Visby; Sunday, 27 May, 2018

I had a quick breakfast and then headed out into town to take in the sites of the city, and in particular the large number of church ruins that dot the city centre.

First stop were the combined ruins of St Peter and St Hans churches, the latter having been built behind the former when it became too small. Today just a small part of St Hans survives, although it’s a pretty impressive column reaching up to where the vaulting of the roof would once have been. St Peters has a number of the stumps of columns visible and it’s easier to make out the line of the church.

From the first set of ruins I climbed up the hill towards the walls and was intending on visiting the prison museum in one of the towers of the wall, but it appeared to be closed – and closed for some time, so instead I headed back through the old town and down to the eastern gate, mostly so I could pick up some water from the shops outside of the historic centre.

As I got to Österport the Land Train was just pulling up for its first journey of the day, so I decided to hop on and took the 25-minute tour round the outside of the city walls. It had an interesting commentary which filled in some of the missing information, not least of all over why there were so many ruined churches (The Hansiatic league suspected the city’s merchants of either harbouring or not actively pursuing pirates in this part of the Baltic and to make a point they invaded and burnt every church, other than the Cathedral, to the ground. With the reformation that followed what remained of the churches were just left to decay).

After the tour I headed back through town, stopping off at a couple of the view points that the terracing on the hill allows, before making my way down to the Cathedral where I had a look around the inside. The original building is from the 12th Century, and whilst parts of it survive the building has undergone significant renovation over the centuries with much of the stone being repaired or replaced, and new stained-glass windows installed.

From the Cathedral I wandered back t the main square and grabbed a quick lunch sat in the sun overlooking the ruins of St Karin’s church, which was my next stop. The church is one of the most impressive ruins as not only do all its walls survive, but even the stone vaulting for the roof is intact, looking like the ribs of a skeleton. You could easily imagine with just some tiles and windows the building would almost be complete again.

A short walk from St Karins and there were two more sets of ruins. The byzantine styled St Lawrence’s and the Dotting’s church and then a short walk further down the road St Clemens. After taking in these in full (including climbing up to the top-level walkway in St Lawrence’s), I headed over to the next set of ruins – St Nicolai. These have been partially repaired, with a new roof placed on top of them to create an events space, and consequently it isn’t possible to go inside.

It also wasn’t possible to go inside St Gertrud’s or the Holy Ghost church, the next two on my walk, before I finally made my way down to the last set of ruins – St Olof’s. The church had once been one of the largest on the island, and probably one of the most impressive, but much of it’s stone had been taken to make other building and today the plants and trees of the Botanical Gardens, which have been created around the church, are slowly swallowing up all the remaining masonry. After looking round the ruins I continued into the gardens and had a long wander around the pretty gardens.

From the gardens I headed back towards the hotel, following the line of the western walls back to the harbour and then up through the Almedalen gardens and their beautiful lake, on a warm sunny Sunday surrounded by lots of people sunbathing, through to the Lilla Strandporten – one of the most important gates in the city walls and then back down the main road to the hotel to freshen up before dinner.

After dinner I headed back to the hotel and grabbed my camera as there was just time to get down to the sea front to catch the sunset. As the beach faces west, it offered a stunning sunset with the accompaniment of the Baltic just gently lapping at the shore. I watched as the sun disappeared beneath the horizon and then headed back to the hotel to turn in for the night.