Kolorowe Jeziorka

Pyrite and other ores were mined at Wieciszow in the Rudawy Janowickie until the 1920s, and the workings that were left filled with water - four small lakes, none of them large, whose colours come from dissolved minerals leaching out of the surrounding rock and spoil: the Blue lake takes its shade from copper and iron compounds, the Purple one from oxidised pyrite, the Green from suspended matter and the small Yellow one from sulphur compounds, with the exact tones shifting with rainfall, season and light. The colours are real and are the reason people walk up, and they are also a straightforward consequence of acid mine drainage, which is worth naming - this is contaminated water, and swimming in the lakes is not advised. The walk is about an hour from the villages through forest with a marked loop past all four, and there are old adits and spoil heaps along it.

What you actually see

• Four coloured lakes - blue, purple, green and yellow from different dissolved minerals.
• Shifting tones - the colours changing with rain, season and light.
• Acid mine drainage - the mechanism behind the colours, and why not to swim.
• Old workings - adits and spoil heaps along the forest loop.

When to go

April to October; bright days for the colour. Half a day.

Honest expectations

The water is contaminated by mine drainage - do not swim in or drink it. Colours vary and can be muted after rain or in dull weather. The walk up is about an hour each way. Photographs online are often heavily saturated.

Nearby

Sokoliki rocks are north; Kamienna Gora is south.