We were up by 6 am, and were surprised to find it so cool. Our little apartment room has no air-conditioning, but it doesn't need it. At home in Florida, the middle of June is hot and humid, with temperatures into the 90's. But here the weather is cool and overcast today. We had beautiful weather in London for the whole time we were there - Mild temperatures and sunshine. We would joke with Harry that we brought the weather with us from sunny Florida. We seem to have left it behind in London. My official weatherman, John, poked his head out the front and back windows and said, "It might rain today". I sure hope not. We are early risers, so by 7:30 we had eaten our breakfast, cleaned up the kitchen and made our beds. We relaxed for a while, before leaving to see Pastor Jaeger at the Petersdorf Church for a look at their church records. John has collected many requests for information, but without the birth dates in this parish for the years after 1862; he cannot connect them to his database of Fehmarn information. So it is vital to see the actual records to help these people continue their research. That’s why today was going to be a very important day for our research. By 8 am, we were on the road, driving towards Petersdorf for our 10 am appointment. We decided that we would make a short stop at the Landkirchen Church cemetery for a bit of photographing before going to see Pastor Jaeger. On the drive over to Petersdorf, we saw these huge straw people standing in a strawberry field. I made John pull over and stop so I could buy a box of the fresh berries. They are in season now and we've seen several local fields. This farmer even had fresh flowers that you could pick, along with picking your own strawberries, if you wanted. After taking a picture of those eye-catching huge straw people, we were on our way.
Stopping at Landkirchen cemetary, John looked for new headstones of people who have died in the past 2 years. He takes a photo and adds it to the website after recording the information in his Fehmarn database. While he walks up and down the rows of headstones, I do the same. But I'm looking for beautiful, fresh and interesting flowers to take close-up photos of to use for screen savers on my computer. We both get very focused on our own photo projects, but had to stop halfway thru so we could get to the church and arrive at our appointment on time.
By 10 am, we were in the church offices of Pastor Jaeger speaking to him and Mrs. Hannelore Schuldt, a church secretary. John explained the problem most people have in America is connecting to an ancestor before 1861. The birth records of this parish from 1862 and after are not available on microfilm at the Family Research Centers of the Mormon Church. This makes a huge block in connecting to the information on John's database. John told Pastor Jaeger that most of the descendents in America come from the Petersdorf and the Landkirchen parishes, so these church records that we were going to look at today were much needed to help many others who have e-mailed John with requests for information. John chose several books to research in. He picked out the records of the Petersdorf births from 1865 and after and gave me the book with the Death records from 1867 to 1890. We used some tables in a side room and quickly went to work searching for information needed by others to help complete their ancestral lines from Fehmarn. Working diligently for almost 2 hours, we finished our work. John thanked Pastor Jaeger for the use of the Church books and expressed his appreciation for this help to his website. Today’s research would benefit many readers who have asked for John’s help in completing their ancestral lines from Fehmarn. By now it was lunchtime, so we walked over to the Südermuhle (South Mill), a historic restaurant, originally built in 1893 as a windmill. Inside, the restaurant is small and has many old items on display, giving it a historical and charming atmosphere. The waitress directed us to sit in the back outdoor dining room. This was an addition to the rear of the restaurant that had grape vines growing on the covered ceiling and an open view overlooking the vast fields with a few new windmills standing tall in them. The weather had turned beautiful, so it was very pleasant and relaxing to sit outside and enjoy the cool air and the clear view.
We did a little guessing on the menu, and ordered pork steak something. I knew mine had fresh mushrooms and John's came with potatoes. This restaurant has a sign on the door that says "1st Class" and we definitely found the food to be first class. The service was excellent and we thoroughly enjoyed this wonderful meal. I can’t believe we had passed this restaurant by on our previous visits to the island.
Feeling refreshed and energized again, we went back to the Petersdorf cemetery to finish taking some photos of headstones or flowers, depending who was taking the photos! We went into the St. Johannis Church in Petersburg to look around. This year we are taking small 20-30 second movie clips (.mpg format) to attach to this journal. Here is one of those clips so you can see a small glimpse of he interior on this church. Before returning to our room, we decided to stop at the grocery store again. Petersdorf has two of them, and they are located beside each other. So..... We went into both of them to look around. We picked up a few needed items for our room at the Edeka Aktiv market. Having our own little kitchen in our room makes it a must for us to shop at the local stores for our daily food needs. I enjoy this and find it very interesting to see the local foods and have found it the best place to purchase the varieties of candies and snacks that I bring back to my grandchildren and friends at home. We went back to the room to rest for a while and to go over our research from this morning. We also have to recharge batteries and plug in my movie camera to recharge it from time to time. Thank goodness for the 2 sets of converter plugs that we have to bring along on this trip. Around 4 pm, we walked across the street to house #19 to visit with Anniemarie Rießen. She had contacted John about her husband’s family history, as his family was born on the Island for many generations back. She contacted John by e-mail and wanted to meet him, so we went to visit. She lives with her husband, Peter and at this time, her granddaughter was visiting. We sat in her backyard garden and had a cup of tea while we talked. Of course, the talk was of John’s research and the Rießen family history. We could not stay long, so Annemarie invited us back to her home on Friday to talk further about the Rießen family history and John said he would show her the information on his computer. We were looking forward to our next visit. Now, we decided to act like a tourist and visit the Meereszenrum, Fehmarn's Tropical Aquarium. The admission was only 7 Euros each, so we paid and proceeded inside. We found about 20 beautiful, large tanks displaying assorted tropical fish, seahorses, colorful corals and other marine life. The also had a large tank of sharks with a walk-thru tunnel in the middle so you could see the sharks swimming over you. We enjoyed looking at the tanks, but better than that....... We enjoyed taking pictures of the fish in the tanks! We stayed for an hour photographing the fish swimming around their tanks decorated with the different corals and plants of the ocean.
As the day goes on, the weather got better. The sky is clear and very sunny and it's hard to believe it 's almost 6 pm. We decided to take a drive to Lemkenhafen, a small town with a marina.
And from there, we drove towards the lighthouse in Flügge. After a few wrong turns, we got near it, but couldn't drive up to the lighthouse as the road was blocked. We found a large number of campers in this area. Fehmarn has several camping areas on the Island and in the summertime, this is a popular area for family vacations. We always encounter bike riders and skaters on the open country roads while we drive around. Summertime was starting and this is the season for the campers to visit the Island. Our driving led us back to the Landkirchen Church cemeteries, where......... You guessed it........we took more pictures. John had now finished checking out 4 cemeteries for new headstones. He remarked that more headstones had been removed and were gone forever. He was glad to have started his project of photographing the stones and posting them on his website, as this preserves them forever....... at least in a photograph. By now it was past dinnertime, and we decided to go back to our little apartment and fix sandwiches for dinner. Lunch was a full meal and we weren't very hungry for another big meal. Our room has a roof-top patio, so we set up the umbrella for the table outside and ate our sandwiches and fresh fruit in the beautiful sunshine..... even though is was almost 8 pm! After dinner, we made a quick trip to the Internet Cafe to check our e-mails and write a quick message to the folks at home. The charge is only 2.5 Euros for 30 minutes of time on their computers, which is very reasonable.
Tomorrow..........the Burg City Archives
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