Ronne tourist information
Rønne is game - are you?
If you come by ship to Bornholm, you will arrive in Rønne Harbour at the foot of St Nicolai Church. The harbour is the biggest one of Bornholm and lively frequented by ferries, fishing boats and cargo vessels. Here, the sea and land mix air with each other.
Take a walk on the cobbles in the quiet streets of the old part of the town behind the church. Rønne is a “garden town”. Behind the half-timbered houses and walls you find both back gardens and big gardens. It can be difficult to see these gardens from the street, but you can smell the many lilacs and fruit trees, hear the bird life and sense the peace between the houses and gardens. And look: In many of the small windows, the natives of Bornholm show their porcelain figures, handmade glass or knick-knacks of special importance. A personal signal to you from each window. Or go for an evening walk. Without being a window peeping Tom, you can experience many beautiful illuminated living rooms and interiors in the old houses of the town – from high-tech to best parlours from the beginning of the 20th century.
Here, there are exceptional many fine half-timbered houses but in between you see the more recent “bomb houses” of red or yellow bricks, which were built as replacement for the many houses, which the Russian bombed in May 1945.
Rønne (and Nexø) are the only towns in Denmark where you can experience the consequences of the violent bombardments. While the rest of Denmark was celebrating the liberation in 1945, Bornholm was still occupied by the Germans. The island was an important bridgehead for German refugees on their way home from the Eastern front. Therefore, on 7 and 8 May the Russians bombed the town so badly that every tenth house was destroyed. A huge work of reconstruction replaced the destroyed houses with the new so-called bomb houses, which you can see today as newer brick houses between the old half-timbered houses. The area around the street Snellemark was hit very badly and now the street consists of only new bomb houses. See the stone relief above the door of the bomb house just south of the church. You can almost hear the noise of the machines.
Another proof of the bombardments is the several hundred wooden houses, the so-called Swede-houses, which Sweden gave to Bornholm to help rebuilding the island. Today, these houses are desired residences in the residential neighbourhood of Rønne (and Nexø).
St. Torv is the living centre of Rønne. Originally, the market place was a drill ground for the military, but today this is the place where guests and natives are gathering. Around the fountain, the granite sculpture, on cafés and in the shops.
Experience the special atmosphere of the market days on St. Torv. Here, the natives of Bornholm present their own products. Get a chat with the people behind the booths. Early in the morning they come from the other parts of the island and from Rønne and line up their booths with homemade handicraft, granite ornaments, candles, clothes, vegetables and much more. A butcher of the island and a fishmonger sell their fresh goods from their own vans.
Go from St. Torv to Krystalgade and walk into a smell of stoneware articles rich of tradition. The ceramics museum, the old Hjorths Fabrik, was the leading producer of design and stoneware of Bornholm dating back to 1859. Today, you still work in the old workshops according to old methods. With all your senses, you can experience people and clay interplay through the working process. And if you want to feel a fine material of Bornholm in your hands, also when you get home, you can buy the beautiful products in the museum shop.
In the fine old street Laksegade, you find the garden museum Erichsens Gård. Here, you can smell and taste the old-fashioned life of the middle-class of Bornholm at the end of the 19th century. Behind the door, you find a living furnished middle-class house where you bake bread on the wood-burning stove, tint yarn with plants, make mustard, bake pancakes and as a guest you can taste the past. The garden is a sense experience in itself – a nice old garden of the province with flowers and herbs, which we seldom see or smell today.
At Bornholm Museum you can experience the fantastic culture history of Bornholm - from the prehistoric time up to the 20th century. The Middle Ages, the churches, shipping, Christiansø, the grandfather clocks and the Second World War, where the Germans and the Russians were on Bornholm. Everything left marks, which you can sense and understand. The marks are gathered here.
At the citadel, a bit south of the old part of Rønne, you find the impressive tower Kastelstårnet with its round shape and its four metre thick walls. This tower looks like the round churches of Bornholm, which were built 4-500 years earlier. 1687, the Danish King Frederik V would fortify Rønne with a gigantic defence castle, which should make the town a fortress with a naval base directed towards the Swedish King. The plans were never completed, but the gun turret and the warehouses were made and today, these buildings contain the Museum of Defence.
Since ages, Rønne has also been the cultural capital of the island. Take a seat in one of the red chairs and you will sit in 180 (!) years of theatre culture of Bornholm. Rønne Theater has been in daily use since 1823. Every summer, nation-wide fame actors perform the Bornholmer Revue on the theatre, which is an experience in itself to visit because of its original atmosphere. This is the oldest theatre of the country and tells about a rich theatre tradition in Bornholm with i.a. dialect comedies and plays, which are written and performed in the original language of Bornholm. Today, the theatre is being used by local theatre amateurs, for performances of tour theatres and as a new drama school for the children of the island.
Bornholms Musikhus, the venue on the market place St. Torv, is the rhythmic concert house of the island, where you can experience well-known Danish and foreign bands and soloists. Either on the big stage or in the small intimate Rasch’s Pakhus with a café and a gallery.
Rønne offers many restaurants and cafés and several hotels. In short distance from the town centre, you can get sand under your feet. The town has a very nice sandy beach, which stretches both to the south and to the north. Scarcely 2 km north of St. Torv, you find the Antoinette beach, which is very popular with the beach boys of the town. Just 1 km south of the town centre, at the nice open natural resort of Galløkken, you find a nice sandy beach too. This stretches about 30-35 km along the south coast of the island to Nexø.
By Galløkken and Antoinette beaches you find two good camping sites, which attract many guests during the summer. Just south of the town, between the citadel and Galløkken, the youth hostel with midget golf is situated. The real 18-hole golf course, one of the three courses of the island, is situated just 4 km from the town centre towards Aakirkeby.
Rønne is full of experiences, opportunities and the central starting point for excursions to the whole island.
Ronne aerial map
Please click on any icon on the Ronne aerial tourist map, to find close by places, offering hotels and tourist information. You can zoom in and zoom out our touristical map as well as switch between satelite and map view of Ronne.
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