Rondje Groene Hart - Day 3

By the time we awoke, the other residents of Sumatrastraat 65 in east Dordrecht had left and we had the run of the place. We had our hard kaiser rolls and brown rolls, eggs, cheese, etc. I decided we would take a ferry to Kinderdijk, then ride on to Gouda (21 km), thus limiting the actual riding time. Dordrecht had several ferry docks, with service to the nearby towns of Zwijndrecht, Ridderkerk and Rotterdam. We easily found the one going up the Noord River to Alblasserdam/Ridderkerk (paying with our NS chip cards). It was a busy shipping lane which we shared with various cargo boats and passed shipyards and hangars. We met a strange young woman in a nurse's uniform with a horsey face. She told me impatiently that she wanted to visit New York some day. I told her to take lots of cash. I asked her what she did for a living and she asked, rather crossly, "What do you think? Look at me."

Rondje Groene Hart - Day 2

Breakfast at the Vuijks'

In the morning we had our breakfast in the piggy salon; a bewildering array of pig figurines and art covered every available space. It was an elaborate spread: boiled egg in a cup, cold cuts and cheese, bread, jam, coffee, with the addition of a fruit salad comprised entirely of fruit from Niesje Vuijk's garden.

Rondje Groene Hart - Day 1

This three-day jaunt through the "heartland" of South Holland is one I'd planned months earlier. Alice came over here Sunday morning and we took the train from Muiderpoort station, a few blocks from my home, to Woerden, a town just west of Utrecht. We decided not to invest in the bike day pass since the train ride (on the Sprinter) lasted only 35 minutes and the pass cost more than the ticket. So naturally this was one of the few times they checked tickets.

Heath & Woods betw Hilversum and Laren

Brilliant weather so we took a break from house painting to do a fietstocht. I chose Hilversum--less wind. A very pretty route through the forests and heath ringing that town.

Amsterdam School - pt 1

Goedmorgen in de Spaarndammerbuurt

One of the things I enjoy about the little cycling tours from the VVV is that they show me things about Amsterdam that may have escaped my notice. Just north of Westerpark, for example, stands the Spaarndammerbuurt, a hotbed of Amsterdamse school architecture.

Lomas de Limburg - Day 3

Breakfast of fietsers

Outside Mechelen we retraced our way over the gravel path, then climbed the 3 km to Gulpen. As we rode into town under cloudy skies I recalled my last visit here almost three years previous. We were zooming down an elevated street, the eastern approach to Gulpen, and I realized I had stayed in one of the modern homes along its length. Back then it was cold and rainy and I slogged through the puddles to have dinner at a cafe. Now it was warm but overcast and by the time we reached the center of town the clouds burst and we decided to take a break.