Baltic Sea Coast

A 386,000-sq.-kilometer (149,000-sq.-mile) pool of chilly, brackish water where herring, humpback whales, and seals thrive, the Ostsee (Baltic Sea) crashes against the northern shore of the German Land (state) of Mecklenburg–Western Pomerania. Ice Age glaciers that carved northern Europe’s contours left behind a long, irregular coastline with deep protective bays, flat, reedy peninsulas, and bold, chalk-lined islands that take a beating from the wind and waves delivered by the dramatic sea.