Białowieża Forest is a refuge for hundreds of species and a destination for very few.

Not everyone can enter the depths of this forest.

Straight ahead is the first line of trees. Tall, sturdy, with canopies that seem as far away as the sun. Once you pass that first line, the noise of the village ceases to exist. There are no engines, no wheels treading these paths. Inside the Białowieża forest, neither vehicles nor bicycles are allowed. Footsteps on leaves and the crackle of the occasional branch are the only sounds you'll notice in the first few minutes. Silence accompanies you with every step.

In a moment of calm, once your heart rate has slowed, your guide will ask you to look up. Centuries-old oaks rise more than 40 meters high, and their two-meter-wide trunks tell the story of the last 400 years. These trees grew on their own; some fell naturally. Now they're shelter for beetles and the perfect place for fungi to grow.

That's when it all makes sense. The nature of this place lies in the detail that absolutely nothing gets cleared away. It only shifts in place and form to become part of its habitat in another way.

A fallen tree isn't a waste; it's a home. More than 1,500 species of fungi live off this wood, and some insects of the Old Continent can only exist here, where everything flows naturally.

A rotting trunk is the perfect place for woodpeckers to nest.

A few steps further and you realize your footprints, and those of your companions, aren't the only ones. A European bison passed through here first. The fresh, large, cloven tracks remind you that this is home to the heaviest land mammal on the continent.

They're elusive animals, hard to spot, but you know they're there. This is their home, the only forest in Europe where these animals live. It holds the largest population of European bison in the world, with more than 800 individuals.

You're not used to picking up on subtle sounds, but the Białowieża forest forces you to switch your senses on. A black stork might cross overhead; deep in the forest's density, wolves and lynxes coexist. Though, to be honest, they rarely show themselves. 52 mammal species live here. As for birds, some people have counted the longest lists in Central Europe.

Pay attention to your guide; it's the only way you'll learn to tell apart a bird's song, a great spotted woodpecker's tapping, and a goshawk's whistle.

Although the Białowieża forest has been protected since the 14th century, it has suffered the ravages of human history. It was first the idyllic hunting ground of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania, and later of the kings of Poland. This kept it from mass logging.

World War I broke that protection, and a quarter of the forest fell under occupation.

Some time later, a German naturalist pushed to rescue it. The Białowieża forest was established as a National Park in 1932, becoming one of the oldest in Europe.

In 1979 came the most important recognition: UNESCO inscribed it on the World Heritage List.

The Białowieża forest is a transboundary site between Poland and Belarus. Today it spans nearly 142,000 hectares of primary forest.

The rules are clear, and they exist precisely to keep preserving the authenticity of this place.

Here, you're not the main character; you're more of a spectator to a work of nature.

Visits happen throughout all four seasons of the year.

If you want to see the newly born green and hear the sound of migratory birds, go in spring. Summer is the busiest season, thanks to its long hours of daylight and mild weather. In autumn, an ochre color palette appears, and the sound of rutting deer echoes in your ears. Winter is demanding, but it reveals an untouched forest, frozen in time, with wolf tracks that passed through before you.

Round out your visit to the Białowieża forest with a stop at the reserve and the Nature and Forest Museum. There, in several languages, they explain the details you may have missed while stepping into another reality. It's only then that you understand you didn't visit a decorative park, but a fragment of Europe that has survived human history and existed even before us.