Poland [antikvár]

THE COUNTRY AND ITS PEOPLE GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION With an area of 312,700 sq. km. and a population of close to 33 million, Poland is the seventh largest country in Europe both as to size and population. From east to west it stretches a distance of 690 km. and 650 from north to south. Poland neighbours with friendly Socialist countries on every side. In the east she has a frontier 1,244 km. long with the USSR, which follows the river Bug most of the way. In the south, Poland borders with Czechoslovakia across the Carpathians and Sudeten range for a distance of 1,310 km., and in the west, her frontier of 460 km. with the German Democratic Republic runs along the Lusatian Nysa and the Odra. In the north Poland's Baltic littoral covers a distance of 524 km. Thanks to her central position, Poland for centuries has formed a bridge between the East and Western part of the Continent, as well as between Scandinavia and the Danubian countries. LANDSCAPE « Situated across the Central European plain, Poland is mostly a flat country (75 per cent of the area is under 200 m. above sea level), but thanks to its geographical configuration the landscape presents great variety. The coastal plain belt of sand dunes and forest in the north ends in splendid beaches, running into jutting cliffs every now and again. South of the Coastal Belt stretches typical postglacial country, the Masurian and Pomeranian Lake Districts, with thousands of lakes lying in thickly wooded hilly country. To the south we enter the great central plain which stretches between the Odra and Bug rivers. This is the most agricultural part of the country, not lacking of a very specific charm of its own. In the north-eastern part of this belt lies the famous primeval Bialowieza forest, probably the last remaining example of the primordial forest which had once covered the entire part of the Continent. South again the country gradually turns hilly; in the east stretches the agricultural Lublin plateau, and west across the Vistula the Swi^to-krzyskie range with its fine fir-tree forests. South west again we come to the picturesque Cracow Jura, with its famous Ojc6w Gorge. South of the country turns increasingly mountainous, ending with the Sudetes in the west, one of the oldest and most picturesque ranges in Europe, which merge with the Carpathians to the east, 7