The best family-friendly hikes and walks around Karczew

Kapliczka – a small cult building, erected along roads or at crossroads for votive, thanksgiving, ritual purposes etc., in its simplest form a wooden box with a picture or sculpture

The “Baza Torfy” educational center in Karczew is located near the “Na Torfach” nature reserve within the Czesław Łaszek Mazovian Landscape Park and is housed in a building of an over 100-year-old forester's lodge. Educational activities at “Baza Torfy” have been conducted since 1995.

Czarne Jeziorka are picturesque, mid-forest peat bogs located in the heart of the Mazowiecki Landscape Park (near Otwock and Karczew). Surrounded by lush bog and forest vegetation, they are an ideal place for hiking or cycling trips away from the urban hustle and bustle.

The park's landscape is formed by pine-covered dune chains and the marshy depressions separating them, often filled with peat.

As we read on the information board, the shrine was erected in 2004 on the initiative of the residents of Karczew, and the wooden figure was consecrated on November 17, 2004. For over twenty years, the sculpture has been welcoming walkers, cyclists, and all forest lovers, becoming a place for reflection, silent prayer, and contemplation. This depiction holds a special place in Polish tradition. Christ the Sorrowful was one of the most frequently recurring motifs in roadside shrines. It is in such simple, forest and field corners that one can most strongly see how spirituality, folk art, and landscape have intertwined over the centuries into a single narrative. The author of the sculpture is Stefan Lisowski (1928–2010) – an artist and sculptor, also associated with Mazovia. According to the board, he was the initiator of the "Kapliczka przydrożna" (Roadside Shrine) series of works and wanted to restore the motif of the wooden shrine to the Mazovian landscape. The Karczew figure is one such work – made from a single piece of wood. This is one of those places that one can pass by without knowing its history. Yet, it holds local memory, a beautiful tradition, and the trace of human work, which aimed to leave something lasting behind.

The best-known and best-camouflaged object of this type in the Mazovian Landscape Park are the bunkers on Dąbrowiecka Góra (also called Biała Góra), which are remnants of German fortifications from 1944 (the so-called Warsaw Bridgehead).

The bunkers of Dąbrowiecka Górka are among the best-preserved military objects from World War I and II in the Mazowiecki Landscape Park. Furthermore, they belong to the fortifications trail of the Warsaw Bridgehead 1915-1944.

A smaller shrine than the Marian one next to it. The renovation process and the history of this place are described on the information boards nearby. Interesting.