Destination: Baltic Sea with Fischland, Darß and Zingst and further on to the island of Rügen.
Sunday, 9th of August:
Before leaving Berlin and heading northwards, we did some very quick sightseeing, just a couple of hours, of the capital.
A colourful Aldi store/shopping centre in Berlin.
Potsdamer Platz/Square.
Typical and famous East German traffic light figure - which is different from the one in "Western Germany".
The Holocaust Memorial.
The Brandenburg Gate.
In front of the Reichstag.
Brezeln, Brezeln, Brezeln :-)
Where the Berlin Wall once stood.
The Spree River passing through Berlin.
En route to the North...
...to the Mecklenburgische Seenplatte (Mecklenburg Lakeland).
First overnight at campsite "Ecktannen" in Waren by the Müritz lake.
First overnight at campsite "Ecktannen" in Waren by the Müritz lake.
Monday, 10th of August:
Our first camping breakfast.
Floating caravan boats. Never seen that before!
Tuesday, 11th of August:
Today's destination: the area of Fischland, Darß and Zingst.
Beach in Prerow, with wicker beach chairs which are typical for Northern Germany's beaches.
Overnight at the "Regenbogencamp Prerow".
Today's first stop: the Hanseatic town of Stralsund, the gate to the island of Rügen. Its old town is listed as UNESCO World Heritage. Unfortunately we didn't really stop in town to actually visit Stralsund as it was impossible for us to find a parking space for our van (and multi storey car parks were not high enough for the van). After circling around and around in the tight streets of the town without any luck, we decided to continue towards Rügen.
Rügen is Germany's largest island, located off the Pomeranian coast in the Baltic Sea, in the Northeast of the country. The island's coast is characterized by numerous sandy beaches, lagoons (Bodden) and bays. This combined with a very diverse landscape and the German resort architecture (from the turn of the 19th and 20th century) make the island a popular tourist destination.
Today, terminus is in Wittow, the northernmost peninsula of the island of Rügen. In the early evening we had found some available spot at the campsite "Am Wasser" in Juliusruh, in the very North of the island, where we decided to spend two nights. In order to be "mobile" with the van (and not losing our spot if we left to drive around in the nearby area), we switched from the campervan to a tent as shelter for the night.
Thursday, 13th of August:
Good morning! Time for breakfast in the sun :-)
Good morning! Time for breakfast in the sun :-)
From Juliusruh via Breege...
Mmmmm, yummy and fresh fish roll!!! Love it!
Friday, 14th of August:
We started the day heading towards the tip of the Wittow peninsula. On our way to the Cape Arkona, a 45-metre high cape marked with two lighthouses, we passed the fishing village of Vitt where I just had to take this picture for Engelbert :-)
Very typical for Northern Germany homes are the thatch covered roofs.
Just a few kilometres southeast of Wittow lies the Jasmund peninsula with the Jasmund National Park. This nature reserve is famous for
containing the largest chalk cliffs in Germany, the so-called Königsstuhl
("king's chair"), the main landmark of Rügen. These cliffs are up to 161 m high above
the Baltic Sea and were depicted in the famous oil painting by Caspar David Friedrich.
In 2011 the beech forest in Jasmund
National Park was added to UNESCO World Heritage List.
From our campsite a path led straight to the famous cliffs. It took us only a 30 minutes bike ride through the forest.
Back at "Krüger Naturcamping": time for yummy BBQ :-)
Saturday, 15th of August:
We left Jasmund Nationalpark southeast to the seaside resort town of Binz, famous for its charming and well-kept historical resort architecture and the natural scenery. We spent some hours in the late morning in Binz.
The town is located by the Schmachter See.
At around 2 p.m. we reached the Baltic Sea spa town of Sellin, just 15 km southeast of Binz. We walked along Wilhelmstraße,
with its splendid houses from the resort architecture period, which runs up to the steep coast, up to 30 metres high - where
there is a steep flight of steps (or a lift) to Sellin Pier and the promenade
on the South Beach (Südstrand).
Time to leave Rügen island. We had our flight back to Oslo on Tuesday and wanted to arrive at my parents' place on Monday to have a night at home, spend some hours with my parents and hand over the van. For not having to drive back the entire 800 km within one single day, we decided to leave Rügen that day and have one overnight somewhere between Rügen and Meckenheim, namely in Lüneburg. On our way back we had planned a detour via Rostock.
Unfortunately we hadn't considered that, given it was Sunday, many (most likely Northern) German tourists would travel home that day to be back at work the next day. Thus, Sunday morning on Rügen was total rush hour on the major roads, which meant three hours constant and tiring stop and go at max. speed 20 km/h from Lobbe to the bridge connecting Rügen island with Stralsund at the mainland.
But at 1 p.m. we eventually made it to the Hanseatic city of Rostock, right on time for lunch and a stroll through town.
Unfortunately we didn't have enough time to visit also the (for Germans) well-known seaside district of Warnemünde.
After some three hours driving we reached Lüneburg, approx. 50 km southeast of Hamburg, and first checked in at the campsite "Rote Schleuse" we had chosen for the overnight. Afterwards we drove into town to discover this beautiful city, which positively surprised both of us.
After some three hours driving we reached Lüneburg, approx. 50 km southeast of Hamburg, and first checked in at the campsite "Rote Schleuse" we had chosen for the overnight. Afterwards we drove into town to discover this beautiful city, which positively surprised both of us.
Monday, 17th of August:
Heading home. Without major traffic interruptions we reached Meckenheim after about five hours driving.
We unpacked the van, had dinner and told my parents about our impressions from these holidays and our experiences with the new van.
Tuesday, 18th of August:
My parents took us to Dusseldorf Airport for our flight back to Oslo where we landed at 9 p.m.
All in all this was nice holidays. I'm happy to have discovered that part of my home country, having seen so many beautiful places and finally having done some camping again :-) However, some organizational issues could have been done better. First of all I totally underestimated the popularity of Northern Germany and especially Rügen island as holiday destination. I totally didn't expect it to be THAT fully booked still in August. When I went with my parents on camping holidays in full summer in France and Italy when I was a kid/teenager, we hardly ever booked any campsites in advance. I was convinced that this would work out also for Rügen and Northern Germany. Unfortunately this was not the case. Therefore we ended up spending most of our time either calling dozens of campsites every day asking for availability or driving from one campsite to another checking if they had something free. Thus we lost valuable time finding a place to stay instead of actually discovering the respective areas and properly enjoying holidays. Additionally, this made us end up in whatever place left, that is in not always the best or most beautiful and clean campsite and often still paying a fortune for it.
Another annoying thing was the fact that at most campsites you never got "fixed" cells assigned which were reserved only for you, even if you temporarily left it. Our overnight home was at the same time our vehicle. This often meant that if we left our spot with our van, e.g. in order to drive somewhere into a nearby town for dinner, our spot might have been occupied by someone else upon our return; the spot wouldn't be guaranteed for us - unless we clearly blocked it with something (a tent). But of course, we couldn't set up the tent every evening just to block the space for a couple of hours and then repack it again the next morning. And we certainly couldn't have left just a camping chair at the spot. Not because this wouldn't have been large enough to declare the space as ours, but rather because it could have been removed/stolen too easily.
Last but not least: the camper van is a cool van, extremely modern and well equipped when it comes to technology and certain functionalities. However, it wasn't really well equipped (yet) with regards to making it a place to temporarily live in. In the end it's still a car and not a fully equipped mobile home. There was no storage possibilities and all our belongings were stuffed and divided into boxes which were complicated to access and had to be rearranged and moved around all the time (the cooking gear and cutlery was in one box, the toiletry in another, the food/spices and stuff for washing up in yet another box, and towels in a forth box...). My parents' plan is to put some extendible cupboard system in it.
Here a collage of pictures from when I inspected the new van during a visit at home earlier that summer.
Grazie, amore mio, for letting me use your beautiful pictures on this blog!
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