Rügen tour. Day 3: Cape Arkona

Sunday morning was cold and sunny. It was very pleasant to have a stroll on Wilhelmstrasse where we stayed in Sellin, in one of those beautiful white villas. Most of them were built around 1900, and one could read about their history on the information desks placed in front of the buildings. This sculpture is called Martha, by Thomas Jastram, 2013:

Breakfast in a local bakery Treppenbäcker was very good. The bakery started in 1912 in Anklam, and was moved to Sellin in 1982, to the Villa Walhalla where it can be found today. They do their work with joy and pride. All baked goods are hand-made and with a lot of effort; they are baked in a unigue coal-fired steam oven. That oven is the only active one of its kind on the Isle of Rügen.  The result is special quality and happy customers willing to stay in a long queue.

After breakfast we got to our rented car and drove to Prora, 4.5 km long building built by Nazi as a beach resort. We’ve seen it many times from air, and it was first time Vagn and I were going to see it from ground:

The enormous building complex was built during 1936 – 1939, although it was never completed. The buildings were used for military.  In 2004, following more than a decade of unsuccessfully attempting to sell the site as a whole, the blocks of the building began being sold off individually. Some of these blocks are being restored into apartments, others to hotels, hostels, summer homes. One the photo above one can see the old and the newly renovated blocks.

Our next stop was Kap Arkona where we were welcomed by these two sweet figures:

Horse carriages and trains are running there every 15 minutes from Putgarten, making it easier to explore the area.

Driving through Putgarten:

We got off in Vitt, and visited the old seaman Vitter Chapel from 1816. A couple of drawings on the wall inside its octagonal building were representing the life at sea. It was built because more and more visitors came to hear the shore sermons of Altenkirchen pastor, Ludwig Gotthard Kosegarten. During his stay on Rügen he wrote many reports about the island, that made both Rügen and Kosegarten famous.

The old fishing village of Vitt with its charming thatched-roof houses that are hided in-between the hills, was nearby. The exact age of this village is not known, but according to some sources it probably already existed in the 10th century as a fishing and trading port. Trips in fishing boats around Kap Arkona can be booked from its small harbour:

The village is under heritage protection, and attracts many tourists.

It is possible to walk from the village to the northern tip of the Kap Arkona by the sea, and to get up the cliffs via a narrow staircase.

This is a chair where one person can seat and watch the sea:

The chair is called “See(h)vogel”, made by Matzi Müller Bildhauer in July 2005.

There are two lighthouses on Kap Arkona. The smaller one was built in 1827, and the bigger one – in 1927. On the photo below is the one that used to be a marine navigation tower.

Nice chairs! Hmmm… built of gravestones. On the back of one of them I could read that someone who was buried under that stone was born in 1890, and passed away in 1924.

This a transformer station beautifully painted. I saw it in many places on Rügen – boring buildings were painted cheerfully, with some nice motives:

There were some areas covered in tiles with names and hearts. We didn’t get the purpose of it, and thought it looked strange. Most likely some couples wanted to memorize their love for each other:

A fire station:

Sculptures on the way (this is a photo from a poster, it was better than mine):

An exhibition of old agricultural machines:

Unfortunately, we had to go back home. There were so many interesting things to see on Kap Arkona; one could easily spend a weekend just there. There are also many hiking trails of different grades of difficulty.

We filed a flight plan from a local restaurant where we enjoyed a hearty German lunch, and got on the road. We drove a different way, and at one point got to a ferry connection which we didn’t expect. We were a kind of strongly surprised, and drove by the ticket office without noticing it, directly to the ferry. The ticket office sent a man after us – we couldn’t escape without paying first!

Our tour during that day, logged with Suunto Traverse watch:

When we took off, it was a bit misty, and we again wondered whether it would be possible to cross over. The only alternative we had was to return back to Rügen: many military areas were active south of our way, and we wouldn’t have the time to fly home via Ferhman. But after we passed FL50 the air was clear, and we continued to Denmark.

Abeam NIKDA:

Our beautiful world seen from the skies:

We enjoyed the flight.

Wonderful weekend: three days on Rügen and QuaxMeet in Bienenfarm. We were grateful for the weather, the nice people we met and the experiences we had, for our ability to fly…