May weekend on the Czarna Hańcza trail

What if you could spend a picnic wandering along the river valley? Walk for hours among gentle hills and murmuring streams, climbing to the next viewpoints? Why not run away from the busy reality straight to the landscape park?

"You praise others, you do not know your own, you do not know what you have" - the old saying works perfectly well, especially when we are talking about Polish tourist attractions. Our country has a lot to be proud of when it comes to beautiful places, and one of them is undoubtedly the Suwałki Landscape Park (SPK), the oldest in Poland. There are melting and gutter lakes, river valleys and terminal moraines - a unique postglacial landscape.

Wandering the trails of the SPK

There are many picturesque spots in the park area. One of them is Hańcza - the deepest Polish lake with a beach covered with boulders. Its banks are surrounded by a high and steep escarpment, so there is practically no vegetation on them. In turn, the submerged vegetation consists of species characteristic of clean, deep and transparent waters, not found anywhere in the lowlands except Hańcza.

Both the flora and fauna of the reservoir are rare. Due to its uniqueness, in 1963 a decision was made to create a water-landscape reserve "Lake Hańcza".

On the trail of Czarna Hańcza

The largest river in the Suwałki Region - Czarna Hańcza - flows into the reservoir. He begins his journey in the vicinity of the village of Okliny, in the buffer zone of the park, and then flows into the lake with a narrow stream and leaves it as a rushing stream in Bachanów. Behind the village, it runs along a narrow tunnel, not exceeding 250 meters in width, to Turtula.

In the next episode, it takes the form of the Turtul pond backwaters, and below it turns into a river valley overgrown with riparian forest. Here, over a kilometer wide, Czarna Hańcza meanders in a dignified manner. You can get to know the entire route of the river during the walk along the cognitive path "Dolina Czarna Hańcza" .

A visit to Wodziki

The best viewpoint of the SPK is Suwałki Fujiyama . From its top there is a wonderful panorama of the hills, meadows, lakes and peat bogs filling the bottom of Szeszupa.

Tourists who go for a walk along the cognitive path "At the sources of Szeszupy" will visit the village of Wodziki . It is inhabited by several families of Old Believers - religious refugees from Russia. There are several wooden houses and farm buildings as well as steam baths in the village (those willing to take a bath in the "black bath" steam room). The wood is also molenna, the temple was built in the 20s of the last century.

Another village, Smolniki , is considered to be the tourist gateway to the northern part of the Suwałki Landscape Park. At the crossroads of its roads, there is a boulder commemorating the fact that the park was created, and the town itself is very popular among tourists who want to rest away from the hustle and bustle of civilization. The cognitive path "Around Lake Jaczno" runs through it.

Overnight on the Wigry

People looking for accommodation in the vicinity of SPK can stay in a center located directly on the Wigry, approx. 10 km from Suwałki. This is the Hańcza Water Club , waiting for guests in the village of Stary Folwark. The great advantage of the location is clean air and silence as well as a wonderful view of the lake. The whole area is fenced. The cost of putting up a tent or caravan is PLN 10 / day per person.

Tourists will find accommodation in 3, 4 and 7-person rooms with a kitchen, toilet and shower, a campsite with barbecue and bonfire places, as well as pitches for caravans with the possibility of connecting to electricity and an unguarded parking lot. Guests have at their disposal, among others fast food café-bar. The center is open from May 1 to September 30. Visitors can rent water equipment.

It's green and quiet here - sometimes so much that you can almost hear a murmur of blood in your veins. This is the perfect place to recharge your batteries and saturate your eyes with the beauty of nature.