Friday 25 – Sunday 27 August 2023
Accommodation: Loft 37 with mezzanine room at MONTOWNIA Lofts & Experience.
With reasonably priced flights from Edinburgh, cheap food and attractions, and a recent accolade as one of Europe’s most underrated cities, Gdańsk is a fantastic choice for a city break. My friend Lauren and I arrived in the city at 11am Friday and departed 9pm Sunday. There is so much to do in Gdańsk and it made for a bargainous and fantastic weekend break.
We flew to Gdańsk with Ryanair and back with Wizzair for £114 each return. The airport is an easy bus journey from the airport to the city centre, taking about 40 minutes and costing not much more than £1 each way.
Where to stay?
We stayed in possibly the coolest apartment I have experienced on my travels, in MONTOWNIA Lofts & Experience. Gdańsk is easily covered on foot and MONTOWNIA (sorry, I feel like I’m shouting at you, but the name is all in capital letters…) is less than 15 minutes’ walk to the picturesque Old Town. Formerly a WW2 assembly plant for submarine parts and shipyard warehouse, the 1930s building now consists of accommodation and the largest food hall in Gdańsk.
The apartments are modern with an industrial style and very spacious. We had plenty of room for two of us and there was a loft section of the room which we didn’t use. The ladder to the loft is very steep so I wouldn’t fancy coming down in the middle of the night while half asleep. I’ll come back to the amazing food hall later.
What to do?
Old Town – Pop ‘Długa’ into Google Maps and head towards the Gdańsk Old Town for a wander around. The area has lots of beautiful buildings to admire as you walk towards Naptune’s Fountain and Green Gate, then over the river. There’s plenty of coffee shops, restaurants and bars to stop at.
Visit museums – Gdańsk has a very strong museum game. There are 10+ museums and the two that we visited were some of the best I’ve seen around the world. The museums were so engaging and we were taken on a journey around the exhibitions (via audio guide) in a way that really brought everything to life. A lot of money must have been invested as the exhibitions were works of art. The audio guides were also clever and could track where you are instead of having to punch numbers in for each thing you were looking at. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend a visit to Gdańsk in the cold winter months as you could spend hours in these two museums alone.
Museum of the Second World War – I didn’t realise before visiting that WW2 actually started in Gdańsk. Almost 90% of the city was destroyed during the war. The main exhibition in this museum is split into before/during/after WW2 – “The Road to War”, “The Terror of War” and “The Long Shadow of War”. We paid 37 PLN (£7ish) for entrance and audio guide (highly recommend this) and spent about 1.5 hours at the museum. This felt quite rushed and you would probably need 2.5/3 hours to take it all in at a leisurely pace. We went on Sunday about 11am and it was pretty busy. It seems to be closed on Mondays and free on Tuesdays.
European Solidarity Centre – The European Solidarity Centre (ECS) is located at the Gdańsk Shipyard (very close to MONTOWNIA apartments). A fitting location as it tells the story starting at the Gdańsk shipyard strikes of the 1970s and ending with the fall of communism in Europe. Another excellent audio guide taking you on a journey around seven exhibitions. You will need a couple of hours to get around everything. On the rooftop there is an observation deck which is free to visit. I wouldn’t go out of my way to visit for the views but we popped up after going around the exhibitions. Also, an interesting addition for those travelling with kids – there is a big soft play area within the ECS for kids up to age 10. Off-season (Oct-April), the ESC is closed on Tuesdays.
Sopot – A short train ride of 12 minutes from Gdańsk Główny will take you to the seaside town of Sopot. It was overcast when we visited so we weren’t seeing the town at its best, but it is a popular tourist location on the Polish riviera.
Sopot Pier – While there we visited Sopot Pier which, at 511.5 meters, is Europe’s longest wooden pier. There’s a small fee to walk on the pier of around £1.50 and we spent about 30 minutes walking along to the end and back.
Crooked House – We had seen photos of Krzywy Domek (Polish for Crooked House) online before visiting Sopot and wanted to visit this quirkly building. However, we were a little disappointed as there are big trees in front and you can’t really see the house. Maybe better in winter when the leaves have fallen.
Electric scooters – I was very keen to try electric scooters during our trip to Gdańsk but we were a bit wary of not knowing the rules of where we could scoot and worried we would crash into people. There is a big bike/walking track running south from Sopot pier and we decided this would be a great place to try them out without causing any accidents. We had so much fun scooting along the bike path, discussing investing in scooters when we got home! There’s a few different scooter companies around and you can download the relevant app to hire one.
Galar boat trip – We started our Sunday with a slow boat trip on a replica of a traditional Polish boat, booked on TripAdvisor. The tour started at the shipyard and sailed to the Old Town and back again, with the option to jump off en route back, close to the WW2 museum (everyone on our boat took this option). Good if you want a leisurely sight-seeing trip and to see Gdańsk from the water. If I was to go back, I would opt for one of the little golf buggy trips instead as it was a little too leisurely for me.
Where to eat & drink?
MONTOWNIA food hall – worth a visit (or two) even if you aren’t staying at the loft apartments. There are so many cuisine options to sample – Polish, Greek, Chinese, Japanese, Italian, Indian, Mexican, Thai and more. Between us we tried three of these and everything was delicious and reasonably priced (as with all food we found in Gdańsk). Order your food and the buzzer you are given will let you know when it is ready to collect. Everyone in your group can choose their own preference and then sit together in the food hall. In the centre of the hall, there is a bar which makes impressive cocktails (we encountered flames and a shark!). There’s live entertainment (maybe just at weekends) and lots of chairs outside if you prefer to sit in the open air. I spotted one coffee place open at breakfast time and then the rest opened at lunch.
Mandu Pierogarnia – it doesn’t seem right to visit Poland without trying pierogies and Mandu Pierogarnia has so many options to suit every taste. From traditional boiled pierogies to furnace-cooked spicy chicken and jalapeno dumplings to chocolate and Orea sweet dumplings. The pierogies were fantastic and we got over excited and ate far too many. There are buckwheat and potato flour dumplings for gluten free and a vegan menu section.
Bar Pod Rybą – another restaurant for traditional Polish cuisine and this time dedicated to potatoes. Entirely to potatoes! The menu was mainly baked potatoes with various fillings. Not being a massive potato lover myself (a controversial topic to my potato-loving best friends), I decided on potato pancake and it was so tasty. Bar Pod Rybą is in the Old Town of Gdańsk and we enjoyed sitting outside in the evening. Despite being in such a central location, the prices were still very reasonable.
Bar Patelnią i Wałkiem – working our way through the traditional Polish dining experiences…visiting a milk bar was on my list for our trip. A milk bar, or bar mleczny is ‘a Polish cafeteria which during the Communist era provided government-subsidised traditional Polish cuisine at low cost’ (thanks, Wikipedia). I don’t think they are subsidised anymore but locals can visit for a quick and cheap meal. Reading this article by The Lazy Holiday made me laugh – “Step in the restaurant, you will see a big menu board (all in Polish) and beneath it, stands an angry cashier. No one escapes facing an angry Polish cashier who speaks no English and that is also one of the biggest charms of dining in a Polish milk bar.” So accurate for our visit – I was trying to frantically get ‘vegetarian’ up on Google Translate while being glared at! You point to what you want and it gets plated up, then the cashier weighs your plate and you pay by weight. We visited a milk bar in Sopot and I got pierogies, sauerkraut and a soft fruit drink (kompot) for under £5.
PROJEKT Café – a very fun café that we visited during our trip to Sopot, that was like hanging out in a cartoon! The whole place is decorated like a cartoon and there are props (like hats, glasses, etc) that you can use for photos. And it’s not just great for the ‘Gram – I had a slice of the vegan lavender cake with blackcurrant and it was delicious. I was slightly disappointed that the cakes didn’t look like cartoons though! {Sadly it looks from the website like this café may have closed but check back in case it’s not permanent}
Hilton Gdańsk rooftop bar – My travelling companion Lauren is the master of finding a good rooftop bar, and led us to the Hilton for cocktails with a view. The High 5 Terrace Bar has an outdoor terrace with views over the Old Town.
Things to note:
- We paid by debit/credit card almost everywhere we went so no need to bring lots of cash. The two exceptions where we used cash were a small clothes shop (only accepted cash) and tipping at restaurants (we were told the staff lose a massive % to tax if you tip by card).
- I left my toddler at home for this trip but did notice that it seemed to be a very child-friendly city. As mentioned, one of the museums had a big play area and there was a kids’ area in the hall of the MONTOWNIA apartments, with books and toys.
- You need to buy bus tickets before you board the buses and validate them when you get on. If you’re getting the bus from the airport, there’s a ticket machine at the bus stop which accepts card and cash. We also bought tickets at a little kiosk shop.
