Saturday 29th June Vagn and I took off from the island of Pellworm early. We even didn’t want to go for breakfast; had some fruit and water, packed our stuff, and that was it. The weather on Helgoland was going to be good for 2-3 days, and we wanted to take advantage of it.
When the two islands of Helgoland appeared on the horizon, we thought they were just another sandbanks, so small they seemed to be. But they became bigger and bigger, and we we came closer, we did a sightseeing flight around them.
Helgoland archipelago consists of two islands: the main one of 1 km2 which is populated, and Düne island of 0.7 km2 – not permanently populated, surrounded by pristine sand beaches. The two islands were connected until 1720 when the natural connection was destroyed by a storm flood. The highest point is on the main island, reaching 200 ft above sea level. Düne has a general aviation airport, a couple of restaurants, and a camping site where we were going to stay.
Helgoland is located 46 km off the German coastline, and to get there and back, one need a fairy good weather.
On final for landing on runway 15:
We were very happy reaching Helgoland:
After formalities, we went to the restaurant “Runway 33” in the airport building for an early lunch. The restaurant is quite large; it has indoor and outdoor tables, and a small shop with food and practical things, and many guests come there. The food was very good; here is the salad with king prawns I had:
Later, we got a camping place, and set up our tent watching other aircraft going for landing:
We wondered what would happen in Denmark, if landing aircraft were flying over a camping area. We have so many noise restrictions in our country – when it is about private flying. Some of my neighbours often hold parties till 4 o’clock in the morning, with 50-100 guests – and you are not supposed to complain about it! But when it is flying – the story is different…
This is how the camping area looks like from above:
You get a number, find your place, and set up the tent. There are great facilities: toilets, washing rooms, showers in 3 separate buildings – it was so comfortable! Ladies could use their hair dryers, there was good light and big mirrors. Tent places were shielded from the wind by natural environment.
And then the beach – clean, endless, with almost no people.
The water was about +15C, and seemed like +10C. In the beginning it felt freezing cold, but as soon as you got up to the neck, it was so enjoyable!
There were small waves, and I too was jumping in them:
Vagn and I spent some hours on the beach, watching other aircraft on final:
Though there is not much vegetation on Düne, the flowers were everywhere:
Flammkuchen in a traditional German beach chair:
Flammkuchen is a German dish, unique to the regions of Southwest Germany, made of bread dough rolled out very thinly and covered with fromage blanc or crème fraîche, and different toppings. We had one with parma and rucola, and one with gorgonzola, walnuts and honey, and shared – both were excellent.
In the evening, we watched the sunset:
There were many birds on Düne; we new there were large colonies of them on the other island, and looked forward to see them on the following day.
