By rail. Trains do manage to wind their way up from the valley and into Zakopane, but the journey from Cracow can take quite a long time. Grab a car or bus from Cracow instead and save yourself the hassle.

Polish State Railways (PKP) is a reasonably efficient organization, though its services, particularly on rural routes, have been heavily cut since the fall of communism and continue to be reduced at frequent intervals. PKP runs three main types of train (pociag):

Intercity or express services (ekspresowy) are the ones to go for if you're travelling long distances, as they stop at the main cities only. Once slow by western European standards, they are getting faster, with journey times between Warsaw and Kraków a very respectable 2.5 to 3 hours. Seat reservations, involving a small supplementary charge, are compulsory; if you haven't understood the reservations system the ticket inspector can sell you one, albeit at a supplement of around £2/US$3. Expresses are marked in red on timetables, with an R in a box alongside. Fast trains (pospieszny), again marked in red, have far more stops than express trains, and reservations are optional. The normal services (normalny or osobowy) are shown in black and should be avoided whenever possible: in rural areas they stop at every haystack, while even on inter-urban routes it usually takes about an hour to cover 20km. In effect you go at the speed of a healthy cyclist.

By train you can travel from Cracow through Sucha Beskidzka and Chabówka (150 km). Fast and express trains run to Zakopane around 3-4 hours, and IC (Inter City) "Kasprowy" and "Giewont" - only 2,5 hours.
In the period of the highest intensity of tourist season and in difficult traffic conditions, it is the fastest means of transportation.