ha) was created in 1976 to protect fir and spruce forest and sandstone crevice caves known as "skalné diery"; black grouse and lynx live in the woods.

History: Vlach herders, outlaws and a mountain hut

The mountain is mentioned in a document as early as 1417. By the mid-16th century Vlach herders grazed their flocks here, and shepherds from the neighbouring estates of Budatín and Strečno fought bloody feuds over the pastures. Between the 17th and 19th centuries outlaws hid in these forests.

The hut opened on 17 December 1934: private owners started building it and the Bielsko branch of the Polish Tatra Society finished the job. In August 1939 Polish border guards used it to watch German troops gathering in the Kysuca valley, and in 1942 the Germans set up a Luftwaffe post with an observation tower and searchlights. In April 1945 the building was hit by two shells and then looted – the warden Bronisław Jarosz chased the looters, rifle in hand, all the way to Oščadnica. After the war the border zone was closed and the keys to the hut were handed out in Rycerka Górna by Karol Peterman, who had spent four years of the occupation hiding in these woods. In 1964 a PTTK commission came to decide on demolition but ordered a renovation instead.

Did you know?

• The name may come from the village of Rajcza, from the dialect word "rajczula" (a sheep pen) or from an Old Polish word for a knight. The chronicler Andrzej Komoniecki also recorded a legend about the lords of Żywiec and their Hungarian neighbours toasting a border agreement with wine on the summit – "raczyć się" means to treat oneself in Polish.
• The viewing tower was built jointly by Poles and Slovaks in 1997.
• From 1999 to 2007 a border crossing for hikers, cyclists and skiers operated here; today, within the Schengen area, you can simply walk across.

Tripto tip

The shortest ascent is the yellow trail from the State Forests car park in Rycerka Górna Kolonia: about 4.3 km and two hours up, with a stony path near the top. The red trail from Zwardoń via Magura takes around 4 hours 45 minutes. For a full day, walk a loop of about 20 km (almost 7 hours on foot): red along the border via Mała Racza and Kikula, blue to the Przegibek hut and green back down to Kolonia. The hut has about 50 beds, so you can stay overnight for sunset and sunrise on the summit. On the Slovak side lies the Snow Paradise Veľká Rača Oščadnica ski resort.