[3][4] The Wieliczka Salt Mine is now an official Polish Historic Monument (Pomnik Historii) and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Its attractions include the shafts and labyrinthine passageways, displays of historic salt-mining technology, an underground lake, four chapels and numerous statues carved by miners out of the rock salt, and more recent sculptures by contemporary artists.

The Wieliczka Salt Mine reaches a depth of 327 metres (1,073 ft), and extends via horizontal passages and chambers for over 287 kilometres (178 miles).

The rock salt is naturally of varying shades of grey, resembling unpolished granite rather than the white crystalline substance that might be expected.

[7] Since the 13th century, brine welling up to the surface had been collected and processed for its sodium chloride (table-salt) content.

[13] During World War II, the mine was used by the occupying Germans as an underground facility for war-related manufacturing.

[1] This was due to the threat of serious damage being done to the sculptures from humidity caused by artificial ventilation introduced in the later 19th century.

[16] During the Nazi occupation, several thousand Jews were transported from the forced labour camps in Plaszow and Mielec to the Wieliczka mine to work in the underground armament factory set up by the Germans in March and April 1944.

[17][19] The mine is one of Poland's official national Historic Monuments (Pomniki historii), as designated in the first round, 16 September 1994.

The mine is currently one of Poland's official national Historic Monuments (Pomniki historii), whose attractions include dozens of statues and four chapels carved out of the rock salt by the miners.

[3] Notable visitors to this site have included Nicolaus Copernicus, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,[21] Alexander von Humboldt, Fryderyk Chopin,[22] Dmitri Mendeleyev, Bolesław Prus,[23] Ignacy Paderewski, Robert Baden-Powell, Jacob Bronowski (who filmed segments of The Ascent of Man in the mine), the von Unrug family (a prominent Polish-German royal family), Karol Wojtyła (later, Pope John Paul II),[24] former U.S. President Bill Clinton, and many others.

It's famous for St. Kinga Chapel, components of interior design carved in salt and brine lakes, one of which is a space for sound and light show with the music of Frédéric Chopin.

The Museum Route is located entirely on the 3 level of the mine and it takes around 50 minutes to go through the 1.5 kilometres long trail.

A chamber has walls carved by miners to resemble wood, as in wooden churches built in early centuries.

The earliest writings about the Wieliczka Salt Mine include a description by Adam Schröter: Salinarum Vieliciensium incunda ac vera descriptio.

[29] Prus combined his powerful impressions of the salt mine with the description of the ancient Egyptian Labyrinth, in Book II of Herodotus' Histories, to produce the remarkable scenes found in chapters 56 and 63 of his novel.