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The Pieniny National Park

(Pieninski Park Narodowy)

The main attraction of the Pieniny National Park is the rafting down the Dunajec River though the picturesque limestone ravine known as the Dunajec canyon. This experience has been available for over 150 years and is the easiest way to see the park. Rafting on the Dunajec

The Peininy National Park is the oldest National Park in Poland, established in 1932. It covers the central part of the Pieniny Mountains and offers a highly varied landscape. Sheer cliffs of limestone rocks and picturesque peaks towering over meandering river gorges are the most spectacular among them. The Flora in the Pieniny National park is very rich and unique. The most interesting among the natural ecosystems is rock grass– the most frequent habitant of endemic plants and relic pine forests with low and twisted old trees growing out of rocks, these are the only natural ecosystem of its kind. These relics have survived for thousands years without changes! A visit to the Peininy National Park is an opportunity to experience close contact with nature and an ideal chance to recover, both physically and mentally.

Fauna: To date, about 6,500 species have been found but presumably as many as 13,000 to 15,000 species live here (which constitutes to almost half of the Polish fauna). Thorough research of fauna, mainly invertebrate, conducted between 1971 and 1974 revealed 3,000 species new for the Pieniny, many of which were also new for Polish fauna. Some scientifically new species were also found. South European, in particular xero-thermophilous fauna is represented in the Pieniny National Park in significant numbers.

The Pieniny are built of a variety of limestone. Corn stone, the hardest type of limestone builds picturesque, almost vertical, white, rock walls along the Dunajec River. The best-known peak - Trzy Korony (Three Crowns) is 982 m a.s.l. And the highest peak in the whole of the Pieniny - Wysoka - 1,050 m a.s.l. Plain rocky walls surrounded by forests, isolated rocks often in the form of needles contrasted with rounded shapes of hills or gentle slopes covered by meadows and fields are typical features of the Pieniny landscape. As a result of the diversified geological structure, various development stages of mineral and organic soils are found in the Pieiny National Park. The soils differ from very shallow to very thick, from stony to loamy, from acidic to alkaline. The two most common soil types are calcareous and brown soils.

[Gallary from The Pieniny National Park]