Trzy Kopce (Żywiec Beskids)

Trzy Kopce (Slovak Tri kopce) is a wooded summit about 1,216 m high in the Pilsko group of the Żywiec Beskids (in Slovakia, the Orava Beskids). It lies on the main ridge between Rysianka and Palenica. The nameless pass separating it from Rysianka is topographically important: it divides the Lipowski Wierch and Romanka group, to which Rysianka belongs, from the Pilsko group. The Polish–Slovak border and the Great European Watershed run over the summit.

The north-western slopes are Polish and fall to the Sopotnia valley, the south-eastern ones to the Slovak Mutnianka stream in the Biela Orava basin; the south-western slopes are drained by the Bystra into the Soła. On the Polish slopes the villages of Sopotnia Wielka (Jeleśnia commune) and Złatna (Ujsoły commune) in Żywiec County, Silesian Voivodeship, meet; the Slovak part belongs to Mútne and the Horná Orava Protected Landscape Area. The "Pod Rysianką" nature reserve lies nearby.

How to get there / trails

Two trails cross at the summit. Times according to Polish Wikipedia:

• the red Main Beskid Trail — 40 min from the hut on Hala Rysianka, 2 h 45 min from Hala Miziowa below Pilsko via Palenica (2 h back);
• from the PTTK hut on Krawców Wierch via Bory Orawskie — 2 h 45 min (2 h 30 min back).

From the Slovak side a blue trail follows the main ridge from the Mútňanské sedlo, and a green one climbs from Mútne via that saddle.

Nature and history

The summit is entirely forested, so the view is limited; from nearby clearings you can see the Orava, Kysuce and Żywiec Beskids, part of the Malá Fatra, the Oravská Magura and the Low and Western Tatras. The name Trzy Kopce ("Three Mounds") is fairly common in the Polish Carpathians: it usually marked a place where three ridges and the boundaries of three villages met, once marked with stone mounds.

Pod Rysianką nature reserve

On the north-eastern slopes of the pass between Rysianka and Trzy Kopce, at 950–1170 m, the Pod Rysianką forest reserve of about 27 ha was created in 1970. It protects fir–spruce–beech forest, a fragment of the primeval Carpathian lower montane forest of the Żywiec Beskids, and the springs of the Sopotnia stream. 133 species of vascular plants have been recorded here, 13 of them protected; rarities include mountain bladder-fern, several willowherbs, Tozzia alpina and one of the few Polish sites of the Moravian subspecies of the strong monkshood. Red deer, badger, roe deer and wild boar live here, and wolf, lynx and brown bear appear occasionally; birds include capercaillie, bullfinch, raven and grey wagtail. Since 2016 the whole reserve has been under strict protection; the red Main Beskid Trail runs along its southern boundary, so that is where to see the forest – without leaving the path.

Safety, season and rules

The trails are easy and open all year, but in winter there is deep snow on the ridge, and in fog it is easy to go wrong at junctions on the wooded ridge. Poland and Slovakia are in the Schengen Area — crossing on marked trails is allowed, but carry an identity document. On the Polish side help comes from GOPR: 985 or +48 601 100 300, on the Slovak side from HZS: 18 300 (+421 18 300); the general emergency number is 112.

Photos: Jerzy Opioła, CC BY-SA 4.0; Małgorzata Krawczyk, CC BY-SA 3.0; Jerzy Opioła, CC BY-SA 3.0 — Wikimedia Commons.