Care for a swim?

For some extra exercise and to save money on bus fares, we decided to become bikers--not the vroomvroom-leather-tassels kind--but the gasoline-free-bike-trails kind. At the moment, we have a small youth bike from a neighbor, and, although a bit small, it is definitely better than nothing! and we are borrowing another bike from a brother in our ward (church congregaton). So, we have the basics.

The other day we decided to go exploring, and find somewhere to go swimming. Because we had already been to the fjörd a few times, we decided to go to one of the many lakes in the area. It was a beautiful day and we chose the nearest lake on our map, Wellsee.

We took off at 9:31am and arrived after a lovely ride about 30 minutes later. We rode around the lake, looking for a beach but saw only tall reeds. We decided to try bushwhacking to get to the water. However, by the time we saw water in front of our feet between the reeds, we were still at least a meter or more away from open water. 

We had also gotten rather scratched up by the sharp-edged grasses--that were taller than F, by the way--which is saying something :P. We decided to give that up--and on the way back, we saw a sign that declared the area as a protected wildlife area...oops. and so much for swimming...

We pulled out our map and chose the next closest lake--a long, narrow one that didn't seem too far away. When we arrived, the water was stagnant, green and slimy-looking, with several different kinds of green things growing on the water. It just frankly didn't look inviting. Okay...plan C--a man that we talked to there suggested that we ride 20 minutes further to the river. He figured that running water would be clearer. That made sense, so on we rode.

Unfortunately it was not...the river was rather slow-moving and still rather green..as much as we desperately wanted to jump in to get out of the heat--we just still weren't thrilled about amount of green slime.. Don't get me wrong! I've gone swimming in plenty of lakes and rivers..but this really didn't look--pleasant.

Plan D. We saw another, much larger lake on the map--that also had a 'beach' marking, so we found that and the size more promising. We rode and rode--at this point we were on the other side of our map..on which street names were no longer marked, only locations of streets, churches, etc...so we had to play it a bit by ear.

Finally we saw water a way off--and we rode and rode, looking for a beach--or even just a place where we could fling ourselves into the water! Finally we found a small opening, that even had a little sand and we leapt happily into the cool wetness.

Of course, it was a lake, so it still had some green, but what lake doesn't? It was wonderful. The blue sky reflected on the open water and everything was cool and relieving. And, as one of our professors at BYU said, if there are animals and green in the water, than it is a healthy lake..if not, then it begs the question if people want to be in there..

By the way, did I mention that it was 12:41pm when we arrived? Yeah...the last 1/2 hour had been rather difficult and we were rather exhausted at that point...

We swam, ate our picnic lunch, swam again and rested on the beach. For the return trip, we decided to take a more direct way--and it only took an hour and 20 minutes!--and that with us being exhausted and only reaching a respectable speed when riding downhill...

Notwithstanding, we made it home, sunburned but happy. It had been lovely to see the countryside around Kiel..we just saw a bit more of it than we had planned :)

p.s. One of the interesting things about Germany is that, soon after you leave the city, you can see cows, horses and tractors. It really isn't comparable to the suburban sprawl of many US cities..thus why I said "countryside"..we weren't actually 4 hours away from Kiel, we had just ridden around in the greater Kiel area--for 4 hours.. :)