In northern Gdynia, near its boundary with Sopot, there is the Orłowo district. Next to it there are the forests of Kępa Redłowska. Kępa, being a fragment of the moraine hills cut off from the rest of the moraines by the valleys of water streams, is a special place for at least two reasons. First, it is covered by thick, natural forest located almost in the very centre of a big urban agglomeration; and second, for over 60 years a natural reserve has been located there which protects the natural woods and the specific flora sustained there from ancient times. The forest meeting the sea creates a cliff which is beaten by the sea wavesl and being very steep and constantly washed by waters, it keeps moving back against the power of the sea. The ravine going back becomes more and more steep as it gets close to the highest part of the hill. So year by year the Orłowo cliff becomes more and more monumental.
The Orłowo Cliff
The beauty of this place was noticed at least two hundred years ago in the first guidebooks on the region which compared it to the famous cliffs of Rugen and even the southern shores of England. In these times there was an inn at today’s Orłowo belonging to an Adler whose name means “eagle”. He called his inn “Adlerhorst”, i.e. “the eagle’s nest”, this gave the name to the district of Gdynia, Orłowo (Orzel meaning an eagle in Polish)
This beautiful fragment of the Gdynia shore stretching for over six hundred metres is a very popular place for walks. It is located only two kilometres from the centre of Gdynia. The place is even more attractive, as the cliff can be admired from a two hundred-metre-long pier.
