Nice weather called for a trip somewhere in Germany!
I thought it has been a long time since I visited Stralsund, and I’ve missed that charming city.
Flemming and I took off early, we had tailwind, and after about an hour were descending over the northern tip of Darßer Ort:
After landing and parking, I put canopy cover on my Aeroprakt – so that it is not too warm in the cockpit when we are back. The canopy cover is so light and practical; after 2 years of use I cannot imagine living without it 🙂
It took time to develop this product… Wings covers are on the way. You can read more on my “covers” website nawico.com
Bikes took us on a pretty road by a rapeseed field, and we couldn’t resist taking some pictures by those ambrosial blooming plants:
The walls of the old town welcomed us in:
We entered via the Kniepertor, one of the two medieval city gates that still remain. On the building on the left of it, we saw this cute decoration depicting St. George:
With respect for all religions in the world, we joked it was St. George when he was a child, playing and preparing for his mission later in life 🙂 because the figure indeed looked like a figure of a child in our eyes. St. George is otherwise one of the most venerated saints in Christianity. He was a soldier in the Roman Army who was sentensed to death for refusing to abandon his Christian Faith. He died on the 23rd April of year 303.
The building with the St. George decoration was the monastery of St. Jürgen (St. George in English), known from the 13th century. For many years, it served as a hospital for nursing, an asylum for the poor, and home for the elderly.
We walked down to the Fährkanal where several boats were serving delicious street-style food:
It looked very nice, but we decided we wanted something different, like a big piece of fish 🙂 and we found a table at Schipperhus restaurant with the waterfront view:
Well, we regretted many times! The food was good – as good as fried fish can be, but the service! I don’t think I have ever been treated so badly in my life. We thought it was the owner who served us, and he did everything he could to destroy our day, and with so much hatred, it was simply unbelievable! In the end, insted of giving a bill, he whote the amount we were to pay on a piece of paper and refused taking payment by card. So unprofessional and so stupid! What we observed at other tables with German customers, was quite different – polite waiters (inclusive ours!), professional service, payments by card were welcomed. We were simply shocked. Another time we’ll bring our German friends from Stralsund with us!
After lunch, we had a long stroll through the old town. I love architecture, and it was really a pleasure for the eye to stop by those old building, and appreciate their beauty. On the photo below left you can see the oldest secular stone building in Stralsund, with a cellar from 1258 and a part of the old brickwork exposed:
Photo in the middle above was taken in a monastery inner yard. The small flats were rented out, most likely to people belonging to that church. The building on the right is Dielenhaus, a typical merchant’s house of the 14th century in Northern Germany. Today, it’s used for civil weddings.
One of the cobblestone streets of the old town (reminded us of Dragør in Denmark):
Wandering through the streets of the old town, Flemming and I saw a cozy restaurant and thought it was a good place for a coffee break.
The staff was really nice, but they didn’t have their deserts on the menu, so they kindly invited us to go in, have a look at the cakes and choose ourselves. After walking like for 100 metres, we finally got into the room with cakes – and there were (only) 2 delicate ones… It wasn’t what we wanted, so we just thanked them and walked back to our cappuccino… It was a lovely place – with fountain, enough space between the tables, and a relaxed ambience.
We saw several of those cute triangle-houses, with one room on the ground floor, and a small room on the first floor:
Beautiful terrasses looked so peaceful:
We later settled for a coffee and cake at a bakery that also had tables outside on a sunny pedestrian street. The prices were approx. 3 times lower (!) than in the restaurant before, capuccino had the same average boring taste, but they had a good variaty of pastries. Birds were eating from hand, we even had to force them to leave:
It sounds like I had lots of complains about the service level and food/drinks quality in Stralsund, but we actually were quite surprised – what we experienced was spare smiles and rushing service (with an attitude of getting rid of you as quickly as possible, though no queues at all). Often we had a feeling that we were treated like “f*cking foreigners” – and the tourist season hasn’t begun yet!
After my Easter 2022 tour in Germany, where I had so many wonderful experiences in each and every place I visited, I felt there was something wrong with Stralsund. I chose to think the less positive episodes in Stralsund were just coincidences, and yes I will come again.
One place I’d like to recommend is Frötsch Konditorei (pastry shop). We were shopping some sweets for gifts there – they had a great variaty of cakes and tarts, and seemed to be so happy to have us as customers. No surprise, the place was full of people! That was a pleasant completion of our time in Stralsund.
At the airport, I took the canopy cover off my Aeroprakt, and put it in its storage bag:
We did a round over the city after take-off; it was easy to recognise the places we had just visited:
Industrial area south of the city, probably a shipyard, and the bridge to Rügen island:
We headed north, and flew over the West Pomeranian Lagoon Area National Park:
Then around 35 km crossing over the water – and we were back in Denmark again:
“At home”, in my flying club, we had grilled chicken and vegetable curry for dinner:
Flemming and I talked about the nice people we met in Stralsund and beautiful places we visited; we were very tired after so many experiences and happy we had such a great day.
