We drove across the Netherlands where we were confronted with a language we did not understand. Sometimes my head just gets tired when I hear other languages that I do not understand. But we managed well enough to fill up the car even though we tried at a couple of unmanned gas stations and had to find a place where we could go in and pay in person. We were also able to buy some food. There were so many wind farms and solar panels along the way we were amazed. It was nice if scary to be driving on the right side of the road again. The trickiest part is getting used to which direction we need to take on the roundabouts. But so far no major issues.
Our immediate destination was Grevesmühlen to stay the night and then meet up with our friends Hartmut and Brigitte. It was dark by the time we had driven so many hours - and I do not like driving in the dark- and we could not find the bed and breakfast we had reserved. After a couple of wrong choices we stopped at a convenience store where a kind clerk telephoned our host who agreed to come and guide us in. Turned out it was at another end of the road we had been on. But the road was interrupted by a forest.
Pension Rabe was a delightful place! And our amazing host was so kind to prepare a 'light' supper for us as we were quite hungry at 9 PM. Then we had a good night's rest.
The next day we found Hartmut and Brigitte in their new home. Hartmut has been helping me with my family history research on the Isle of Rügen for many years so it was nice to see them again. I like Wiener Schnitzel and they had found a restaurant a couple of blocks from their home where we had a nice lunch. And then it was time to hit the road again.
We drove on to Rügen, the land of my German ancestors. My great grandfather Rudiger Johann Moritz Grawe was born in Altefähr on Rügen in 1852. All of his ancestors come from Rügen. I was first on Rügen in 2001 with researcher Ruth Froelke who helped me gather information from 5 different parishes.. A few years later Hartmut began helping me by going to the various Evangelische parishes and extracting the information about the 11+ surnames of my ancestors. There are 29 parishes and I learned that the people actually moved quite a bit from parish to parish. Sometimes the families would have children born in 2 or 3 different parishes. As Hartmut would send me the information I would put the names together in the correct families. We spent a few days on Rügen in 2014 but this year we had booked a whole month so we could see the area and get a feel of what it is like. Sadly the Evangelische churches have made the decision to exclude people from searching the old parish records. There were still 7 parishes yet to be searched when that decision was made. I do not know if those records will be accessible in my life time. But I have done all I can do to find my ancestors. I just hope that some day I can gain access to the records of Bobbin, Wiek and Altenkirchen where I know I had ancestors living so many years ago.
Rügen is one of the most beautiful places on earth! I felt such a tranquility as we drove around the island and such a sense of peace. I yearned for the "old" but of course it has literally been decades since my ancestors lived there. The island has been under Danish rule, Swedish rule, Pomeranian rule and German rule. Not to mention the communist rule after WWII. It is actually amazing that anything has survived! The communists made it their business to destroy many old beautiful manors, etc because they were unwanted symbols of capitalism. So sad because much of value was lost. Then if you think about the REALLY old times, Kap Arkona was a religious site of the Wendish people who believed in idols. And there are burial sites of the very old stone age peoples. All of these must have been my ancestors so I spent a lot of time thinking about what it was like for those people and how I have descended from them. There have been many reflective moments.
We experienced so many things that were interesting and enriching. The parish church in Patzig was opened especially for us to see the inside. That was an unexpectedly emotional experience as I thought of my Klempin and Jasmankan ancestors being christened, married and buried there. We were also invited to the special Thanksgiving service which we were glad to attend. Then Herr Holz, the Evangelische Pfarramt, invited us to come to the Trent parish building for a tour and on the same day we also were given a tour of the Schaprode parish building where my Scheele ancestors attended. It was a delight to be there as well.
We drove to Greifswald to attend church in the Branch there. The Branch has a suite of rooms in a building in Greifswald. The people are lovely and each time we were there one of the women came and offered to translate the proceedings. Although I took a couple of German classes almost 20 years ago my German language skills are sorely lacking.
Over the weeks of being in a German environment some of the German began to come back. I found I was able to understand a lot more. And amazingly I was able to communicate with my basic German and lots of hand signals.
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| Well this view with the chalk cliffs is kind iconic and we actually got here. |
There are probably more photos attached than anyone but me really want to see but it was impossible for me to ignore the beauty and the interesting things. We saw sights others may not have found interesting and also missed some sites but it was fantastic to spend some time on that Island. Of course it was fall and the weather cooled considerably but still it was beautiful! So, enjoy!
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| Schipol Airport in Amsterdam |
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| Another brand new car. Only 1.7 km on this 2019 Peugeot Rifter. We quite like this car. It handles well, has a small turning radius, quick acceleration and we seem to get pretty good gas mileage. And we love the space for hauling our suitcases. |
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| Driving on the right side of the road again! And this time it was very nice to be in the lane without the traffic. |
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| We saw any many wind turbines as we drove along as well as many solar panels. Some of the solar panels even had sheep sharing the same fields. Innovative! |
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| A good reason to smile. We were so hungry after driving over 6 hours and not knowing where to stop. Our kind host at Pension Rabe prepared this "light" supper for us. This was not his plan but he pulled it off very nicely! Of course we did not eat all of this but what we had was yummy |
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| A lovely glimpse of a windmill as we left Grevesmühlen. |
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| Driving across the Rügendam - bridge from Stralsund to Rügen - almost to our lodging. |
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| Interesting addition of color to divide the lanes. |
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| A nd here is our new home, or at least our home for 4 weeks. We have the bottom right hand flat with a bedroom, small kitchen, bathroom and nice living dining area plus the balcony. We loved being here. It felt comfortable and was close to everything we needed. |
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| North view of the beach at Binz. |
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| South view of the beach at Binz. |
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| Binz is a tourist town and there are SO many tourists even in the fall! |
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| So many beautiful white buildings! |
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| Beautiful! |
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| Beach view! |
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| Beautiful Binz Church. |
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Rügen Steam Railway - Rasender Roland. We bought our tickets and took a train from Binz to Göhren and then back again. It was an interesting little trip. Lots of passengers and the weather was kind of chilly. |
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| Waiting at the Göhren train station for our return trip. |
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| I absolutely love the forests, especially the forest floors which have little undergrowth. If we were in the walking mode we would have spent hours walking along this beautiful area. |
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| So Steve caught me coming back to my seat after taking some photos. |
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| The vegetation was so lovely and just made my heart sing. |
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| Loving the view! |
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| If you look closely you will notice the hunting blind near the tree. We saw so many hunting blinds as we drove around this island. |
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| View from the train. |
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| We rode outside on the way back. Steve called it a "cattle car". It was kind of chilly!!! |
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| Trains going each way. |
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| The engine. |
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| We stopped here and took time for a little lunch before we went on with the rest of our trip. |
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| There was so much HAY! The ground must be fertile because the yields were so good. |
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| Great view! |
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| Nice view! |
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| Rügen is amazing! there are so many bicycle lanes, hiking trails and so many things for tourists to see and do. So many cyclists, so many hikers. And such a beautiful place to ride and walk. |
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| So, this is Steve's " I am cold and grumpy but I will smile because you are taking a picture" face. Well it is probably a grimace not a smile but we lived to die another day 😉 |
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| I just could not get enough of this beauty! |
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| It was cold on the cattle car. |
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| So many beautiful trees! |
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| So lovely! |
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| Rounding the corner on our way back to Binz |
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| Just one of the lovely trees on the corner by our home. |
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| This little electric train transported people around the area. It only runs during tourist season but provides a great service. It is free with the 'tourist' cards we get when we rent a place to stay which also offers discounts on various services. |
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| I had read about the Naturerbe Zentrum Tree Top Walk long before we made this trip. I was intrigued and thought in would be a great adventure. And what an adventure it was! |
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| The beginning of the journey. They loaned out walkers to help those who struggled with walking. Steve took advantage and had the assist to make the trek. |
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| View from the tower. |
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| This was the first part . |
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| On our way! |
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| Fall was coming! |
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| And then we saw the real part of the tower! |
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| This tree is about 80 feet high and does not reach the top by any stretch |
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| View as we made our way to the top. |
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| The top is in sight! |
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| We made it to the top but were disappointed that the fog and mist prevented what would have been a glorious view. |
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| Foggy view! |
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| Despite Steve's terror of heights we got up to the top. And he informed me the 'only' reason he made the effort was because he loves me. And he lived to tell the tale. |
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| Starting back down. |
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| But first a view from the top |
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| Lots of people young and old made it up and made it back down. It was cool but I wish the fog would have lifted. |
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| Pretty red flower. |
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| This is a road. I think the road construction is interesting. That is our car in our designated parking spot right up by our home. I just wanted to share the way the road looked. |
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| A magnificent stair case in a municipal building in Sassntiz. |
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| And here is a white flower. |
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| We drove to Sassnitz to catch the ferry to see the chalk cliffs. |
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| Sassnitz Harbor |
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| Pretty cloudy but at least the water is calm. We had to check the weather daily so we were able to go out when it was not raining. But there were a lot of cloudy days. And sometimes the report changed while we were out and we still got rain. |
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| Sailing under the German flag. |
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| The sun is trying to come out |
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| The cliffs. |
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| A happy boy! |
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| Cormorants sunning themselves and drying their wings. |
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| Uninvited guests! |
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| This is why I did not tour the submarine. I am much to claustrophobic! |
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| The submarine docks in Sassnitz. Steve took a a tour. |
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| OK he caught me with my mouth full! |
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| A beautiful view of the harbor. |
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| Sassnitz street. |
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| We loved buying fresh rolls everyday! |
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| Definitely fall! |
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| The pier |
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| Loved these little guys taking advantage of the rain puddles. |
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| These electric trains took people to various venues for a price. |
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| Loved this cool bike! |
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| Along the walking street in Binz |
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| Such a fun street in Binz! |
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| On the way back to our home. |
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| You gotta love the house colors! |
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| Just a random street. |
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| This is the building in Greifswald where the Branch of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. meets. It was so great to find this group of members . The spirit was strong and the people were lovely. Each time we went a kind sister would come and translaer for us. Wish we could have been there more often to get to now them all better. |
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| Saw these cranes on our way home. |
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| These cranes were amazing and there were so many. |
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| Some people are so clever with how they use their haybales. |
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| Binz |
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| Binz |
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| There is so much amber, or Bernstein, on Rügen.This is only one of the stores that sells a lot of jewelry. I found a lovely pendant here that I will bring home. |
So that ends the first part of our time in Rügen. There was just too much to cover in only one blog post. And we also took a side trip to Dresden and Freiberg which will have its own post.
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