Wierchliczka (966 m a.s.l.) is the easternmost peak of the Polish Little Pieniny range — quiet, a little off the beaten track, and genuinely rewarding. The Polish-Slovak border runs right across its summit, giving the place a special frontier feel. Expect sweeping mountain meadows, grazing sheep, and open views towards the Beskid Sądecki.
The northern slopes are dominated by two vast open meadows, Zapustek and Brysztan, once the farmfields of the vanished Lemko village of Biała Woda. Today highland shepherds from Podhale bring their flocks here each summer. The southern slopes are forested and fall within the Slovak Pieniny National Park (PIENAP). In spring the meadows bloom with wildflowers, in summer they offer a blissful sense of space, and in autumn they glow golden in the low sun.
How to reach the summitA rare Polish plant, the hill thistle, grows on Wierchliczka's slopes — a quiet reminder of the rich natural and human history of this border mountain. The name itself derives from the Slovak stream Riečka flowing down the southern side.