National parks

Wigry National Park

Wigry National Park, established in 1989 in the southern Suwałki region, is one of Poland's larger national parks — it covers some 151 km2 of lakeland, forests and peat bogs spread around Lake Wigry. The lake itself, reaching 73 m in depth, is among the cleanest and deepest in the country, famed for its population of noble crayfish, a living indicator of water purity. As many as 42 lakes are scattered across the park, and moose, wolves and beavers roam its forests.

The park's emblem is the 17th-century Camaldolese monastery in Wigry, picturesquely set on a peninsula jutting into the lake. It was here that the young priest Karol Wojtyła used to rest, canoeing the Czarna Hańcza river — and as Pope John Paul II he returned to Wigry in 1999. Today the monastery houses the Wigry Museum, while the villages of Krzywe and Czerwony Folwark offer nature and fishing-history exhibitions.

Wigry is above all about water: paddling the Czarna Hańcza with a finale on the lake is one of Poland's classic canoe routes, and a popular cycling loop circles the Wigry. Viewpoints open onto panoramas of the lake and the Augustów Primeval Forest.

Practical tips: visit between May and September and allow at least half a day. An entrance card is required (buy it online or at information points) and it also covers the park's exhibitions. Remember this is Poland's so-called "pole of cold" — even in July, evenings get distinctly chilly.