Oravská Vrchovina

The Orava Highlands (in Slovak, ''Oravská vrchovina'') is a range of small mountains in the

Žilina Region The Žilina Region (; ; ) is one of the eight Regions of Slovakia, Slovak administrative regions and consists of 11 districts (okresy) and 315 municipalities, from which 18 have a town status. The region was established in 1923, however, in its p ...

of north central Slovakia, part of the

Outer Western Carpathians Divisions of the Carpathians are a categorization of the Carpathian mountains system. Below is a detailed overview of the major subdivisions and ranges of the Carpathian Mountains. The Carpathians are a "subsystem" of a bigger Alps-Himalaya S ...

. In Slovakia these hills are considered part of the

Central Beskids The Low Beskids () or Central Beskids (; ; ) are a mountain range in southeastern Poland and northeastern Slovakia. They constitute a middle (central) section of the Beskids, within the Outer Eastern Carpathians. Since there are several traditi ...

; in Poland they're considered

Western Beskids The Western Beskids (; ; ; ) are a set of mountain ranges spanning the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Poland. Geologically the Western Beskids are part of the Outer Western Carpathians. Traditionally the Western Beskids were considered part of th ...

. The highlands stretch along both sides of the

Orava River The Orava () is a river in north-western Slovakia passing through a picturesque country, in the Orava county. Its source is nowadays the Orava water reservoir whose waters flooded the confluence of Biela (White) Orava and Čierna (Black) Orava i ...

, and cover an area about 220 square kilometers. It consists of two smaller areas: the ''Podchočská brázda'' (the Podchočská furrow) and the ''Veličnianska kotlina'' (Veličnianska basin). The highest of the relatively modest summits are ''Kopec'' (1251 meters), ''Machy'' (1202 meters) and ''Mnich'' (1110 meters), the last of which towers over the ski resort town of

Zuberec Zuberec () is a village in northern Slovakia and a popular tourist center at the foothills of the Western Tatras. Zuberec features numerous accommodation facilities, restaurants, museum and a tourist information office. The village is the place ...

. Geologically the highlands are composed of Carpathian

flysch Flysch () is a sequence of sedimentary rock layers that progress from deep-water and turbidity flow deposits to shallow-water shales and sandstones. It is deposited when a deep basin forms rapidly on the continental side of a mountain building ep ...

and the limestone unique to the

Pieniny Klippen Belt The Pieniny Klippen Belt is in geology a tectonically and orographically remarkable zone in the Western Carpathians, with a very complex geological structure. It is a narrow (only 0.4 to 19 km) and extremely long (about 600 km) north ba ...

. Mountain ranges of Slovakia Mountain ranges of the Western Carpathians Highlands {{slovakia-geo-stub