Crossing to Kępa Bazarowa, Torun's island on the Vistula

Walking over Piłsudski Bridge

Most Józefa Piłsudskiego (Rapackiego Square to the island) takes 15 minutes on foot and costs nothing. Walk the eastern side, the Old Town side, where the pedestrian walkway runs with the city walls on one hand and the wooded island ahead. The walkway is narrow, single file in places, and a 1930s riveted steel truss carries the road traffic alongside you.

The view shifts with every step, and that is reason enough to cross on foot at least once. A wooden bridge stood on this crossing around 1500 and was one of the longest in Europe.

Crossing by boat

Katarzynka II (jetty under the brick Bridge Gate) makes the same crossing in five minutes and lands at the Pałac Widokowy slipway on the island. The fare is 8 zł adult, 6 zł child. It is a small open-topped white motor launch with a striped awning and 20 seats, running daily in season with no booking.

Sailings depend on the river level, so check the jetty before you count on the boat back. The same launch also runs a 30-minute cruise at 16 zł adult and 9 zł child.

The viewpoint at the end of ul. Majdany

Punkt Widokowy Panorama Torunia (ul. Majdany, Kępa Bazarowa) is open ground with no ticket and no gate. From the low deck on the sandy bank the Bridge Gate, the Cathedral of SS John and the leaning tower stand in a row across the wide brown river, with the whole brick wall-and-tower line of the Old Town behind them. The signboard tells you which spire is which.

This is the postcard view of Toruń. Parking at the platform is free for cars and coaches, and guided coach parties and school groups arrive through the day. Come after dusk instead, when the Old Town floodlighting is on.

Dybów Castle and the peace stone of 1411

Zamek Dybów (left Vistula bank, 300 m from the viewpoint) is roofless. Red-brick curtain walls and the stump of a gatehouse tower stand in mown grass, the girders of Piłsudski Bridge rising behind them. At night the brick is floodlit amber.

King Władysław Jagiełło raised it in the 15th century as a counter-fortress to the Teutonic castle on the far bank. The grounds cost nothing and stay open around the clock. Access went events-only for part of summer 2026, and normal free visiting resumed on 3 August 2026. The courtyard is still used as an open-air event and festival venue.

Kamień I Pokoju Toruńskiego 1411 stands low among the island trees and grass, a plain inscribed granite block with no railing and the river light behind it. Poland–Lithuania and the Teutonic Order signed the First Peace of Toruń here on 1 February 1411. It is the island's one piece of world history, and easy to walk straight past, so slow down and look for it.

Inside the reserve

Rezerwat Przyrody Kępa Bazarowa covers 32.4 ha inside a Natura 2000 site, and the riparian forest in it is rare. The grove works like a nave, black poplars and willows carrying the light high and letting it down in patches, nettle and ivy filling the ground between them. The footpaths are soft sandy silt, and the Vistula glints through the trunks the whole way.

The reserve holds 58 bird species, white-tailed eagles among them. You pay nothing to walk in, but this is protected ground. Stay on the marked didactic trail. No cycling and no fires.

In January 2026 the illegal felling of 335 trees here came to light, and the case remains under prosecution. The scar is visible on the walk.

The beach on the western tip

Plaża nad Wisłą przy Zamku Dybowskim is a 200 x 40 m strip of pale river sand on the island's western tip, with a beach-volleyball net and timber shelters. A changing hut and bike racks sit behind it. The Old Town skyline fills the water view.

The municipal beach is free and nobody gates it. No lifeguards work here and there is no supervised swimming, so treat the Vistula as something to look at. The beach brings back a city beach that stood on the same sand in the 1970s. The Mała Wisełka pontoon promised for it has not been built.

Eating and sleeping on the island

Pałac Widokowy (ul. Majdany 1) is the only place to eat, drink or sleep on Kępa Bazarowa itself. The house is the Toruń Rowing Club of 1920, white and manor-style with a columned porch, restored and running as a hotel and restaurant since 2022. Terrace tables face straight across the Vistula at the Old Town panorama, and a webcam on that terrace has made the view familiar to people who have never stood on it.

Mains run 50 to 60 zł. Rooms start at 296 zł (zł zł zł). Book well ahead. The place was built for weddings, conferences and corporate galas, and the whole of it can go to a single event.

The island from the water

Trans-Wod, with the ships Wanda and Wiking, moors at Bulwar Filadelfijski by the Holy Spirit Gate and runs a 40-minute loop along the length of the medieval town and around Kępa Bazarowa. It is the only way to see the island's wild outer shore, the side no path reaches.

Departures are hourly from 9:00 to 19:00, May to September. Tickets are 40 zł adult, 30 zł child. Under-4s travel free. The ships are white double-deckers with an open sun deck and a bar, and private charters sail after 19:00 with a 15-person minimum.

Bulwar Filadelfijski and its restaurants

Bulwar Filadelfijski is the facing bank, two minutes away by boat, and the bank you look at the island from. The quayside runs 1.8 km of resurfaced granite and timber below the Old Town walls, rebuilt in 2024, with new glass-and-wood pavilions holding a café, bike hire and boat hire. Barges lie moored along it and the benches face the green wall of the island opposite. Nothing here costs anything to walk, and walking tours stage from here.

Widokówka (Bulwar Filadelfijski 5) is a small modern pavilion café with an outdoor deck of blankets and patio heaters. The heaters keep the deck working out of season. The counter does cakes and ice cream, and the Vistula and the island's treeline fill the view (zł zł). It opens 11:00 to 20:00 most days. Weekends start at 10:00. The indoor room holds a handful of people.

Barka Atena (Bulwar Filadelfijski 1) is a converted steel river barge with the restaurant on the middle deck, portholes and deck rails, the Old Town illumination on one side and the dark island on the other. The kitchen does fish and Polish plates, eaten on the water. A double room is 250 zł (zł zł). The barge is strictly seasonal, late April to the end of September.

Restauracja Bulwar (Bulwar Filadelfijski 18) occupies the 19th-century Racławice barracks, thick brick walls with contemporary rooms inside, a river-facing terrace and a walled garden. The kitchen cooks seasonal Polish-European food, with mains from 50 to 130 zł (zł zł zł). Thirty-two wines are poured by the glass. A 276 m² room takes exclusive hire for weddings, receptions and corporate dinners. Hotel Bulwar has rooms, if you want to wake up looking at Kępa Bazarowa.

SALT Restaurant (Bulwar Filadelfijski 11) sits in the Copernicus Toruń Hotel directly opposite the island, glass-fronted onto the boulevard with a panoramic summer terrace above. Steaks and duck lead the à la carte, alongside a Taste Toruń tasting menu. Service runs from 13:00 until 22:00, and to 23:00 on some days. Reserve for the à la carte room. Rooms start at 465 zł (zł zł zł zł), and the hotel's 149 rooms and conference floors make banquets and private dining routine. The Bridge Gate jetty for the island boat is a 5-minute walk along the quay.

Planning the day

The island itself is free and open around the clock; the boats are not. The Wanda and Wiking loops run May to September, Katarzynka II sails only when the river level allows, and Barka Atena shuts from the end of September until late April. Book Pałac Widokowy before you travel and reserve your table at SALT.

See the Torun guide and the Torun hotel search.