September 13, 2024, 6:00 am | Read time: 3 minutes
While it can get crowded on Baltrum’s beach in summer, in winter you will find empty beach chairs and secluded dune landscapes. The small East Frisian island is therefore the perfect retreat for those seeking peace and quiet from the mainland, for which the hustle and bustle is a foreign concept.
Even the ferry crossing prepares visitors for what awaits them on Baltrum. While the gray sea roars outside and the wind whistles piercingly, the atmosphere inside is calm and contemplative. In winter, only a few holidaymakers travel to the smallest East Frisian island. And those who do come know exactly what they are looking for. Peace and quiet, and, above all, distance from life on the mainland. When fog settles over the Wadden Sea between the island and the mainland, you get the feeling of being in a world of your own – far away from the rest of Germany.
Baltrum is still considered a bit of a hidden gem among the East Frisian Islands. In the summer, it is mainly families with children and older people who come here. They enjoy the fact that there are no cars here, the beach is close by, and the nature reserve in the east of the island invites you to take long walks between sea buckthorn bushes and sand dunes.
Out of season, in winter, Baltrum comes back to life. “The silence, the vastness, the nature, the sunsets – everything that tourists come for is special,” says Torsten Moschner, who runs the National Park House on the island and inherited a guesthouse from his parents. Moschner himself lived, studied, and worked on the mainland for many years. And eventually came back. “I always notice the advantages of the island when I’m somewhere else.”
The Bruns-Strenge family has also repeatedly opted for the island: “I couldn’t imagine living on the mainland,” says Klaus Bruns-Strenge, who runs the Hotel Dünenschlößchen with his wife Sandra. While the children live on the mainland, the couple usually only leaves the island to go shopping or for vacation. But they still don’t miss anything. And since they have installed a swimming pool and sauna for guests in their hotel, winter is even easier to bear. Especially after a walk around the island, you look forward to the soothing warmth.
A walk around the island doesn’t take long – the saying “Baltrum is called that because you’ll soon be around” is somehow true. The island is only around five kilometers long. Once around the island is about 15 kilometers – you can do that in a few hours. In return, you get to experience the rich nature of the North Sea with its tidal creeks, the Wadden Sea, the dune landscape, and the beach in a kind of fast-forward way.
Baltrum in the winter is the ideal place for a relaxing vacation. You can feel how much you calm down here as soon as you return. As you sit on the ferry, the island slowly disappears and the mainland draws closer, you feel like turning back. To get out of your own life and simply live on the island. Or come back, preferably in the winter.
The original of this article was published in 2014.