Welcome to Szwajcaria Orzyska, a favorite place for German holidaymakers at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Until 1945, you could get here by train on the Giżycko-Orzysz line, getting off at the station in Ublik. There is no trace of the former station or tracks, but the building erected for the station's employees has survived to this day. Until recently, apples were stored in neglected interiors. We had a lot of work to do with them, but the beauty of the shape, red brick and gable mansard roof stimulated the imagination and fueled enthusiasm. The entire collective worked on the new life of the building: me and the other Monika, our husbands: Paweł and Marek and my sister Marta. We searched Olx, junk places and antique shops far and wide, completing the equipment of 5 apartments for almost a whole year.
You can relax here in comfort, enjoying the high, stone-built spaces of the apartments downstairs or the brightness of the two-story lofts upstairs. Their interiors have a bit of French elegance, but in a casual and eclectic version. Vintage accessories and furniture have a second life under the Station's roof. I polished some of them during lunch breaks and more than once I returned to remote meetings wearing goggles. The effect surprised even us, because the combination of old and new looked like something out of an interior catalogue. In the Station building, in a wild garden with old trees and among the nature surrounding us, you will be able to relax without any distractions. In such a setting, it will most likely be a higher form of pleasure.
We invite you to the doorstep of the building from the beginning of the 20th century. This is one of the buildings adjacent to the no longer existing station in Ublik. The railway line from Giżycko to Orzysz, with a stop here, was opened in 1908. The last train departed from here in 1945.
Although time masked its beauty, the shape of the building and its brick facade fueled our enthusiasm during the painstaking renovation. The interiors, although badly neglected, stimulated the imagination: the ground floor with a stone character charmed with the height of the rooms and thick brick walls, and the attic tempted with the possibility of creating a mezzanine. After a year of full mobilization on the part of me, my other Monika, our husbands and my sister - Marta, we fulfilled our dream of bringing the building with history back to life. Today we invite you to the peaceful interiors of 5 apartments, created with care, in a vintage atmosphere and based on natural materials. Although each of them has a slightly different character, together they tell the story of the building we called: Ublik Stacja.
There are two apartments on the ground floor.
The Ceglany Apartment is 55 m² in size and has been designed for 4 people. It consists of two bedrooms: one with a double 180 cm bed (no door, it is open to the living room), the other with 2 single beds (closed room), a living room with a kitchenette and a bathroom with a shower. The apartment has a direct exit to a 30-meter terrace. The living room has a goat and a huge window overlooking the greenery.
The Garden Suite measures 47 m² and can accommodate 4 people. It has a separate bedroom with a double bed (180 cm wide) located on a wooden platform and a convertible sofa in the living room, equipped with a cast iron goat and connected to a kitchenette. This apartment has two exits to the garden - the kitchen and the living room.
There are 3 duplex apartments on the first floor.
Scandi Loft, 68m², dedicated to 4 people. This is our largest interior. Downstairs there is a bedroom with a double bed, a bathroom with a shower and a living room with a kitchenette. On the mezzanine there is a second bedroom with two single beds and a bathroom with a toilet and a washbasin.
Mint Loft is 35 m² in size and can accommodate 3 people. There is a double bed on the high mezzanine and a corner with a single bed a little lower. Downstairs there is a living room with a kitchenette.
Eco Loft is 65 m² in size and is designed for 4 people. Downstairs there is a living room with a kitchenette and fireplace, a bathroom with a bathtub and a bedroom with a double bed, and upstairs there is a second bedroom with 2 single beds.
A French note plays in the interiors. We have combined natural elegance with history, revealing entablature and bricks. It is eclectic, but not overloaded with colors or equipment. We have given many pieces of furniture a second life here. We found them in the Olx, in the nearby Brocante antiques mine, in the junk rooms we visited. I have renovated many of the achievements myself. We have combined the furniture with natural fabrics and cozy details, ensuring maximum functionality of each apartment.
The entire fenced area is 6,000 m². It is situated on a not very busy road. A solitaire - lilac grows in front of the Station, welcoming our guests. There are also flower beds. The building opens onto a lush, wild garden. It is overgrown with grass and old trees - ancient linden and heavenly apple trees, souvenirs of the orchard, grow there. There are tables and chairs in this space, and hammocks hang among the trees.
You can come to our closest neighbor - Wojtek, who runs an eco farm next door and owns an old school building, for cheese and endless stories. The other neighbors are some 300 meters away.
Although this space is the best place to rest, the internet works flawlessly and if you need it, you can work from here.
Each of the apartments has been equipped with a kitchenette with a refrigerator, capsule coffee machine, dishwasher, kettle, pots and dishes. You can cook anything you want in them. The Ceglany apartment has a 4-burner stove and an oven, the other apartments have 2-burner cookers (and no ovens). In each of the interiors there is also a table where you can enjoy meals together. In the common area of the garden there is a stone fireplace at your disposal.
There are several places in the immediate vicinity where you can buy local cheese, milk and cottage cheese. Our neighbor Wojtek runs an ecological farm right next to the Station. You can come for delicious cheeses, admire the beautiful old school building and look at the goats.
If you want to try local flavors and take a break from cooking, we have a few recommendations for you. We leave them for you below.
It blows with calmness and the soothing presence of nature, much more than boredom. But if you want to get a little bit boring, there are ways to do it. The area of the Station itself is above average charming. The brick building is surrounded by the greenery of the garden with hammocks, tables and chairs hidden among trees, and wooden deckchairs in the gravel courtyard. The area is large, the plot is 6,000 m², so each of our guests will surely find a space for themselves.
The station is surrounded by nature, just outside the plot, kilometers of wilderness begin, through which you can wander for hours, admiring the landscape of Orzyska Switzerland. Hills interspersed with blue lakes, forests, fields and meadows. Flying overhead cranes and moose who happen to walk in the area, and herds of cows. And over all this idyll, white fluffy clouds. This is how it looks with us. It is pleasant to walk, run and ride a bike here.
Ublik itself is worth a little attention. The former village school (from the 1920s) is located next door, there is an ecological farm. You can also see a 19th-century palace surrounded by a park, situated on a hill above Lake Ublik Wielki. It is a memento of the entire palace and park complex, which in the 1920s included: over 1,500 hectares of land, 5 farms, a forester's lodge and a fisherman's lodge. There was a breeding ground for warm-blooded horses and cattle, a distillery and a potato drying plant. In the 1930s there was an SS guesthouse here.
A few minutes walk will separate you from two lakes. We have 400 meters to Ublik Mały, 300 meters to Wielki. You can reach the village beach with a pier in 10 minutes. Ublik Mały surprises with an extremely turquoise color of water. Due to this color, it is called the Green or Emerald Lake. In the smaller Ublik, the water is cooler due to numerous springs. One of them, on the south-eastern shore of the lake, has exceptionally tasty water (it flows from the edge of the lake's gutter). There are many stories about German weapons from the Second World War sunk in the lake. Both lakes are connected by a tunnel, called by the locals the tunnel of love. It is a former German tunnel in very good condition, which was built during the construction of the railway embankment. Until 1945, this was the line between Giżycko and Orzysz. Ublik Wielki is connected by a canal with Lake Buwełno, which in turn connects a narrow stream with another lake - Wojnowo. All of them are fun to see from the kayak's perspective.
Numerous bicycle routes, with the Masurian Bicycle Loop at the forefront, start right at the station. The choice is really big, we have asphalt, gravel and field roads. Leading through forests, fields, meadows and around lakes (we especially recommend a tour of the Buwełno lake). One of our favorite routes is: a trip to the atmospheric Stara Kuźnia restaurant, the port in Rydzewo, to Śniardwy and further to Mikołajki.
Nietlickie Marshes Reserve is located 5 km from the Station. This area is located between Lake Niegocin and Śniardwy. It is a mainstay of cranes (the largest flock of cranes observed in the roosting site numbered about 9,000 birds, 5,000 is the local "standard") and black grouse, but there is an unprecedented number of birds, including: corncrakes, nightingales, white-backed woodpeckers, black storks and multi-species flocks of wild ducks. There are also many rare species of animals, you can come across: elks, beavers, badgers and otters. It's worth taking binoculars with you. If you do not want to tear through difficult terrain, you can go to the bridge on the road to the north of Cierzpięt.
Our favorite horse farm is located in Gałków. It allows you to experience a gallop across the river, trot in the meadows and gallop in the paddock and try your hand at the saddle for the first time.
Each apartment is such a small apartment from 45 to 68 meters. They are equipped with a fairly large table suitable for work. We do not have standard desks or additional tables, but we can always provide them on request. Workation is governed by its own rules and if you want, you can do the work just as well from an armchair, sofa or even a bed.
