The best MTB trails around Kije

Exposed fragment of the wall of a former quarry created as a result of extraction of Ordovician quartz sandstones. These rocks were already exploited in the interwar period and after World War II, primarily for the production of paving stones, which were used to pave, among others, a part of Wojska Polskiego Street and Plac Defilad in Warsaw.

Currently (May) there are a lot of mosquitoes, you need to fill up your water bottles quickly;)

In front of the entrance to the castle and the castle hill itself, right in front of the ticket office, there is a terrace with benches and cannons. Beautiful large decorated cannons.

The former quarry and the surrounding forest area have been protected since 1981 as the "Biesak-Białogon" nature reserve. The sandstones quarried here were used to produce paving stones that decorated many streets in Kielce. Thanks to mining works, a profile of rocks of marine origin was uncovered, representing two periods in the history of the Earth: Cambrian and Ordovician. Fossilized deposits of the Cambrian sea, over 500 million years old, are the oldest rocks visible in the reserve. Ordovician sandstones are younger than them and are approximately 480 million years old. They include inserts of greenish, soft rocks called bentonites - fossilized marine sediment mixed with volcanic ash. In the northern wall of the quarry there is also a fragment of the profile in which older (Cambrian) rocks lie on younger (Ordovician) rocks. This, in turn, is a record of ancient orogenic movements that led to the shift and inversion of the arrangement of rock layers. The landscape value of the reserve is emphasized by a small lake filling the excavation of a former quarry.

A few steps to the entrance

The Royal Castle in Chęciny was erected on the ridge of a rocky hill (367 meters above sea level), probably at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries, on the initiative of Wenceslaus II, the king of Czech and Poland. The first references to the castle date back to 1306, when in a document issued by Władysław Łokietek, the castle (Latin: castrum nostrum ducale) together with 11 villages was to be handed over to the bishop of Krakow, Jan Muskata. The clergyman was a political opponent of Łokietek, whom Piast wanted to win over to his side, but the planned diplomatic operation backfired, so already in 1307 the stronghold re-entered the royal domain. From this period there is also a mention of the first castle official in charge of the Chęciny stronghold, named Wrocław [Latin: Wroclaw].

A very beautiful place where you can marvel at the different epochs, starting with the medieval knight's castle in the western part, the ruins of a Renaissance castle in the middle of the property and the fortified farm buildings. The farm buildings house a restaurant, a hotel and a garage for old carriages and sleighs. The offer is very large, e.g. horse riding, carriage rides, kayaking on the directly adjacent river. Details can be found here: http://www.zameksobkow.eu/en/attractions/ The restaurant and the rooms of the hotel follow the theme "Middle Ages and Knight's Castle". In the restaurant you eat in the knight's hall with many interesting exhibits from the old days. The hotel's rooms are in the same style, but with modern bathrooms.

Renaissance chapel from 1600