Tatra

Declared in 1954 on the Polish side (its Slovak twin having been created in 1949), it protects the only properly alpine high-mountain massif in the whole Carpathian chain, with Rysy as the summit the two countries share. Zakopane, the town at its gateway, became in the late 19th century the first great mountaineering centre in Eastern Europe, a role it keeps today as the informal capital of Polish skiing.