Tatra National Park

Tatra National Park (Polish: Tatrzaski Park Narodowy; abbr. TPN) is a National Park located in the Tatra Mountains in the Maopolska Region in southern Poland, bordering Slovakia. It was created in 1954 on an area of 215.56 km The Park has its headquarters in the town of Zakopane. There is also a similar national park on the Slovakian side of the border, called Tatransk The first calls for protection of The Tatras came at the end of the 19th century. In 1925 the first efforts to create a national park, in cooperation with Slovakia, took place.

Formally the park was created in 1937, on an area that belonged to the state forests authority. In 1947, a separate administrative unit, Tatra Park, was created. And in 1954, by decision of the Polish Government, Tatra National Park was created. In 1992, the Polish and Slovakian national parks in the Tatras were jointly designated a transboundary biosphere reserve by UNESCO under its Man and the Biosphere programme. The National Park covers the only Alpine mountain range in Poland. The highest peak in Poland, Rysy (2,499 m AMSL), is located here. The Polish Tatra range, which is a part of the Carpathian Mountains, is divided into two parts: High Tatras (Tatry Wysokie) and Western Tatras (Tatry Zachodnie). The landscape consists of sharp-edged peaks and hollows with numerous rock formations. There are around 650 caves, of which the cave system Wielka Sniezna is the longest (18 km) and the deepest (maximum depth 814 m). Six caves of the system are open to public.