🧱🏘 Civilisation!

⛪️🔔🏖 Last but not least, I'll show you human civilization. There are three churches and the island bell, which you can hear ringing in the video. There are numerous restaurants and a few souvenir shops. There are two grocery stores and a 24-hour store with vending machines in the town hall building. Beach chairs are available on the beach, which you must reserve.

✨️😁🌊 You can also see my soft face on my first day on the island (for comparison, see my rough face after 10 days in the previous post).

🪶📃🕰 Life and history of Baltrum

📖🫅🗺 Baltrum is the smallest of the East Frisian Islands in the North Sea. It was first mentioned in 1398, when Widzel tom Brok gave the island – then called "Balteringe" – to Duke Albert of Bavaria and later received it back as a fief. The name "Baldatringe" appeared even earlier, in the 11th century. Ancient writers may have known of it even in the 1st century AD.

🎣🦭🛶 In the past, the sea often threatened the island’s small population. Around 1700, most people lived from fishing and hunting. Villages were sometimes abandoned because of shifting sand or storm damage, such as the great storm of 1825. From 1870, sea walls and dikes were built to protect the land.

🫧🌊🔔 Baltrum became a seaside resort in 1876. The Old Island Church from 1826 is one of its landmarks, with the famous "Island Bell" from a Dutch shipwreck. As visitor numbers grew, the Large Island Church was built in 1930, and the Catholic St. Nicholas Church followed in 1957.

🌳🌹🌿 A small highlight is the Rose Garden between the two main villages, cared for by volunteers and known as Germany’s smallest spa park. There are beautiful figures and the path is made of shells.

🐴🚴‍♀️🛴 Baltrum has no cars or motorcycles. People travel by horse-drawn carriage, bicycle, e-bike, or e-scooter, giving the island its calm and relaxed atmosphere.

💫🦥🐾 My plush son Vincent misses Baltrum at least as much as I do!

🤗 For a more nuanced discussion, please feel free to use the comments section, private messages or the anonymous contact form on my website.

🌳🌲 On Baltrum, there are more trees than one might think!

There are downy birch forests (Betula pubescens), oak forests (Quercus), pine forests (Pinus), mixed forests, deciduous forests, coniferous forests – you can find spruces (Picea abies), woolly creeping willows (Salix repens) – many other willows – many sea buckthorn shrubs (Hippophae rhamnoides) and so on and so forth. Looking up, you might also spot a European mistletoe (Viscum album).

From time to time, you can also just try something… birch seeds or delicious pine cones. Exquisite! All completely natural, without car or industrial emissions! 👨‍🍳😋

🤗 For a more nuanced discussion, please feel free to use the comments section, private messages or the anonymous contact form on my website.

🌸🌼🪻 Baltrum has many flowers for you!

(1) Dune pansy (Viola tricolor maritima)
🌿 A maritime form of the wild pansy growing in sandy soils near the sea. I think it's the most beautiful of all the island flowers!

(2) Mouse-ear hawkweed (Hieracium pilosella)
🌿 A creeping perennial, frequent in dry grassland and sandy soils.

(3) Sea rocket (Cakile maritima)
🌿 A salt-tolerant plant of sandy beaches and dunes. A pioneer plant important in dune formation. I saw many, but only one was blooming.

(4) Narrowleaf trefoil (Lotus tenuis)
🌿 A low-growing legume with slender leaves and small yellow flowers, thriving on dry or sandy soils, including coastal grasslands.

(5) Oakes’s Evening-primrose (Oenothera oakesiana)
🌿 A coastal biennial with large yellow flowers that open in the evening, adapted to sandy dune habitats.

(6) Small bugloss (Anchusa arvensis)
🌿 A bristly annual with small bright blue flowers, typically found on sandy or disturbed ground.

(7) Sea milkwort (Lysimachia maritima)
🌿 A succulent coastal plant with fleshy leaves and pinkish-purple sepals, adapted to salty shorelines and salt marshes.

(8) Sea thrift (Armeria maritima)
🌿 A hardy coastal perennial, often found in the salt marshes.

(9) Ragged-robin (Silene flos-cuculi)
🌿 A delicate wildflower of damp meadows, with deeply cut pink petals that give it a ragged, star-like appearance.

(10) Common starwort (Stellaria graminea)
🌿 A slender wildflower, common in meadows and along paths.

(11) Honeysuckle (Lonicera periclymenum)
🌿 A fragrant climbing shrub often found in hedgerows and woodland edges.

(12) Yellow flag (Iris pseudacorus)
🌿 A large wetland iris with bright yellow flowers, common in marshes and along water edges.

(13) Cow parsley (Anthriscus sylvestris)
🌿 A tall, airy umbellifer with delicate white flower clusters.

(14) Lilac (Syringa species)
🌿 There are many cultivated and hybrid forms of lilac. This one smelled really good!

📖🔍 I was able to identify the species based on its appearance, habitat and the species list of the East Frisian Islands (Niedringhaus, Haeseler, Janiesch).

🤗 For a more nuanced discussion, please feel free to use the comments section, private messages or the anonymous contact form on my website.

🥳✨️ Today I turn 39! I'm enjoying the day all to myself on the German North Sea island of Baltrum. It's the smallest of the populated East Frisian Islands. I've visited here several times since I was a small child. Baltrum is so small that there are no cars and no street names, only house numbers.

⏳️🪁 The last time I was here was 23 years ago, at the age of 16. The photos show me when I was about 3-4 years old (1989/1990), and the others when I was 6 (1992).

👶🦷 I remember losing my very first baby tooth on Baltrum. But you can't see it, because it happened on the last day. As a child, my hair was quite light—but yes, that's really me!

🐇🐓 In the early 90s, there were lots of pheasants and rabbits on Baltrum, and they were very friendly. But that hasn't been the case for decades. Today you can still see them occasionally, but back then there were a lot of them!

🐚🦀⛱️ I remember the girl I played with on the beach, and I also remember that a small seahorse and several starfish washed up into the hole we dug.

🐴😳 I was a bit sceptical about the horse (Norwegian Fjord Horse) because I didn't really like feeding it by hand. I was once bitten by a donkey, and that scared me. But I wasn't afraid to get on the horse and ride it. I have many memories of Baltrum, and that's why I'm spending my birthday in this special place. I'll have a detailed report as soon as I get back.

🤗 For a more nuanced discussion, please feel free to use the comments section, private messages or the anonymous contact form on my website.