Thinking about the afterlife at a Hotel in Rügen

My two weeks summer holiday last year was spent at the Hotel Rügen and the Baltic Sea Apartments on the Baltic island of Rügen which is Germany's largest island and has been a holiday destination since the 19th Century. Rügen is a very popular destination for German holiday makers. The sea is very safe for swimming and Rügen doesn't get as scorching hot as many Mediterranean countries and is only three hours drive from Berlin

The first week of my holiday was spent at the Hotel Rügen which I enjoyed very much, but towards the end of the week I found myself gazing out of the bedroom window at the majestic cliffs of snow-white chalk which rise so dramatically out of the blue-green sea. How many people over the years have starred at these very same cliffs which are now eroding and great swathes of chalk have crashed into the sea? Did my grandparents and great-grandparents see the cliffs as I am seeing them? These great cliffs that are still here for all to see but where are all the people that first visited this island? Why is it that everything that lives and breathes has to die and yet the cliffs and the sea and the beaches will still be here when I'm not? Where do we all go to? Do we really survive after death? Is there another life after this?

These are the questions that seemed to be occupying my mind more and more, and I made a conscious decision not to be so morbid. After all this was my summer holiday, I shouldn't be thinking about life after death.

My first week at the Hotel Rügen soon passed and I transferred to the Baltic Sea Apartments (Ferienwohnung Ostsee) for the second week of my holiday. Again the accommodation was excellent. From these apartments I hired a mountain bike and headed for other places of interest. One of the most notorious buildings on Rügen is Prora which is a vast, reinforced concrete holiday camp built in the 1930's. The building stretches for more than three miles and it took me 20 minutes to cycle along it. It is now Rügen's largest discotheque, a youth hostel and a museum.

On my return to the Baltic Sea Apartments I found myself wondering about Prora which had been built by Adolf Hitler in preparation for the forthcoming war. Construction was never completed and no-one ever did have a holiday there. Where were all those people now? Perhaps there really is an afterlife where there are no wars, no evil and is a far better place to be than here on earth. I certainly would like to think so.

Putting all these thoughts out of my mind I made my way down to the beach and settled down in a Strandkorb. I was sure of one thing for certain, if there really is a life after death it can't come much better than this. Sunbathing beside the gentle waves I fell fast asleep. Staying at the Hotel Rügen and the Baltic Sea Apartments on the island of Rügen had certainly given me something to think about.