Orłowo Pier

Today's pier in Orłowo is 180 metres long, but in 1934 it was more than twice that length and competed with Sopot. From the wooden deck you look out over the Gulf of Gdańsk, the Orłowo Cliff and the fishing end of Orłowo, where boats are hauled up onto the sand. This modest pier has a history its length does not betray: it was built by army sappers, and in 1936 an air crash happened here in front of strollers.

History: a pier built to rival Sopot

The first small landing stage was built during the First World War, when Orłowo was still called Adlershorst. In the 1920s, by then within interwar Poland, it was extended to about 115 metres so that passenger boats could call. Orłowo was growing into a Polish seaside resort, popular partly because neighbouring Sopot belonged to the Free City of Danzig.

In spring 1934, sappers from the training company of the Bridge Battalion in Modlin built a 430-metre pier with a landing for excursion boats in just two months. They reused timber from the passenger pier in Gdynia, which was being taken down to make way for the South Pier. As in Sopot, there was an entry fee, and a small café operated on the deck. In winter 1949 a storm swept away 240 metres of the structure, and in 1953 the pier was rebuilt to just 180 metres, purely as a promenade.

What to look for

• The memorial stone with a plaque recalling the air crash of 16 July 1936, in which General Gustaw Orlicz-Dreszer, president of the Maritime and Colonial League, was killed in full view of people on the pier.
• Piles reinforced with steel rings – the result of a rebuild in 2006–2007 that took ten months and cost PLN 3.5 million, giving the pier an entirely new structure.
• The view of the Orłowo Cliff to the north and across the Gulf of Gdańsk.
• Fishing boats on the beach beside the pier, a trace of the old fishing village.

Good to know

Orłowo takes its name from Johann Adler, who built a restaurant called "Adlershorst" (Eagle's Eyrie) at the mouth of the Kacza stream; in 1871 the settlement had only two houses. In May 1920 the writer Stefan Żeromski moved into a fisherman's cottage here. In 1936 a two-storey bathhouse with a hundred cubicles and tubs of heated seawater was built next to the pier; it fell into ruin from the 1970s and was demolished in 2012–2013.

Tripto tip

The pier is free, and a walk to the end and back takes 15–20 minutes. Combine it with a walk along the beach below the Orłowo Cliff, but keep away from the cliff face after landslides, in strong wind or after heavy rain. Set aside half a day for the pier, the beach and Orłowo. In summer the Gdynia City Theatre's open-air stage operates nearby, so check the programme. The light for photos is best in the late afternoon.