I thought I would be the first one meeting up for breakfast at 7 a.m. in the hotel, but there were other travellers, too.
The morning was perfect – calm and sunny, it was unbelievably nice and warm weather for September. I walked to the bus stop that was just a couple of minutes away.
Around 13 km to Zingst and a 20 minutes ride:
Crossing over the Meiningenbrücke, the bridge I flew over the day before:
Soon I was in Zingst. During the trip, the bus driver was shouting at some other cars that got in his way – what is it with the German bus drivers? Such a polite nation in general, but… I experienced the same in Flensburg a year ago, when a bus driver was shouting at me. If you are curious, here is the link to that blogpost.
The buses between Barth and Zingst had a trailer attached, for bikes. Each bus could have around 20 bikes standing there, so that people could travel around with their bikes. What a great idea! I didn’t want to bring my bike though, as I preferred walking that day, but in that area there were lots of excellent bikeways.
Zingst was quite beautiful and very different of Barth. Nice villas, streets lined with shops and restaurants, beauty salons (good sign!). If people need beauty salons on vacation, it means they take their vacation time to relax.
Breakfast restaurants were full, people were buying freashly baked bread and hand-picked strawberry, the life in Zingst was visibly slow and enjoyable. I noticed, I also began walking slower and slower – and enjoyed it as well.
On the beach, there was a photo exhibition. Something about nature with the texts only in German…
When I was stading on that dune, a volunteer from the Red Cross approached me and explained the dunes were protected and people were not supposed to stand or walk there. If they translated their warning signs to English and other languages of the nearby countries, it wouldn’t be necessary with volunteers watching you… Nevertheless, important with protecting the dunes.
Seebrücke Zingst, a 270 m long pier with benches and artworks:
At the head og the pier, a diving gondola offers tours down to 4 m below the surface – good fun for children and great introduction to the underwater world. I wish I had such an experience as a child, so that I got inspired and could start scuba diving earlier in life.
It was so wonderful to get into the water:
The Aviator and The Blue Bear loved staying on the beach with me:
And the 1 kg of strawberries (it wasn’t possible to buy less) tasted so good…
Later, I had a lazy walk through the resort. The amount of restaurants was overwhelming, and they all looked to be very good. Few tourist shops, and many shops with quality outdoor clothing. I had planned to have a meal in the harbour, I thought that fish would be freshest there.
See rescue station from the old days, now a museum and a pub:
In the harbour, people were sailing, having an ice cream in a cafe, or just going for a stroll on the wooden walkways by the water. There were no childen, almost not at all, due to the fact that the vacation properties and hotel rooms in Zingst were rented out on a weekly basis, and in September all kids are back to schools and kindergartens. It was very peaceful 🙂
I had chosen Kranichhouse for lunch. Kranich is crane in English, it is a tall grey bird with a wing span of up to 245 cm. The kranich couples are said to stay together for the life time. There were many of those birds in that area.
Name Kranich also reminded me of a vintage glider of the type Kranich that was lovingly restored in the Danish Vintage Gliding club in Arnborg, and I was lucky to have a flight in that glider (maybe that was the real reason for choosing a restaurant). The story of that restored Kranich is quite remarkable, you can read it here.
Zingst is a popular seaside resort in Germany. I spoke to a couple sitting at the table next to me in the fish restaurant – they came from Frankfurt.
Later, I took a bus back to Barth. What a lovely day I had!