★ History and art · Kraków and aroundKrakówA district of avenues, arcades and monumental buildings designed as the ideal socialist city, with an ark-shaped church built by the workers.
The storyIn 1949 the communist government decided to build, next to Kraków, the city of intellectuals and the Church, a new town for the workers of a huge steelworks. Nowa Huta was laid out around a central square from which avenues radiate, with buildings in the Socialist Realist style. It was meant to be a town without churches, but the residents fought for years to have one: the Arka Pana, the Lord's Ark, was built with the volunteer labour of the faithful and consecrated in 1977 by Cardinal Karol Wojtyła.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ History and art · Tarnów and the eastBochniaThe oldest salt mine in Poland, less famous than Wieliczka, with an underground train, a wooden slide and the chance to sleep underground.
The storyRock salt was found in Bochnia in the mid-13th century, a few years before Wieliczka, and the mine was worked until 1990. The miners dug tunnels as deep as 468 metres and carved a large chapel in the salt dedicated to St Kinga, the Hungarian princess who, according to legend, brought salt to Poland by throwing her ring into a Hungarian mine. Since 2013 Bochnia has been part of the UNESCO site of the Royal Salt Mines, together with Wieliczka and the Saltworks Castle.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ Town · Auschwitz, Wadowice and the JuraLanckoronaA hilltop village with a sloping square surrounded by 19th-century wooden houses.
The storyLanckorona received town rights in the 14th century from Casimir the Great, who built the castle on the hill. In 1771 the castle was defended by the Bar Confederates against Suvorov's Russian troops. In 1869 a fire destroyed the town, which was rebuilt with the single-storey wooden houses you see today, with their porches and overhanging roofs. For years now, in December, the "Angel in the Town" festival has filled the streets with painted angels and nativity scenes, and Lanckorona is known as the village of angels.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ Town · Zakopane and the TatrasChochołówA highlanders' village whose main street is lined with houses of thick fir logs, which the residents wash and scrub until they turn pale.
The storyIn February 1846 the highlanders of Chochołów rose up against the Austrians, who then ruled Galicia, for Polish independence. The revolt lasted a few hours and was crushed, but the village has remained a patriotic symbol. The houses, built of whole logs squared with an axe, are among the best-preserved examples of Podhale architecture: every year, before Easter, many families wash them with soap and water.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ Town · The Pieniny and the Sącz regionStary SączA small town with a cobbled square and low houses, grown up around one of the oldest convents in Poland.
The storyIn 1280 Kinga, daughter of the King of Hungary and wife of the Polish prince Bolesław the Chaste, founded a convent of Poor Clares here, where she retired after her husband's death and died in 1292. The convent is still home to enclosed nuns. In 1999 John Paul II canonised St Kinga right here in Stary Sącz, before hundreds of thousands of the faithful, on an altar built in the meadows near the town.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ History and art · The Pieniny and the Sącz regionUście GorlickieA 17th-century Greek Catholic wooden church, with stepped onion domes and an iconostasis, in an almost deserted valley of the Low Beskids.
The storyUntil 1947 these valleys were home to the Lemkos, a mountain people of Greek Catholic or Orthodox faith. With Operation Vistula the communist government deported their families to the western regions of Poland, and many villages disappeared. The churches, the tserkvas, remained, some of them now used by Catholics: St Paraskeva's in Kwiatoń is considered the most harmonious and has been a UNESCO site since 2013, together with other wooden churches of the Carpathians in Poland and Ukraine.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ Town · Tarnów and the eastLipnica MurowanaA village with a square of arcaded houses and three old churches, famous for its Palm Sunday palms more than thirty metres tall.
The storyThe village received town rights in 1326 from King Władysław the Elbow-high. The 15th-century wooden church of St Leonard is one of the UNESCO-listed wooden churches of southern Lesser Poland. Since 1958, on Palm Sunday, Lipnica has held a palm contest: bundles of willow branches, dried flowers and herbs tied around long poles, which families prepare for weeks and carry in procession. The tallest exceed thirty metres.
Full page, why go and what's nearby →★ Town · Tarnów and the eastOlesnoThe painted village: houses, wells, barns and even dog kennels are decorated with colourful flowers, inside and out.
The storyAt the end of the 19th century the women of Zalipie began covering the soot stains in their chimneyless houses with lime drawings; then they moved on to flowers, with home-made paints and brushes of cow hair. The most famous painter was Felicja Curyłowa, whose house is now a museum. Since 1948 the village has held a competition, the "Painted Cottage", which still takes place every year on the weekend after Corpus Christi, when the houses are repainted.
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