Norderney

Another weekend, another chance to disrupt the course of our monotonous existence and venture into the unknown. This time it was time to hop on a boat and have a taste of life on an island.

We registered months ago for a run: the 20th anniversary run of the island of Norderney. Knowing very well that our crippled bodies might not take the stress of running and seeing the weather forecast to promise thunder and lightning, we were doubtful of having a succesfully pleasent weekend. Despite these inconveniences we decided to go anyway.

It did rain on our way to the island but as soon as we landed the rain stopped. There was a two hour layover between our arrival and the opening of our designated campground, so we used the time to walk from the harbour to the center of Norderney where we had a coffee in a fancy round building.

On the campground we set op our tinier than tiny tent and took a little nap. By this time there was a big hole in the clouds above the island an the sun heated the inside of our tent into a sauna-like environment. Nina couldn't take it so we had to go to the beach five minutes from the campground where she jumped into the sea while Pauli was a nynny (Finnish for coward) and stayed behind. Back in the tent we took another little nap.

Shortly before the run, we woke up and headed to the start line. Bang! The run started and we were almost the last. Against our fears, our bodies decided to cooperate with us. The second half of the 10 km run we decided to speed up a bit 'cause we were doing so well. Luckily, this didn't induce any more pain. Only in the very end Pauli felt his hip and Nina her knee but we finished the run bravely. It took us an hour but we were happy to have been able to run the whole race. We even passed other runners in the end.

The showers were unisex military tents. The water was almost knee-high and black. Disgusting! But better than no shower at all. In the evening: Pizza, Hefeweizen and bed.

During the night it rained very hard but our tiner than tiny tent withheld the fury of the sky.

In the morning, there was blue sky again and Nina was impatient to go to the beach. We packed our stuff and headed to the water. It wasn't even high tide yet but the water was already really high and the storm produced high waves. This time Pauli dared to go into the water. It was fricking freezing, Mr. Bigglesworth, but fun!

During a walk on the windy beach we saw a bunch of Emmas (seagulls) stealing the breadrol from a lady. Right afterwards one of the Emmas pooped on Pauli's brand new coat.

After eating we took the ferry to the mainland and headed back to Oldenburg.

It was another nice summer weekend!

For more pictures see here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/nina.kristina.weber/Norderney