Poprad Landscape Park

The Poprad is unusual: it rises in Slovakia on the southern side of the Tatras and then cuts north through the Carpathian ridge into Poland, which is the wrong way for a river in this region and gives the valley its shape - a wooded gorge with the border running through it and a railway threading along the bank. The park covers about fifty thousand hectares of that country, mostly beech and fir, and what made the valley prosperous is underground: carbonated mineral waters come up along faults here in quantity, and the spa towns of Krynica, Muszyna, Zegiestow and Piwniczna were built on them from the nineteenth century, with pump rooms, promenades and wooden villas. Several springs are free to drink from and the waters are heavily mineralised and taste of it. Walking is on gentle wooded ridges. The Lemko villages of the valley have wooden churches, several of them UNESCO-listed in the wider group.

What you actually see

• A river running north - the Poprad cutting through the Carpathian ridge the wrong way.
• Carbonated springs - mineral waters rising along faults, free to drink at the pump rooms.
• Nineteenth-century spas - Krynica, Muszyna and Zegiestow with villas and promenades.
• Lemko wooden churches - in the valley villages, several UNESCO-listed.

When to go

May to October. Two days.

Honest expectations

The mineral waters are strongly flavoured and not to everyone's taste. Spa towns are busy in summer and prices rise. Walking here is gentle rather than dramatic. Some wooden churches are locked and need a keyholder.

Nearby

Krynica-Zdroj is east; Nowy Sacz is north down the valley.