When I talk to my friends here in the US, they ask me about polish geography. So I wanted to talk about it today. Let’s get all the simple facts together, like where exactly the country is located, who are Poland’s neighbors and what kind of terrain dominates the landscape.
Generally speaking, Poland is a land reaching from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Carpathian Mountains in the south. Within that land, terrain variations generally run in bands from east to west. The Baltic coast lacks natural harbors except for the Gdańsk-Gdynia region and Szczecin in the far northwest. The northeastern region, called the Lake District, is densely wooded (gęsto zalesiony), sparsely populated (rzadko zaludniony) and lacks agricultural and industrial resources. To the south and west of the Lake District, a vast region (obszerny, rozległy region) of land extends to the Sudetes on the Czech and Slovak borders to the southwest and to the Carpathians on the Czech, Slovak, and Ukrainian borders to the southeast
The country extends 876 kilometers from north to south and 689 kilometers from east to west. Poland’s total area is 312,843 square kilometers, including inland waters. The neighboring countries are Germany to the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, and Lithuania and the Russian province of Kaliningrad to the northeast.
The average elevation (elewacja) of Poland is 173 meters, and only 3 % of Polish territory, along the southern border, is higher than 500 meters. The highest elevation is Mount Rysy which rises 2,499 meters in the Tatra Range of the Carpathians, 95 kilometers south of Kraków. About 60 square kilometers along the Gulf of Gdańsk are below sea level. Poland is traditionally divided into five topographic zones (topograficzne strefy) from north to south. The largest, the central lowlands (niziny), is narrow (wąska) in the west and then expands to the north and south as it extends eastward (ku wschodowi). Along the eastern border (wschodnia granica), this zone reaches from the far northeast to within 200 kilometers of the southern border. The terrain in the central lowlands is quite flat (płaski), and earlier glacial lakes have been filled by sediment (osad). The region is cut by several major rivers, including the Odra, which defines the Silesian Lowlands (Nizina Śląska) in the southwest, and the Wisła, which defines the lowland areas of east-central Poland.
To the south of the lowlands are the Lesser Poland (Małopolska) uplands, a belt varying in width from 90 to 200 kilometers, formed by the gently sloping foothills of the Sudeten and Carpathian mountain ranges and the uplands that connect the ranges in south-central Poland. The topography of this region is divided transversely (poprzecznie) into higher and lower elevations, reflecting its underlying geological structure (geologiczna struktura). In the western section, the Silesia-Kraków Upthrust contains rich coal (węgiel) deposits.
The third topographic area is located on either side of Poland’s southern border and is formed by the Sudeten (Sudety) and Carpathian (Karpaty) ranges. Within Poland, neither of these ranges is forbidding enough to prevent substantial habitation; the Carpathians are especially densely populated (gęsto zaludnione). The rugged form (nierówny kształt) of the Sudeten range derives (pochodzi) from the geological shifts that formed the later Carpathian uplift (wzniesienie). The highest (najwyższa) elevation in the Sudeten is 1,602 meters, in the Karkonosze Mountains. The Carpathians in Poland, formed as a discrete topographical unit in the relatively recent Tertiary Era (trzeciorzęd), are the highest mountains in the country. They are the northernmost edge of a much larger range that extends into the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Hungary, and Romania. Within Poland the range includes two major basins, the Oświęcim and Sandomierz, which are rich in several minerals and natural gas.
To the north of the central lowlands, the lake region includes the only primeval forests (pierwotne lasy) remaining in Europe and much of Poland’s shrinking unspoiled natural habitat. Glacial action in this region formed lakes and low hills in the otherwise flat terrain adjacent (przylegające) to Lithuania and the Baltic Sea. Small lakes dot the entire northern half of Poland, and the glacial formations that characterize the lakes region extend as much as 200 kilometers inland in western Poland. Wide (szerokie) river valleys divide the lake region into three parts. In the northwest, Pomerania is located south of the Baltic coastal region and north of the Warta and Noteć rivers. Mazury occupies the remainder of northern Poland and features a string of larger lakes. Most of Poland’s 9,300 lakes that are more than 10,000 square meters in area are located in the northern part of the lake region, where they occupy about 10 % of the surface area.
The Baltic coastal lands are a low-lying region formed of sediments deposited by the sea. The coastline (wybrzeże, linia brzegowa) was shaped by the action of the rising sea after the Scandinavian ice sheet retreated. The two major inlets in the smooth coast are the Pomeranian Bay on the German border in the far northwest and the Gulf of Gdańsk in the east. The Oder River empties into the former, and the Vistula forms a large delta at the head of the latter. Sandbars with large dunes form lagoons and coastal lakes along much of the coast.
I think these are the most important facts about the geography of Poland. I hope you will find this blog interesting.
Do następnego razu! (Till next time…)
