- published: 20 Nov 2014
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Wolin (Pomeranian Wòlin, German: Wollin) is the name both of an island in the Baltic Sea, just off the Polish coast, and a town on that island. It is separated from the island of Usedom by the Świna river, and from mainland Pomerania by the Dziwna river. The origins of the name are unknown, although it is likely of Slavic origin. In the old Slavic language the word "wolyn" meant a wetland, and over time, it was Germanised.
Water from the river Oder (Polish: Odra) flows into the Szczecin Lagoon and from there through the Peene west of Usedom, Świna and Dziwna into the Bay of Pomerania in the Baltic Sea.
Most of the island consists of forests and postglacial hills. In the middle is the Wolin National Park. The island is a main tourist attraction of northwestern Poland, and it is crossed by several specially marked tourist trails, such as 73-kilometer long trail from Międzyzdroje to Dziwnówek. There is a main, electrified rail line, which connects Szczecin and Świnoujście, also across the island goes an international road E65 (national road 3 / S3 expressway), which crosses Europe from north to south.
A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individual nations designate their own national parks differently (for example, see Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in the United States), an international organization, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and its World Commission on Protected Areas, has defined National Parks as its category II type of protected areas. While ideas for this type of national park had been suggested previously, the United States established the first such one, Yellowstone National Park, in 1872. The largest national park in the world meeting the IUCN definition is the Northeast Greenland National Park, which was established in 1974. According to the IUCN, there were 6,555 national parks worldwide in 2006 that meet its criteria.
In 1969 the IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) declared a national park to be a relatively large area with particular defining characteristics. A national park was deemed to be a place