Mushroom Foraging, Smoked Fish Huts, And Military Zones: Dylan Graves Explores The Baltic Sea

Hel, Poland, is a spindly finger of land stabbing into the Baltic Sea — a witches’ claw curling toward the northern European elites across the water. The peninsula survives on storm scraps, delivering Baltic-standard waves: grey, sloppy, windswept foam, and air sharp enough to cut — a proper Baltic kiss.

Once a vital fishing village, later fortified and fought over during WWII, Hel has seen its share of conflict and reinvention. For decades, it was a military zone, locked off from the public. Now, it’s the surfing capital of Poland. 

Who better to chart surfing’s fringe than Dylan Graves? The guy’s found his lane: drifting from one corner of the globe to the next, swapping stories with the misfits and lifers who make up the edges of the scene. The Anthony Bourdain of surfing, if you will — minus the writing chops and heroin habit.

In his latest exposé, he forages for wild mushrooms, stumbles upon a fairytale cottage-core fish house in the forest, and tags along on the surf tour for Hel’s swell event of the year. The waves are nothing to write home about, but in a place where you’d be lucky to surf at all, and the sun rarely shows its face, the locals are refreshingly content. A few pearls of local wisdom:

“It’s messy, but it’s still fun, as it always it. It’s sunny, so we don’t have anything to worry about.”

“You can’t even make one turn, but it’s still fun.”

Step into the frosted land of Hel above, and if you’re sniffing out a surf trip through the Old World, check out our guide to European pleasure here.