Museums
3200 metres of corridors of a secret Nazi complex, with a boat crossing through flooded sections
Mountains
an underground complex from the secret Project Riese, built by Gross-Rosen prisoners, today with routes featuring holograms
Mountains
a peak of the Owl Mountains, whose massif hides the galleries of a German wartime underground complex
a collection of historic military and civilian vehicles, gathered since the late 1980s
Churches and monasteries
a classicist church with a portico on four columns, rebuilt from a Protestant church from 1741
Mountains
a dome-shaped gneiss peak in the Włodarz Massif, surrounded by traces of the secret Riese complex
a Neo-Gothic church from the 1920s with a Baroque crucifix two centuries older
a dome-shaped hill of the Włodarz Massif with traces of a wartime narrow-gauge railway
Mountains
a dome-shaped peak 781 metres above sea level in the Owl Mountains with spruce-beech forest and a view of Riese
Culture
a municipal library operating since 1947, combined with a community centre, activities for children and a town swimming pool
Things to do in Głuszyca include the Riese underground complex, Owl Mountains peaks, a museum of historic vehicles and churches from different eras.
Riese was the codename for the largest mining and construction project of Nazi Germany in 1943-1945. The Riese Włodarz underground complex in the Głuszyca municipality is today the largest part of it open to tourists. It has about 3,200 metres of corridors, an underground cinema and a boat crossing. A dense network of tunnels crosses at right angles beneath the hill, with four entrances.
The second stop is Osówka, a mountain 716 metres above sea level with a vast wartime complex hidden under it. Construction began in mid-1943, and today the underground can be visited with a guide. The two sites are different ways into the same project, so if you only have time for one, pick what interests you more: the extensive corridors and the underground cinema, or a mountain with a guided route.
The highest is Włodarz at 811 metres, with steep slopes and a flat, domed summit. Nearby are Moszna (771 m) and Jaworek (781 m), and south-east of Jedlina-Zdrój Jedlińska Kopa (744 m), where traces of the narrow-gauge railway from the Riese construction survive on the slopes. Spruce and beech forest of the lower montane zone covers Moszna, Jaworek and Jedlińska Kopa, and all four peaks carry the tags "Free", "Nature" and "Beautiful views". We have gathered them under Mountains in Głuszyca.
The Museum of Automotive Engineering and Technology shows military vehicles (including the Chevrolet, Dodge WC and DAF), civilian Żuk, Syrena and Tarpan vehicles, several generations of Volkswagen, a tractor and historic stationary engines. The collection began in the late 1980s with a wartime Willys found by chance.
The Church of Our Lady Queen of Poland was built in 1741 as a Protestant church and rebuilt in the classicist style in 1804-1809. A portico on four columns decorates the facade, and the tower changes from a square base into a round form. Christ the King Church from 1929 was designed by Karl Fromm, an architect from Wałbrzych. It echoes Neo-Gothic forms and holds a Baroque crucifix from the late 18th century. A quiet afternoon is also possible at the Culture Centre - Municipal Public Library on Grunwaldzka 26, which has operated since 1947, lends audiobooks (including the Czytak Plus format for blind and partially sighted readers) and runs robotics and programming workshops.
Nearby lie Grzmiąca, Boguszów-Gorce, Jedlina-Zdrój and Sokołowsko, each with its own overview of places. If you travel alone, check Głuszyca solo, and for trail lovers there is nature in Głuszyca.
