Gabby the motorhome is parked in yet another cold and windy car park and is being slowly covered with a thin layer of sand . Silly Sat Nag couldnt find where we were looking for which was a surprise as we were looking for one of the largest sand dune in Europe. It was similar to the Pyla Dune in France . A dune that grows year on year . And big enough to be seen for miles .
There was plenty of parking and the site looked particularly popular even at this time of year . A few cars and a number of motorhomes and us. We had to walk today and that walk would be over soft sand which would play havoc with Glenns knee .
We were going to see an 120 year old lighthouse facing the North Sea . It is a famous lighthouse as it was moved on wheels and rails to another spot to avoid the coastal erosion that was making such a mess of it . It was also being buried by the moving sand dune .
The Rubjerg Knude lighthouse was first lit in 1900. It was originally 650 feet from the coast in Jutland . Now it was 20 foot away . It was defunct and weighed around 1,000 tonnes . It looked a pretty lighthouse and was originally sitting high on top of the cliff. I guess with erosion it would have ended up in the sea . A pile of rubbish . Nothing left to see if it had not been manually moved from one spot to another .
The thought it worth moving the lighthouse . The bill for moving the white square lighthouse designated a national treasure was funded partially by the Ministry oof the Environment . The rest funded by the town of Hioerring ,
The lighthouse was last in operation in 1968 and was briefly turned into a museum which showed the story of the structures struggle against the sand dune which was threatening to engulf it . Autumn storms were making life difficult for the lighthouse . The cliff was being eroded beneath the lighthouse. So what happened next . The lighthouse was moved to a new location in 2019. A story that hit the headlines around the world . It was a huge project and quite unique . It took eight weeks for the builder and his team to prepare for the move . They had to dig deep and move tons of sand . The foundation of the lighthouse was dug out and the foundations reinforced with iron and concrete . The sand was moved so that rails could be laid down so that the lighthouse could roll down to a better and safer position . I would have loved to have been there to watch the preparations to move the lighthouse and then to see it moved bodily across the sand . The lighthouse is safe now for another 30 years . I wonder if it will be moved again or just left to fall down .
As we left the site and drove a short way down the road the landtrain if that is the right word arrived . We could have had a lift to the lighthouse and a lift back . But that is our luck . Sometimes we end up in the wrong place at the wrong time . But at least we saw the lighthouse which is something most people will never get the chance to see . Perhaps writing about the lighthouse and writing these blogs tie in with that Chinese proverb .
