The Poprad forms several dramatic meanders between the towns of Piwniczna and Muszyna. The river also forms picturesque gorges in its upper and middle run, of which the most prominent is the one between Piwniczna and Rytro, usually referred to as the Gorge, dividing Beskid Sądecki into two separate mountain chains called Pasmo Radziejowej and Pasmo Jaworzyny. The river, along with other regional attractions such as the mineral springs, is a magnet for qualified tourism and water sports in the area. The mineral springs discovered already in the 19th century stimulated the development of resort towns along the course of the Poprad, such as Krynica, Żegiestów, Lomnica, as well as Muszyna and Piwniczna where the popular river rafting trips are organized. The surrounding Low Beskids are also a popular winter-sports destination, with trans-Carpathian railway connecting Nowy Sącz in Poland, with Košice in Slovakia.
Railway line
During the Austro-Hungarian Empire when the region was part of the Austrian Partition of Poland, there was a railway line built by the authorities along the valley of the Poprad, between 1874 and 1876. It was a major undertaking, because the installation of tracks was severely limited by the river on the one side, and steep mountain slopes on the other. The engineering firm Koller und Gregorsen from Vienna won the bid for the construction of the entire line Tarnów-Leluchów-Orlov including the tunnel Żegiestów-Andrzejówka. The tunnel, some in length, collapsed, causing a major human catastrophe. Over 120 Polish railway workers from nearby settlements were killed in the rubble. Rescue attempts proved impossible and the place was left undisturbed as a mass grave. As a result of the accident, the idea of running a double track was abandoned as a whole. A much narrower tunnel was dug out around the site of the miners' entombment, allowing for a single track which was continued along the entire stretch of the railway line. In the interwar period of the sovereign Poland the railway line along Poprad was refurbished and improved to provide the connection with the rapidly expanding resort towns in the Beskids, including Muszyna and, most of all, Krynica-Zdrój, the biggest spa town in Poland called the Pearl of Polish Spas.
