Opening hours: Closed Mondays; open Tuesday-Friday, 9:30am-4pm, Saturday and Sunday, 10am-4pm; in summertime, July and August, open daily, 10am-6pm.
Established in 1960, the Central Maritime Museum is nowadays housed in several historical buildings in the centre of Gdansk These include the Great Crane - the former port crane from 1444 - and three port granaries ranging in date from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century, called the Miedz (Copper), the Panna (Virgin) and the Oliwski. The Museum of Fishery on the Hel Spit, the Museum of the Vistula River in Tczew and two ships, the "Soldek" and the "Dar Pomorza", are the divisions of the Gdansk-based museum.
The holdings tell the history of ports, shipbuilding, seafaring and trade, and include items used in shipyards as well as in coastal and sea rescue operations; ship equipment, navigation tools, driving gears, manual arms, deck weapons, and the like. The Museum has interesting collections of Slav boats, medieval ships from Gdansk and Elblag, sixteenth and seventeenth century warships, Polish merchant and passenger ships dating from 1920-1939 as well as post-1945 river ships and towboats. There are some boats from Oceania, Indonesia, Indochina and Africa. Exhibited are also various objects from the Dal, the yacht that took Andrzej Bohomolec across the Atlantic on the first such journey ever completed by a Pole, and souvenirs from the Polonez, the yacht commanded by Krzysztof Baranowski on the round-the-world cruise. A separate place is taken by items related to the seafaring experiences of Joseph Conrad Korzeniowski, the celebrated writer. Owing to the sea-bed search activities which the Museum has been carrying out, its holdings include also items salvaged from ship wrecks, such as the bronze cannons and cannon balls from the Solen, the Swedish vessel sunk in the battle of Oliwa in 1627. In addition, the Museum collects works of art of maritime subject-matter and boasts paintings by such prominent Polish painters as Leon Wyczolkowski, Julian Falat and Zofia Stryjenska.
Permanent exhibitions: At the Great Crane: "Boats of Non-European Peoples"; "Shells of Tropical Waters"; At the Olowianka Granaries: "Poland and the Baltic Sea".
The "Soldek" Museum Ship - The first sea trader built in Poland after World War II, nowadays moored at Gdansk. Open to the public since 1985. Visitors may see the Soldek's interior and equipment as well as an exhibition Soldek: "Construction and Voyages".
The "Dar Pomorza" - A training vessel built at a German shipyard in 1909, sailing under the Polish flag since 1930. Admired in ports all over the world and called the White Frigate, it was moved to the Central Maritime Museum in 1981 and is now moored at Nabrzeze Pomorskie in Gdynia (manager: Marek Twardowski, MSc, tel. +48 58 620 23 71, 620 24 77). The "Dar Pomorza" is open for visiting daily except Mondays, 10am-4pm; in July and August, Mondays, Sundays and holidays, 10am-7pm). Visitors may see the ship's equipment as well as two exhibitions: "History of the Dar Pomorza Traning Ship" and "Poles at Cape Horn".
Centralne Muzeum Morskie
ul. Ołowianka 9-13
80-835 Gdańsk
Region: pomorskie
Phone: (+48 58) 301 86 11
Phone/Fax: (+48 58) 301 84 53
WWW: www.cmm.pl
Email: sekretariat@cmm.pl, info@cmm.pl