View of the Wattenmeer from the beach
The great thing about Ostfriesland is that it's very small town Germany, and the bad thing is that small town Germany has relatively awful train/bus connections.
We woke up early Sunday morning and after hastily packing and getting ready, headed to breakfast where we definitely skewed the 8:00 am age demographics. After a (fairly) quick train/bus ride we were at Harlesiel and ready to start our Wattwandern adventure.
Abby knee-deep in Watt
We finally started our Wattwandern around 11:00 am, and it took us approximately four hours to cover the 9 km stretch of Watt with several breaks so that our Wattführer Frank could explain various biological, ecological and geological facts about the unique Watt-landscape. One of the amazing parts of the hike was how quickly the Watt conditions changed from knee-deep slimey mud/marsh fluff to fairly solid sand to waist-deep water channels we had to cross called Priele.
Wattwurm "Spaghetti"
Ecologically, the Wattenmeer is incredibly active and diverse from various mollusks and shellfish to the famous Wattwurm (Watt worm). The Wattwurm lives in a little u-shaped tunnel just below the surface of the mud. It filters through the sand/mud on one side and every half-hour or so "poops" out the filtered sand through the other side leaving little mounds of what's called "Watt Spaghetti." Try to imagine walking through the Watt and having nothing but these little hills of "sand" worms as far as the eye can see--it's really quite amazing.
I honestly don't think we could have had better luck with the weather this weekend for our Wattwandern. The skies were mostly clear, the temperature was just right at around 75°F with a nice breeze instead of the normal strong winds.
Go Gamecocks! It's harder to write in Watt than you would think.
The Wattwandern Crew
Once out of the Watt, we had time to explore the island of Spiekeroog for a few hours which is unbelievably quiet due to the ban on cars and discouragement of bikes. The sleepy little island was mostly devoid of tourists the day we were there due to the ferry service being stopped earlier in the day. The five of us trekked to the main village on the island where we celebrated our completed Wattwandern with some beer, Jever again!, and great local seafood at a small restaurant. After dinner we had just enough time to grab some ice cream before heading to the harbor where our ride back to the mainland was waiting, a small Fischkutter (fishing boat). It was amazing to take the boat back approximately where we had, just hours before, hiked over the tidal flat. Frank the Wattführer even had the boat captain toss in a small net to catch some wildlife and gave us another short ecological lesson on the local marine life.
The island of Spiekeroog
Our ride home: a German Fischkutter
Back on mainland at the Neuharlingsiel Harbor, probably one of the cutest small-town harbors in the world, we had just enough time to grab tea and coffee before starting our long journey back to Hannover.
After everything was said and done, it was a great weekend with great friends and a perfect final hurrah with Jackie and Abby!
Frank the Wattführer showing how to determine the sex of crabs
What's that Frank? Cuttlefish, you say?
Neuharlingsiel Harbor
*Edit: Our Wattführer's name was Frank Ralf but went by Frank (Thanks, Jackie!).
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Umm...wasn't our Wattführer's name Frank? I'm pretty sure his name was Frank. Where did you come up with Ralf?
ReplyDeleteJust corrected it.
ReplyDeleteHe signed his emails Frank Ralf when I was making reservations, so for whatever reason Ralf was in my head as I was writing.