kroete on tour

As it is a wonderful summer day today, Ugla, Henri and i did a excursion to a little pond nearby and looked at the water lilies.

Very interesting. Did you know, that a bicycle demo exist in Hamburg? Every year in June since 1995 meet a lot of cyclists - this year about 23000 people and two travelling toys.
We had the best place - as always - and a lot of fun:


Morning at the old warehouse district


Altonaer Balkon - a wonderful look at Hamburg harbour and the Köhlbrand Bridge


More and more cyclists arrive


and here we go...


today we can use the freeway


more cyclists

And here we are on top of the Köhlbrandt Bridge with a beautiful view:

We started early in the morning, because we had a long distance to cycle today: 130km along Elbe River to the city Wittenberge. I would do a life mission today: Meet a stork. And along Elbe River loads of storks are nesting every year.


Between 1945 and 1989 the river was a part of the inner German border. This sign remembers at this time.


And suddenly he stood in front of us - a stork. Henri protected me of course.


We stopped at a nice restaurant for lunch. They offered a "all-you-can-eat-buffet" - yummy!


Henri wasn't convinced - but he found a good dish á la carte.
Insektenhotel = insect hotel
After lunch we did some bird watching.


As you can read at the sign, in the nest are living 5 storks this year, the parents and 3 chicks.


We reached Wittenberge and spent the night there. The next morning, the weather wasn't sunny anymore - but nevertheless we started to Rühstädt.
Rühstädt is famous for its high number of resident white storks and has been awarded the title European Stork Village by the initiative EuroNatur in 1996.
I'm very excited.

Morning at Elbe River:


And just when we reached Rühstädt it started to rain and to thunder.
After the rain we went to the NABU info-center.

We saw a lot of signs during our walk like this:


Here is listed, how many chicks are in the nest every year and when the storks arrive and leave Rühstädt.
At the info-center we learned a lot about storks:

1. A stork weighs 4 kg and a Kwaadapp


2. A stork family of five eats a lot each day - 130 mice, 18 frogs (o-oh), 658 earthworms....


3. I can ride a stork :D


4. Storks are globetrotter and live in Africa or Spain during the winter.


After this we did stork watching - i needed a good camouflage and found one:


Anyway the stork of a house discovered me and we had a fight. But you don't have to be afraid - i won the fight.




At lunchtime we went back to Wittenberge and took a train to Lübeck. Because at the afternoon my uncle came for a cup of coffee:



What an exciting weekend!

Yesterday Father's Day was in Germany and I did a excursion with Henri and Ugla by boat. We came back early Friday morning and Luigi picked us up on the beach in Niendorf:




Yes, Henri was a little bit seasick.


But he felt better, when we arrived the beach.


After a breakfast, Luigi drove us home with his truck and we had a power-napping for the rest of the day.... :D

Today Henri showed me a little bit of the surrounding area and we had a look at the strawberry fields:

Wonderful tree-lined street


"Do we need some eggs for a strawberry pie?"


No eggs needed, because the strawberries are not mellow yet.


These neither


It is a great field - in a few weeks we can pick a lot a strawberries here :)