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German border in De Dollard (DE/NL).

One Bordermarker in the Dollard estuary on the border Germany/Netherlands.

Bordervisit on 14 december 2002 12:05. (IJswadlooptocht by André, Johan and myself)
The story: Bordermarker in De Dollard (German=Dollart) visited. In June 2001 BoundaryPoint member Peter S. discovered the northernmost marker on the DE/NL border (BP message # 2548). This one is not on land but is in the Dollard estuary. A tidal area connected to the Waddenzee, where at low tide the seafloor is dry. The obvious way to visit such a bordermarker is by boat at high tide. I’ am a guide in the Waddenzee-area, where we walk from the land over the (dry) sea-floor to islands. We call this wadlopen. See www.wadlopen.com. So walking to the bordermarker should be more appropriate. Walking to the bordermarker in summer is not really an option. In De Dollard there is a lot of mud, which makes it impossible to go there. So we had to wait for the winter season. Hoping for some good frost. Last week came what we hoped for: -10º C at night and -5º C in the daytime. This gave us the opportunity to walk to the marker over the ice!! What happens is that at low tide the ice lays on the mud, making it "easy" to walk over the ice without being bothered by the mud. On 14 December we, André, Johan and myself, made the trip for a real class A visit to the northernmost DE/NL bordermarker, which at the same time is the only maritime marker (?). It was a freezing day at again -5º C, wind blowing from the east. While low tide was at 14:15 we started off at 11:25, arriving 40 minutes later on the border. Only once and a while we crushed trough the ice, but we were prepared for that. We wore neoprene suites and socks, iron clamps under our shoes etc. The bordermarker is a big wooden pole of about 7 mtrs high, supported by two other poles. Surrounding the construction are 8 lying poles, reinforced by rail. Of course we could not see the complete construction, as the ice was piled about 50 cm. high. Unfortunately there was no visible border sign. My gps reading (wgs84) N53º 16,436' - E7º 12,086'. Due to the cold my gps was on "low battery" very fast. De Dollard is in the very north-east of The Netherlands. On the web I found a scanned map and altered it a little to show the marker. See below. The red arrow points to the marker and the red dashes show our route. Harry ten Veen, 15-12-2002. Thanks André and Johan ! For border pictures of the border entering De Dollard, see here:
The map:
The photos:
	André and Johan crossing a small ditch in a polar-like environment. 2002-12-14
	The bordermarker from 500 mtrs distance. Standing in Germany looking west. The Netherlands are behind the bordermarker. 2002-12-14
	The marker reached and the border crossed. This is standing in the Netherlands, looking back to Germany. The supporting poles are in line with the border. Our sticks are 2 mtrs in length. So the bordermarker is about 5 mtrs high. 2002-12-14
	Yours truly. 2002-12-14
	André and Johan under the lee of the bordermarker. 2002-12-14
	A closer look at the construction of the wooden bordermarker. 2002-12-14
	The protective construction of sloping horizontal poles, reinforced with rail. See how the ice was floating at high tide and now, at low tide, fell down and broke on the protective construction. 2002-12-14

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