Recently I wrote about pilgrimage to Częstochowa. There is also another famous pilgrimage that takes places on the sea.

Every year on the Sunday preceding June 29, fishermen (rybacy), seafarers (marynarze) and sailors (żeglarze) from all along the Baltic coast gather on the waters of the Puck Bay(Zatoka Pucka) and set off on a pilgrimage, which takes them all to the small fishing port of Puck. It is their way of thanking the sea for all its blessings.

The best time to visit the Polish seaside town of Puck (approx. 50 km from Gdańsk) is towards the end of June, around the day of Saints Peter and Paul, which falls on June 29. This is when Puck hosts the traditional annual seamen’s boat pilgrimage as well as an outdoor folk music festival and a market brimming with anything from local crafts and produce to toys and trumpery.

The Kashubian tradition of sea pilgrimages apparently dates back as far as the Middle Ages, when – as legends have it, local fishermen were also often pirates and sea rovers. Ever since the custom was revived in 1981, every year Kashubians from Chałupy, Jastarnia, Hel, Władysławowo, Łeba and even from some more distant Polish fishing towns set sail to Kuźnica, where they join a religious service held right in the middle of the Puck Bay. Then, all the festively decorated fishing boats, yachts and other seaborne craft head in a parade to the port of Puck, where a sung Eucharist is celebrated by the Bishop at the parish church. The Kashubians take this opportunity to thank the mighty sea for all its generous gifts and to pray for safe fishing and good hauls in the year to come.

The sea pilgrimage to Puck is an important event in the calendar of every Kashubian, especially if a fisherman. However, it also attracts more and more tourists every year since it provides them with an exceptional opportunity to experience the local folklore at its very best – to appreciate the beautifully decorated boats and traditional brightly-coloured outfits embroidered with very distinctive Kashubian floral patterns, and to listen to people speaking the local Kashubian dialect, which, despite its vague smilarity to Polish, is almost entirely incomprehensible to the inhabitants of nearby Gdańsk and to Poles in general.

I have never been there, just know about it from the stories. Hopefully some of you have been to this pilgrimage and can share the impression? Please let us know.

In the meantime enjoy this video from the pilgrimage:

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)