Baltic Sea & East Germany

09/08/2023

We felt like we were in a bad movie today... Sweden's season had been over for a while, tourists were out and about in tranquil crowds. Perfect for us. Today we visited the town of Warnemünde in Germany in late summer temperatures of 25 to 30 degrees. The large crowds of people, 95% German pensioners, filled the streets of Warnemünde very well. A little too much for us. Nevertheless, we liked Warnemünde with its historic buildings.
After the visit we drove on and headed for the Western Pomerania Lagoon Landscape National Park. When we arrived at our desired campsite, we were once again surprised at how tourism is still flourishing here. The campsite was fully booked and the next one was also full. So we drove a little away from the sea and found a nice campsite by a lake. We decided to stay here for 2 days.

September 9, 2023

First fixed appointment today: to staff the bike rental at 9:30 a.m. Today we wanted to explore the lagoon landscape. We rented “pensioner” e-bikes 😊 We explored the beautiful landscape on the bikes. During the tour we realized how beautiful the Baltic Sea beaches are. And in the hot temperatures, the beaches were well attended. We discovered that free physical culture (nudism) is still actively practiced here. We left it alone... After 50 kilometers of cycling, we treated ourselves to a cool down in a beautiful harbor restaurant in the neighboring village.
By the way, Heidi had holiday feelings again today. It was probably due to the hot temperatures.

September 10, 2023

On the Stralsund we visited the town of Barth. We were able to marvel at Barth's church tower again and again the day before during our bike tour. Today we saw it up close, it is really impressive. Barth celebrated the city festival with various market stalls. We enjoyed a coffee in an alley and met Jürgen by chance. We met him at our last campsite in Sweden. The best proof: you always see each other twice in your life. We really liked the town of Barth, small but nice. After our visit to the town, we visited Stralsund. We parked Oski directly in the selected parking space in Stralsund and walked into the city center. Stralsund has a very impressive church, unfortunately we couldn't visit it from the inside because it was already closed. So we strolled through the city center to the harbor and ended the evening at our parking space.

09/11/2023-09/18/2023 Island of Rügen & Usedom

Rügen is the largest island in Germany, has around 65,000 inhabitants, is 926 square kilometers in size and is mainly visited by German tourists. At our time, mainly German pensioners. But we were allowed to be the youngest again 😊😊😊 Also a nice feeling... From the island of Rügen we took a ship to the island of Hiddensee. Hiddensee is 17 kilometers long and 3.5 kilometers wide. We decided against bikes (our backside still hurts…) and instead went hiking. We walked along the coast. Parts of Hiddensee and Rügen are built on sand. The sandy cliffs are retreating by around 30 cm every year due to landslides. We ended the evening after Hiddensee with the best fish & chips we have had so far. We spent the next 4 days on the island of Rügen. We visited Cap Arkona, the Königstuhl and the chalk cliffs. We visited the chalk cliffs on a boat and admired the view in the best weather. Reto later walked a bit along the coast, Heidi enjoyed the sun in the café. We also visited Prora, which was built during Nazi times. Prora should have become a holiday village for 20,000 German citizens. Because the war broke out in the late 1930s, it was never finished. A third of the planned buildings were renovated and converted into hotels and holiday apartments. But there are still ruins. The visit to the museum made us very thoughtful and showed us the megalomania of the Nazis. We then left Rügen and headed for the island of Usedom. Usedom is the second largest island in Germany, is about half the size of Rügen but has around 10,000 more inhabitants. On Usedom we enjoyed the beautiful sandy beaches and enjoyed a swim in the Baltic Sea, which was somewhat warmer than in Sweden. We explored locations from World War II and visited the island cheese dairy. The owner of the cheese dairy learned the craft in Switzerland and while tasting it, a feeling of home arose. Good cheese is not easy to find in northern countries.

Both islands fascinated us with beautiful sandy beaches and streets that lead through beautiful tree-lined avenues and the vastness of the arable fields. We were also very touched by the tragedy and suffering of the Nazi era.

September 18, 2023

Today we left the German Empire for a short moment. We visited Swinnemünde, the Polish border town that borders the island of Usedom. Świnoujście is a typical tourist town; in recent years a lot of money has been invested in infrastructure and tourism. After Swinnemünde we drove about an hour to our camp for the night.

September 19, 2023

On the drive to Stettin we were amazed. Investments are not only being made in tourism (as seen in Swinnemünde), but also in new roads and highways. Around 20 kilometers of motorway and road network will be expanded between Świnnoujście and Stettin. Szczecin has a population of just over 400,000. In Stettin (also in Poland) we visited the beautiful old town and marveled at the many historical and colorful buildings. The city is also known for the mighty St. James Cathedral. You have the opportunity to admire Stettin from above on the church tower. We didn't miss this. We then left Poland and drove back to the large canton of Germany.

September 20, 2023

First we visited Prenzlau. There we visited, among other things, the old church where we climbed the narrow stairs to the church tower and enjoyed the view. After that we drove on. From one place worth seeing to another. In the Uckermark region we visited a monastery ruin and the associated old monastery mill. We were able to marvel at many old relics from the past. In Boitzenburg we visited the show bakery and coffee roastery and the brewery. We skipped tasting the beer and instead enjoyed our obligatory coffee and cake. We then drove to our camp for the night, and on the third attempt we found the right place for ourselves. At an old brickyard and on the Havel.

September 21, 2023

After a short morning walk we visited the old Mildenberg brickworks park. We were able to visit the former clay mining area with an old diesel locomotive. Today the former clay pits are small lakes. Reto visited the Brickworks Museum in the afternoon. In the museum, the manufacturing processes of a brick were shown visually and mechanically. In the evening we ate herring fillet in the restaurant next door. Was delicious.

September 22, 2023

A rainy day, which we used as a driving day. In Lübbenau (Spreewald) we visited the GDR Museum. The exhibition showed us how the GDR functioned in terms of food, luxury goods and everyday life. We were impressed by the exhibition and drove to our next campsite in Casel with a lot of new background knowledge.

September 23, 2023

The weather has calmed down again and so today we drove to Saxon Switzerland at around 21 degrees and full of anticipation. On the way we wanted to make a stop at the Bastei (a rock formation). Unfortunately everything was very “crowded” so we decided to continue. After shopping and a quick stop at the drugstore, we drove to our campsite. The campsite in Porschdorf is beautifully situated on a hill near a former farm. From our place we had a wonderful view of the mountains of Saxon Switzerland.

September 24, 2023

Hiking day for Reto, foot recovery day for Heidi. Reto hiked the Lilienstein mountain and the Bastei on the way back. The 5 hour hike was very impressive and had many viewpoints.

September 25, 2023

We had to change today's program relatively early (8:15 a.m.). Oski excluded us. Keys, phone, wallet inside, Reto & Heidi outside... Thanks to our Swiss neighbors we were able to quickly call the ADAC. Thank you very much Doris & Stefan, you saved the day for us 😊 After around 3 hours and the best care from neighbors and the campsite, the car key was fished out of Oski by the ADAC. Oski remained free of damage. After a late breakfast we made our way to Schmilka. Schmilka is on the Czech border. After a short walk we met our friends Fabs & Oli, who happened to be camping very close to us. To celebrate the day, the men had delicious cake, coffee and beer. Luckily there was still a spot available at Fabs & Oli's campsite so we were able to spend another cozy hour with dinner.

September 26, 2023

Fabs & Oli went biking in the Czech Republic, we went on a “Heidi”-adapted hike and then enjoyed the beautiful weather at the campsite and in the café 😊 After dinner, our German neighbors Susanne and Michael welcomed us for a glass of wine invited. We ended the evening with them.

September 27, 2023

From today on we are on our way home. We decided to drive across Czech territory and only on main and side roads. The trip across Czech territory (250 kilometers) was very interesting and varied. Sometimes it looked like Switzerland, in other places it was incredibly wide. Today we went to the 3rd last campsite of our break. This was on the Czech-German border near a golf course. We enjoyed the beautiful evening atmosphere in nice warm temperatures.

September 28, 2023

The goal today was Dollnstein. A small village south of Nuremberg on the Altmühle. Today we were mostly on main roads. At a rest area we met two people from Vaud who drove for 9 months with a motorbike and dog to Mongolia (via Russia). The two young men are also on their way home and want to be home tomorrow evening. After the rest area we visited the small and pretty town of Berching. Berching has around 9,000 inhabitants and has a beautiful, historic old town.

Oski chauffeured us home safe and sound today and without any breakdowns. We look back on 25 wonderful weeks. We were able to see and experience a lot and always felt comfortable where we were and what we were doing. We were also able to meet many lovely people who gave us tips, helped in emergencies or with whom we were able to spend lovely and funny hours. We have not experienced any severe weather, storms, accidents or medical emergencies, for which we are very grateful.

A few numbers about our 25-week trip:

We drove around 21,500 kilometers
We have traveled to or crossed through 8 countries
Wine and beer bottles are no longer traceable :-)
Chip packs and biscuits neither (our trousers still fit)
Ran or hiked about 1,600 kilometers

We played “Tschau Sepp” 200 times (with the better ending for Heidi)

Heidi has read what feels like 200 books, Reto 2...

After so many weeks of travel, we look forward to seeing our loved ones, who were sometimes close with today's technology, but still very far away. Homesickness drew us back home.

We gave up a lot in terms of sleeping comfort, wardrobe, space and our loved ones, but we gained so much. For our relationship, for consciousness and freedom.

That was our last entry. We hope that we can experience a trip like this again in the future. It was nice for you to accompany us on our journey. Bye bye 😊