Things to do in Gdansk

Landmark · The old town core

The reconstructed merchant city — Neptune's fountain, the Golden Gate, and the crane on the Motława that was medieval Europe's largest.

Local tip: Mariacka street is where the amber workshops are, and the stone terraces with their gargoyle spouts are the only surviving original detail on a street that was otherwise rebuilt from photographs after 1945. Go early; by eleven it belongs to the tour groups.

Culture · Młode Miasto, north of the old town

A weathering-steel building shaped like a ship's hull at the gate where the August 1980 strike began, next to the monument to the workers shot in 1970.

Local tip: Allow three hours. The permanent exhibition is one of the best modern history museums in Europe, and the roof terrace looks straight out over the shipyard cranes — which are still working, not preserved.

Neighborhood · Between the old town and Oliwa

The real centre of gravity of daily Gdańsk — a German-built district of grand tenements, Garnizon's regenerated barracks, and the best everyday restaurants in the city.

Local tip: Most people who move here for work end up living in Wrzeszcz rather than the old town, and they are right. Wajdeloty street and the Garnizon quarter are where you would actually spend a Tuesday evening.

Nature · North Gdańsk

A Cistercian abbey with a famous baroque organ, set in a large landscape park running up into the wooded moraine hills.

Local tip: The organ recitals run several times a day in summer and are free with park entry. Walk uphill behind the park into the Trójmiejski Landscape Park — an enormous forest that starts inside the city and runs for twenty kilometres.

Neighborhood · Between Wrzeszcz and Przymorze

A district built on a disused airfield, containing an 860-metre residential block and one of Europe's largest collections of monumental murals.

Local tip: The Falowiec at Obrońców Wybrzeża is among the longest residential buildings on the continent — walking its full length takes about twelve minutes. The Monumental Art murals on the surrounding blocks are a curated open-air collection built up since 1997.

Nature · East of the city, past the Vistula mouth

A flat island of pine forest, dunes and two bird reserves between the Vistula's outlet and the bay, with a resident grey seal colony.

Local tip: Take the bus over the bridge and walk east through the Mewia Łacha reserve to the river mouth, where the seals haul out on the sandbanks. It is forty minutes from the old town, there is no through traffic, and on a weekday in September you will have the beach essentially to yourself.