Monday 4 June
Having watched over the weekend with growing unease the continuous procession of vessels of all shapes and sizes tying up to the fuel berth, the crew was relieved when Monday morning began quiet and clear. Even having sold over 20,000 litres of diesel in the last few days, they still had enough left for my tanks to be filled. At least Skipper could be confident it won’t have lain dormant at the pump, harbouring contaminants that will affect Trevver’s smooth operation.
We enjoyed an easy reach under genoa past the attractive city of Sopot, a spa town and, back in the day, favoured playground of the German Reich. As we entered Nowy Port at the mouth of the Wisła River, we dipped our ensign while passing the monument to the Defenders of Westerplatte, where the first shots of the Second World War were fired by a German battleship. It was then a long motor following the river and the Kanals Portowy and Kaszubski, through dusty, dirty and smelly shipyards and past semi-derelict wharves. Eventually we reached the Motława River into the heart of the old city of Gdansk, where we slipped into a marina berth between Granary Island and the 5* boutique Hotel Gdansk.
Like so much of what we’ve seen elsewhere of Poland, huge regeneration projects are under construction, and so it is with multiple apartment blocks on Granary Island: a dusty, noisy building site from early morning until teatime. A walk into town to find some of the highlights of the guidebook left us by our friendly local lady revealed Dutch Renaissance architecture similar to that we enjoyed in Amsterdam…except this was destroyed during WWII and has been rebuilt. Somehow it feels a little like walking through a cardboard cut-out film set of Holland’s capital city, but is nonetheless attractive. We followed a recommendation in the guide for a delicious alfresco supper of tapas at Patio Español.