Nexø is the second-largest town on Bornholm, a working fishing port on the island's east coast. It lacks the half-timbered charm of Gudhjem or Svaneke, but it has an honest, unpolished character — the harbour is full of actual fishing boats rather than pleasure craft, and the fish you eat here came out of the Baltic that morning.
The town was heavily bombed by Soviet forces in May 1945, days after the rest of Denmark had been liberated, which explains why much of the architecture is postwar rather than picturesque. The Nexø Museum covers this history along with the life of Martin Andersen Nexø, the novelist who took the town's name as his own. The Bornholm Railway Museum is a separate gem a short walk from the centre, dedicated to the island's narrow-gauge railway that ran from 1900 to 1968.
Nexø Church dates from the medieval period and survived the 1945 bombing largely intact. Just west of town, the Bornholm Butterfly Park is a tropical greenhouse of free-flying butterflies — good for families and a surprising find on a Baltic island. South of town, the sandy beaches at Balka are among the best on Bornholm and draw Danish families throughout the summer. Further inland, the ancient megalith site at Gryet is one of Denmark's largest collections of standing stones, hidden in a wood just west of town.