And the Sea Murmurs On

This year's trip to the Baltic Sea took place quite early, at the end of February, for the Linux Winter Camp 2014 conference. But since man does not live by conferences alone, my friends and I set off to explore the coast.

The trip began with a greeting to the sea and one obligatory beer each. You could say it's become something of a tradition by now. And since the weather was on our side…

On the way back from the beach we stopped to look at the shelters and bunkers on Hel. Just after the First World War, a zone of fortifications was created along the whole Hel Peninsula, meant to defend the nearby ports. The construction of the fortifications and shelters sped up considerably in the spring of 1939.

Large guns positioned at the tip of the peninsula were meant to support the ships fighting at sea. A whole infrastructure of barracks, roads and railways was built around the guns and shelters. In case of a landing from the land side, rifle trenches and a group of bunkers were set up in Jastarnia.

While on Hel, it's also impossible not to make your way to the area of the lighthouse. During the defence of Hel, the lighthouse was blown up on 19 September 1939 by Polish sappers, to make it harder for the German artillery to aim. Two years later it was rebuilt, and in 2001 it underwent renovation.

Hel is also associated with its seal sanctuary (the Seal Sanctuary of the Marine Station of the Institute of Oceanography of the University of Gdańsk). If we're lucky, we'll catch the seals' feeding time, where you can watch the animals.

At the end of the day we headed to Puck Bay and to the town of Puck itself, where the conference was to take place. Here the water was calm and the wind had died down considerably.

And the sea murmurs on, forever…