MSZANA DOLNA is a little town of approx. 6,800 inhabitants, nestling in the valley where the Poreba brook joins the Mszanka river, which, in turn, flows into the Raba. Sited at the altitude of 400 metres a.s.l., the town is an important road junction: here the Skomielna - Rabka - Mszana Dolna - Limanowa - Nowy Sacz road meets the Cracow - Lubien - Mszana Dolna - Zabrzez road; Mszana Dolna railway station is an important stop on the Chabówka - Nowy Sacz line. A few unimportant industrial plants, existing in the town's vicinity, can not hamper its active participation in the tourist traffic which has good prospects of development at Mszana Dolna.

The village of Mszana Dolna, already in the records from the year 1369, belonged to the crown lands; initially being a part of the Nowy Targ district, it became an independent leasehold in the eighteenth century. Although Mszana Dolna received its municipal rights as late as 1952, it functioned as a town much earlier, which is proved by the fact that already in the seventeenth century the town organized five fairs annually and markets - every week; it was also frequently mentioned in the old records as "Miescisko" (town). There is a memorial in the town, which commemorates 881 Jews murdered by the Nazis in 1942.