Frozen...

...water.

...trout.

...branches.

...meadow creek.

...ufo.

...bear paw.

...weir.

...creek bank.

Sylt's frozen beaches

A short look back to the end of 2010...

...and to the northern end of Germany with its northernmost island Sylt.

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Not a surprise any more: the very special (= early, snowy) winter season 2010/2011 in Central Europe.

The North Sea island of Sylt, located on the northwestern tip of Germany, is normally known for a very moderate climate during winter time. The "heat reservoir" North Sea makes sure that the temperatures are around or above 0°C during a normal/average winter.

But until 30 December 2010 there had been easterly winds with very low temperatures, so that the thermal storage system North Sea was subcooled to -3°C. As a result the Wadden Sea was frozen over and even the west coast beaches began to freeze.

The first two photos I took on New Year's Eve, at the "Hoernum Odde", at the southern tip of Sylt.
While parts of the Wadden Sea were already free of ice because of the tide, some spectacular icebergs sunbathed on the beach.

As far as I know these feathery little birds are known as dunlins [Calidris alpina] in their winter plumage.

Normally you see them running along the shoreline, but at very low temparatures they are on "energy saver mode" and so they try to hide behind the icebergs. They all stand only one one leg, to keep down the loss of heat as much as possible.

Right after Christmas I took these pictures of the frozen and snow-covered beaches south and north of Sylt's capital Westerland.

A few hours before we visited the beach the first time during our island sojourn, there was a snowshower, so that the whole island was covered with white, fresh snow.

At the end of our first beach day, right after sunset, the sky coloured the snow-covered dunes and the beach with its blue light. The most beautiful time to take (evening) photos: the blue hour...

* * * F R O Z E N * * *

Since one week our part of the world has been in the clutch of Father Frost. Especially in our area - the valley of the river Tauber - the temperatures have gone down to -18°C (-0,4°F) during night and have not increased to more than -8°C (17,6°F) during the course of the day for more then one week now.

So not only the ponds and lakes, even the rivers are frozen over, especially where the flow velocity is not too high. In the meanwhile they even stopped officially the ship traffic on the bigger rivers of Southern Germany like Main and Neckar because of the embacle / ice drift.

I took these photos on Sunday, 2009-01-11, at the lower course of the Tauber, near the village of Niklashausen & Reicholzheim.

The last picture I took at the mouth of the Tauber into the river Main at Wertheim. On Sunday the last river boats were allowed to cruise along on the Main. Now the boat traffic came to a standstill.