This was my first, and definitely not last, walk with Berliner Wanderclub. Fifteen people met at Bernau S-Bahn Station and took bus 894 to Wandlitz. We then walked to Liepnitzee, followed the southern shore to Obersee and Hellsee, past Schloß Lanke and Upstallfließ, and finished in Lobetal (a very interesting place). In total around 16 km. Unfortunately, I forgot to record the exact route on komoot.com.
Bonustip: The “Alte Schmiede” in Lobetal doubles as library and café (coffee and homemade cake: 2 euro), and probably a lot more for the citizens of Lobetal, most of whom are physically or mentally challenged one way or another. The café also has outdoor seating.
Given the fact that it was not a photography tour and that therefore, there would not be much time to take photos, I only took one lens with me, and I must say I am quite pleased with what one can achieve in a short time with the Canon 24 mm, aka “Pancake”.
Practised some “ICM photography” on the way (too rushed, of course, since photography was not the purpose of the walk and I had to keep up with fourteen other people):
Much of the way along Landwehrkanal, this woman followed me (she stopped and lingered and looked at me every time I stopped to take a photo, which was quite often, so I’m sure). I shook her off shortly before the end of my walk. Who is she, and why was she following me?
The pandemic now pervades all of our lives to an extent that a sequel to the first Corona diary is in order, and therefore, this will be continued in “Corona Diary II“.
21 October
Autumn colours
17 October 2020
Which will win today – the mist or the sun?
Red basil in bloom
15 October 2020
Another grey and rainy day.
8 October 2020
Covid19 numbers are back to what they were during lock-down in early spring. And so is the weather, so this feels like “back to sqare one”. Looking out the window, mainly for splashes of colour.
The containers in the backyard of the neighbouring construction site about to be overgrown, and a bottle left from New Year’s Eve 2019/20.
6 October 2020
Between two buildings in the morning.
8 September 2020
28 August
With or without the tree?
22 August
It finally rained, and the construction site was quiet. Bliss.
14 August
Not exactly from home, but I am not at home a lot these days. This is not a good time of year to have to keep all windows and doors closed due to ear-splitting noise and clouds of dust (see “Neighbours from Hell”).
So on one of my getaways, I missed a train and therefore had time to photograph the starlings which reside on Bahnhof Alexanderplatz. Tiny but cute, with beautiful plumage.
31 July early morning
27 July
Probably my favourite lens – the 35 mm macro
26 July
Beautiful rain. I could not resist putting some of my plants back on the balcony. I usually scoff at people who spray water on flowers before taking photos of them. So I wait till it rains. A concept possibly better known as a form of hypocrisy.
15 July
14 July
Swallows (I think – correct me if I’m wrong). The acrobats of ornithology. They fly so damn quickly that I’ll never be able to get a sharp photo, even if they come quite close to our balconies. They are probably also the reason why insects never really make it as far the flowers on our balconies. Both a blessing and a curse.
I have tried to make my balcony insect friendly by sowing some wild flowers, and also counting on the herbs that eventually bloom, such as oregano and thyme.
So when there is finally a suitable macro photography model on my balcony, is it thanks to those efforts? No. It is because of a mint plant which I bought in a supermarket earlier today.
6 July
Splashes of yellow.
And some experimenting.
5 July
A crane disappeared and revealed a tower I did not know I could see. Now I have to go and see what it is. Sigma 150-600 at 600 mm.
28 June
27 June
It was just a tiny little thing, about ten mm long. And don’t worry, no animal was harmed in the making of this photo. It is safe and sound, back in the coriander plant where I found it. I love my Canon 35 mm Macro lense.
The underside
Clover, as part of my efforts to create an insect-friendly balcony. Failing miserably.
24 June
A small section of my early morning coffee view, with a little bit of exposure tweaking in Lightroom.
23 June
And in the early evening, I played with Mr Sigma 150-600
22 June
Enjoying the sunrise (very early morning). I do hate pigeons, but they sure make better models than, say, swallows.
Sigma 150-600 mm, at 600 mm, heavily cropped:
20 June
Thistles.
19 June
It was just a tiny little moth, not much bigger than a mosquito.
I went on what turned out to be a fabulous five-day trip to the North Sea. I guess I should thank the “Neighbours from Hell” (now in stereo), since because of them, I had been scrambling to find a place to go which would seem like another planet, without actually leaving the country.
The Wadden Sea (das Wattenmeer, Vadehavet) is fascinating (which I already knew, having spent a week in Sankt-Peter-Ording two years ago), the weather was its September best, and I gorged on fresh fish and seafood, and walked a lot.
Norddeich
I was based in Norddeich which was convenient for taking ferries to and from Norderney and Juist, and – like most coasts facing the North Sea, has a long, tall, dike with a promenade on top providing a marvellous view of the Wadden Sea and the tides. On top of that, the main road is lined with restaurants serving, among other things, fresh, wild-caught fish.
If I had had one more day there, I would have joined one of those guided walks
Some people are, of course, too busy to spend time on a 45 minute ferry ride. Then it is much more efficient to spend time in cars getting to and from airports.
Sharp photos will never be my forté, especially not when it comes to wildlife, but I am quite pleased with the above two photos. I am not sure which one I like best.
Black and white or colour?
On the highest points, you can see the sea on both sides from the same spot:
Actually three very different gardens connected by lines of a total of 500 trees, integrated in the green belt surrounding the old town which used to be the location of the city fortifications.
Kiel is the seat of the Schleswig-Holstein state government and an Olympic, university and port city on a fjord.
With the historic paddle steamer Freya, from Kiel to Rendsburg along the Kiel Canal which is the most frequented man-made maritime shipping route in the world and connects the North Sea with the Baltic Sea. Alledgedly, almost three times as many ships as on the Panama and Suez Canals.
Holtenau Lock. Tour of Rendsburg. St. Marienkirche, old town market and town hall.
But first, a pre-breakfast walk.
The obligatory two war memorials
Yellow poppies – a first for me
The lock:
First impressions at the end of day two:
What was I thinking? Why did I not cancel?
Masking and distancing rules are not being complied with at all.
Already in Berlin, several people were allowed on the bus without masks, and are consistently refusing to wear them. No reaction to that from neither the driver nor the guide. The guide mostly does not wear his when interacting with us in and on the way in and out of the bus.
During meals at the hotel (so far, dinner last night and breakfast this morning) we sit far too close to each other for my comfort (i.e. as if everything were back to normal), and the staff who serve food and drinks are not wearing masks, and not keeping any kind of distance at all but speaking straight into our faces. I feel very uneasy and am not very hungry (that is the upside of everything :-)). The Riesling goes down very well, though.
Breakfast is a buffet (unlike what was described in the programme), and people are mostly unmasked and not following the “one-way” signs, in short, ambling around the buffet area, chatting (i.e. spewing droplets on the food). Yuck. There are two other bus-fulls of people presumably also from other German states.
On the boat today, there were way too many people in my opinion, and the numbers were definitely not reduced, unlike what we had been promised), and I gave up sitting with the rest at the tables allocated to us for the buffet lunch since it was indoors on the lower deck, too cramped and with no air.
We keep hearing that “here in Schleswig-Holstein, the rules are not so strict” and therefore bus-fulls of tourists from other areas, such as Berlin, are apparently believed to have miraculously lost any contagion which they may have carried with them, the second they entered Schleswig-Holstein (?????), and can therefore drop the precautions and measures in force where we came from.
So apparently, we have all misunderstood something when travel restrictions were implemented? Is the fact really that when you travel from a more affected area to a less affected area, you immediately become less likely to be carrying the virus? The entire travel and hospitality industry is going bankrupt for nothing? Then why don’t we invite for example Americans to come to Europe and be cured, if that is how things work?
It is one of the dumbest arguments I have ever heard and reminds me of something Donald Trump might say.
The ignorance, even after almost seven months, about how this virus spreads is breathtaking.
Unfortunately, we arrived back at the hotel too late for me to start packing and making my way back to Berlin, and tomorrow I will be spending most of the day in my hotel room for the webinar, which I absolutely do not want to miss, so I have to be stationary all day.
I will then decide whether I go back to Berlin after that, tomorrow evening, or whether I stick it out, wear my mask and my visor, try to ignore what others do or don’t do, make as little conversation as possible, and skip lunch on the boat on Saturday if it is as cramped and stuffy as it was today.
Seeing the North Sea was going to be the other highlight for me, so part of me is reluctant to skip Saturday’s programme. The other part feels I am already making a big mistake by being here.
Others don’t seem to mind catching this disease, and if I knew I would just keel over and die immediately upon being infected, that would be fine, but I really do not feel like going through what others my age are going through for months when they get infected, and then either die or live with horrible after effects for the rest of their lives.
Day three: On this day, I will attend a webinar photography course, organised by artistravel and presented by Martin Timm
I will be missing a trip through “charming villages” (not my thing) to Sieseby, Kappeln and “the Viking city of Schleswig” (definitely not my thing). Happy to be staying in and near my room.
During the morning, it was raining quite a lot, so for the first couple of tasks, I “recycled” some of the photos taken the day before (above). Here are some of the rest:
Playtime
After the course, I went out to investigate the location of the nearest bus stop and took my camera with me:
And now I have tempted fate long enough. Am returning to Berlin tomorrow (Saturday). Missing this:
Eckernförde, lunch, and a last glimpse of the sea.
The distancing and hygiene rules we had been sent/promised prior to the trip – and I stupidly believed they would be complied with:
Busfahrt:
Intensive Reinigung des Busses vor Antritt Ihrer Reise, besonders an allen Kontaktflächen, wie Haltegriffen, Knöpfe, Armlehnen und Kopfteile
Sie reisen in einer kleinen Gruppe von 26 Personen, so dass ausreichend Platz im Bus vorhanden ist
Ihr Reisegepäck wird ausschließlich vom Busfahrer verladen
Mund-Nasen-Schutz zum Ein- und Aussteigen und während der Fahrt, wenn ein Mindestabstand von 1,5 m nicht eingehalten werden kann (ausgenommen sind Personen, die in einem gemeinsamen Haushalt leben) – für Notfälle hält der Fahrer einige Einweg-Mund-Nasen-Schutzmasken bereit
Auf nicht kontaktfreie Begrüßungsrituale (Händeschütteln etc.) ist zu verzichten. Wir schenken Ihnen lieber ein Lächeln!
Vor Betreten des Busses bitte die Hände desinfizieren. Beim Fahrer und auch auf dem WC steht Desinfektionsmittel bereit
Nach jeder Beförderung werden die Kontaktflächen vom Busfahrer desinfiziert
Um eine erhöhte Luftzirkulation im Bus zu gewährleisten werden vermehrt Pausen eingelegt
Zu Beginn der Fahrt erhalten Sie noch einmal eine ausführliche Einweisung durch den Fahrer
Hotel:
Das Tragen eines Mund-Nasen-Schutzes ist nicht verpflichtend, auf den Fluren oder auf dem Weg zur Restaurant empfehlen wir dies aber für Ihre eigene Sicherheit
Das Frühstück wird Ihnen nach Ihren Wünschen vom Servicepersonal zusammengestellt
Für das Abendessen erhalten Sie eine Auswahlkarte
10 Personen aus verschiedenen Haushalten dürfen an einem Tisch sitzen
Adler-Schiffe
Die Kapazität der Schiffe wurde um 50% gesenkt, so dass ausreichend Platz vorhanden ist und der Mindestabstand von 1,5 m eingehalten werden kann
Mund-Nasen-Schutz muß beim Betreten/Aussteigen und beim Bewegen auf den Schiffen getragen werden. Bei entsprechendem Abstand, Draußen und am Tisch darf der Mund-Nasen-Schutz abgenommen werden
Bei den Rundfahrten auf Amrum und der Hallig werden die Gruppen nochmals geteilt, so dass auch hier ausreichend Platz zur Verfügung steht.
