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The idea for this trip started to develop in the winter of 2002 and 2003, when I
heard rumors, that the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein, might be lying on
the beaches of Osmussaar, after the Russians had ceased to use it as a target
practice ship. However after couple of months investigation, I finally received
accurate information, that there is nothing to be seen from the Schleswig-Holstein
on the beaches of Osmussaar. The battleship was sunk by Russians, in the shoal
of Neugrund and bombarded from the sea and air for many years. In the seventies,
the ship was finally dismantled. Today Schleswig-Holstein is lying in the
bottom of the sea. The Estonian Maritime Museum have located the ships cannon,
rudder and other parts, at the depth of 8-9 meter's, at the position of N59°19'98"
E023°31'97".
- Even after these news, the island itself had started to become an obsession to me and I decided to make the trip with my fiancé, even when there is nothing left from the Schleswig-Holstein. While spending few moths to investigate all the rumors and stories, I also received other interesting stories from the Osmussaar. The island keeps inside the former Soviet coastal batteries remains and there is a grave for the German marines, who died when their light cruiser Magdeburg ran aground here in 1914. There is also other ruins to be seen, like the remains of a Jesus chapel. When I combined all of these, I had enough reasons to head for Osmussaar and drag my fiancé with me.
- The trip itself wasn't easy to arrange, as the Finnish travel agency's hadn't even heard about Osmussaar. I finally arranged the trip through emails, contacting directly the Estonian travel agency's, especially in Haapsalu. It wasn't easy, but it was worth it. We spend three days on this trip. The first day saw us heading with a boat to Tallinn and continuing with a bus to Haapsalu. The second day we finally headed for Osmussaar with a small fishing boat, that left from Dirhami, located about fifty kilometers north from Haapsalu. I must say that the island doesn't look too big on the map, but the five hours we spend here walking and exploring constantly, wasn't enough. There is so much to see, that five to six hours isn't enough to see everything. We certainly will be going back to this little island, perhaps during the next summer, to see the rest of the "sights".
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The three days on this trip, were very hot and the island itself, doesn't have
any cafe's or anything like that, where you could freshen yourself. It's
almost completely abandoned, with only one family living in the center of the
island and raising sheep's. In the south "harbor", there is a well and
we were told that the water in that well is drinkable. Oh well, we did drink
from it and at least so far, both of us are ok. So you need to take everything
you want to drink and eat with you. Fluids on this day when we were here, was extremely
important as the sun was burning very hot above us and no shady places
anywhere. The few places, where there is a shady places are among the ruins and
these were the places where we rested for awhile. However, both of us burned our
skin quite badly. I don't know what kind of a sun lotion could have protected us
here? It probably would have needed to have a factor, that could protect even
from a nuclear blast...
- Even when we enjoyed this trip very much, there were moments when we had cold shivers going in our spine, no matter how hot it was. You need to remember, that the island has been closed from civilians even as late as 1992, when the Russians finally left from the island. Also even when there is nothing important on this island other than its strategic location, it has seen fighting, death and misery in the course of years. This is illustrated very well with the fact, that there is graves for four different nationalities on this little island. The Germans, Russians, Swedes and Estonians all have their own graves here. Also even when the Estonian army has secured and cleared this island, I still wouldn't advice you to move anything you see on the ground. For example, the Naissaar near Tallinn was completely mined even few years ago and Osmussaar, with it's completely rusty "things" lying around, isn't any more safe than Naissaar in my opinion.
- Finally I would like to thank all the organizations and people, who made this trip possible, either by helping to arrange the trip or giving information, concerning Schleswig-Holstein and Osmussaar. Thank you very much!
(We made the second trip to Osmussaar in June 2006. This time we were able to check all the places that we had to skip in 2003 because of shortage of time. It was especially interesting to see the 180mm coastal gun remains from the inside.)
