Vacations and Holiday Relaxation of Cracow Inhabitants in the Light of the Social Welfare System This paper presents the vacations and holiday activity of the inhabitants of Cracow. This activity serves as a basis for grasping of the correlation between holiday relaxation in tourist forms and the system of social welfare services in the sphere of tourism. The research work was preceded by a critical analysis of the social policy of the State in the sphere of relaxation. On the basis of the empirical material, it has been found that the structure of the Cracovians' rest is identical with the all-Polish structure, whereas the level of participation in some forms exceeds the country's average, which results from the social structure of the Cracovians and the town's specificity. It is noticed that the interacting force of the relaxation related social services on the vacations and holiday activities is not great enough change the structure of tourist traffic in a diametrical way. The empirical research demonstrates some inconsistencies between the aims of the social policy in the sphere of relaxation and the actual distribution of means within the phramework of social services in this sphere. Thus, the actual model of social policy is outdated and inefficient while the tools of its implementation fail and they cannot fulfil the functions that are ascribed to them. At the same time, the hitherto existing solutions disrupt the organization of the services in tourism recreation.