Stage 4: Baltic Germany

Saturday 26 May

We stayed at Moltenort, watching dinghy sailors, canoeists, motor boaters and sailors all mixing in and around the marina. It is a very friendly place. The village is pleasant too - probably a good place to commute from if you work in Kiel. We cycled along the edge of the fiord to Laboe, to visit the U-boat museum and memorial.

The tower dominates that side of the fiord, and houses a good museum about the history of the German navy. It was interesting to read the modern German view of the two world wars - both condemned as unnecessary and unwinnable. We started climbing stairs up the tower, surprised to find that we were the only ones on a rather exposed staircase on the inside of a large open, empty square tower. After about 300 steps, we heard other people, and found the top of the lift! The view was stupendous over the fiord and north towards Denmark.

There was a U-boat to walk around, too. Crowds of people were on the beach, many swimming. We had a paddle in the very warm, shallow water, then turned back to the U-boat memorial.

The bronze sea eagle on the top of it has been taken away for cleaning, but inside it is a very sobering experience. There are rows of bronze plaques listing the names of all the U-boat submariners who were killed in the two world wars (nearly 35000) along with where they were killed and their dates of birth. They were all about 20, their boats were sunk all over the world, but very many in the English channel, and the sheer number of names is horrifying. 

Sunday 27 May
We sailed to Eckernforde, which is about 20 miles up the coast. It is a bank holiday weekend -Pentecost, apparently, so there were lots of sailing regattas. We had literally hundreds of dinghies sailing out of the Olympic site just a little way up the fiord. Luckily, most of the races were just inshore or just offshore of the course that we wanted to take, but a few dinghies darted across our bows. As we came into Eckernforde, a muddle of larger yachts resolved itself into a race heading out of the fiord. We gybed onto starboard, and a big gap opened up as they tacked either side of us. We came to the sailing club which we visited last year, which seems to have some part in the regatta, so we expected some noisy evening events evening events.

Actually, the evening was quite restrained, but we were woken at 11pm by fireworks. They were set off near the leisure centre in the town, which meant that we saw them over the fiord. They were very good indeed, with colours, such as a vivid orange and purple, which I'd not seen in fireworks before.
Monday 28 May
We decided to cycle to Schleswig, which is about 27 km away. The direct main road has a cycle path beside it, but the cycle signposts directed us a quite different route, getting us quite lost and confused at times.

We started alongside a lovely lake, wandered through small villages and fields, and ended up on a hilly section which kept on dipping down to the Schlei and climbing back up into the woods around.

At about lunchtime, we found the Viking museum, about 4km this side of the town, and had a good lunch before going around the museum.

There were some nice objects, but surprisingly few of them, considering what a major town Heddaby (Haithabu) was in Viking times, controlling the main portage route from the Baltic to the North Sea.

There was also a reconstructed Viking village - quite nicely done, and in a gorgeous position down by the lake or inlet of the Schlei as it would have been.

Once we'd done all that, we decided to cycle straight home, rather than go into the town of Schleswig. We got slightly lost on the way home, but it was a super scenic ride, and probably the best part of 40 miles, all told.








Tuesday 29 May
There was a warning of gusts this morning, and then the wind would be north east again - the direction in which we wanted to go, so we stayed in Eckernforde for another day. Shopping in the morning and a bike ride through empty leafy lanes, with lilac and may in the hedgerows, to the Schlei. It was a place where a ferry crosses, about 5 miles from Schleswig.

The river bends among wooded hills and there are a few houses - the sort of place your granny should have a holiday home for those long summer holidays, mucking about in boats and swimming in the river! There was a family swimming, and a granny, and dinghies, but maybe this wasn't an Enid Blyton story!





Wednesday 30 May
We finally left Eckernforde this morning, with a fine reach down the fjord with the drifter up, until the wind rose and we had to turn closer into it, when the drifter was furled and taken down, and soon a reef was necessary. It was a quick sail up the coast to the Schlei, which is the next fjord, but this time with a very narrow mouth, opening out to a wide shallow lagoon and the winding channel down to Schleswig. We moored close to the entrance, in Maasholm, which we visited last year. There are two older Sirius 32's resident, and we picked a place next to one of them.

Thursday 31 May
We left early, because the weather was forecast to get worse during the afternoon. We just went up the coast into Flensburg fiord.

It was a lovely sail in a nice force 3, with just one tack to get around the lighthouse at Kalkegrund, which seems to be in the middle of the fiord, but marks the end of a shallow spit, although the local boats sailed inside it. We actually just entered Denmark for a few minutes before tacking back into Germany - we didn't change the courtesy flag, and noticed that many local boats had a Danish courtesy flag rigged permanently. By lunchtime, we were moored up in Getling Mole, a very well organised marina rather a long way from anywhere, really. The forecast increase in wind did not materialise, although it did rain in the late afternoon. Winds are supposed to be very gusty tomorrow, so another bike ride is planned.

Friday 1 June
By the morning, the wind had really kicked in, with steady wind speeds of 20+ knots and gusts well over 30. Our plan to ride bikes over to Flensburg, straight into the wind, was shelved, and we went to Kappeln, about 15 km, but due south rather than west, instead. It was a nice rural ride along a cycle path beside a not very busy road, with tall green grass, dark green woods, blue sky and deep blue sea.

The town is a rather nice jumble of old buildings with some new pedestrian areas, and a fine large church which has two storeys of galleries and a detailed carved altarpiece.

The town is on a narrow part of the Schlei with an opening bridge, which was run in a much more relaxed pace than the Dutch ones we went through.

There was a museum of old boats - well, a reserved pontoon labelled as such, where you could wander and look at a variety of boats at your own risk.









Saturday 2 June
We stayed another day at Gelting Mole, in order to get to Flensburg by bike. The wind was still in the west, but not as strong as yesterday, but there were some strong sudden showers. The distance is about 30 km, so we decided to stay on the excellent bike track alongside the main road, rather than the wandering bike paths along more scenic, hilly and devious routes. We had about 3 showers, when we sheltered in bus shelters, which broke up the journey a bit, but it did seem a bit of a slog into the wind at times.

When we finally arrived, we locked up the bikes to a handy bike rack and dived straight into a brewery/restaurant for a well-earned beer and meal.

Then we wandered along the main street - all pedestrianised and very full of shoppers. We admired the old merchants' houses (the hofs) and the courtyards behind, and the church with two Danish model ships and some extraordinary wall paintings.

One of these showed a bishop being tortured on the rack, with his intestines being pulled out. The others were a bit less gory.

There is a ship museum, in the same sense as the one in Kappeln, a bit of the harbour dedicated to old wooden boats, some with labels to tell you a bit about them, some well preserved, some not.








The ride back was much easier because the wind was behind us, except that my back tyre developed a slow puncture. The best way to deal with it was to ride flat out for about 2 miles, pump it up while Gordon caught up, and then dash off again. Actually, Gordon was nearly as fast as me, so he was able to take a share in pumping, and it gave us an excuse for frequent rests, which probably helped us get back in little over 2 hours, including about 10 stops for pumping!