Przemysl Old Town

Przemysl is one of the oldest towns in Poland, on a hill above the San, and it looks Austrian because it was: the town spent a century and a half under Habsburg rule as the centre of a fortress complex begun in the 1850s and expanded until 1914 into a ring of over forty forts across a perimeter of about forty-five kilometres, at the time among the largest in Europe. Many of the forts survive in the fields and woods around the city and are visited on foot and by bicycle. The town itself has a steeply sloping market square, a Roman Catholic cathedral with a Renaissance chapel, a Greek Catholic cathedral in a former Jesuit church - the Ukrainian Greek Catholic archeparchy is seated here - a clock tower holding a museum of bells and pipes, and Kazimierz's castle above. It is the last major Polish town before the Ukrainian border and has always been a crossing point.

What you actually see

• A fortress ring - over forty forts across a forty-five-kilometre perimeter.
• A sloping market square - Austrian-era facades on the hill above the San.
• Two cathedrals - Roman Catholic and Greek Catholic, both in the centre.
• A bell and pipe museum - in the town's clock tower.

When to go

April to October. A day.

Honest expectations

The forts are scattered across countryside and need a car, a bike or a long walk; most are unrestored and some are unsafe to enter. Museums close on Mondays. The town is hilly.

Nearby

Krasiczyn castle is ten kilometres west; the Bieszczady are south.