Day two or is it three, I even had to check my phone this morning to remind myself it was Wednesday and not Tuesday, a good sign I think, though it maybe just the tiredness I get when travelling. Anyone else the same? In my youth I could travel for miles and not be tired, these days a day out on the bike leaves me exhausted!
Anyway, up earlyish to try and sort out the blessed sat nav woes, redid the route in MRA, exported as a track, imported into Basecamp, then created a route sitting on top of the track as I don't trust MRA imports any more and finally transferred to the Garmin (Zumo 346), looked fine, but it still played merry hell with me today. More of that later. During breakfast found there were several other guests, including a lovely young lady over from Oz to do a Masters in cycling in Amsterdam, arrived in London last week and decided to cycle to Amsterdam, definitely the place for cycling, bikes everywhere, seems they have priority pretty much everywhere too.
Breakfast, sorry chaps no photo of the young lady
After breakfast set off on my planned route, heading south east on Goeree-Overflakke island, along some flat, straight roads, towards the crossing off the island, but the motorway junction going north is closed, [There follows a long moan] Mrs Garmin didn't warn me, my fault, I was so focussed on the screen route I hadn't been paying attention to the road signs, which to be fair are in (double) Dutch, but after I'd turned around, 8Km down the road, travelled 8k back, them 8k back again, realised what had happened, I was not happy. Not least as the N road I'd been on and of course the motorways have no way off and nothing around them, it's a very rural part of Holland. So a detour south, then east, then north to get back on track, some of it was fun on the smaller roads, but a significant about was motorway, the Dutch do like their motorways ... and driving close behind if you're not going fast enough, was was generally the speed limit. [/Long moan off]
Eventually I arrived at Kinderdijk which is a UNESCO World Heritage site, lots of ye olde windmills, a fabulous sight. However I didn't fancy paying the tourist fee to visit nor the motorcycle parking charge, so sat in a cafe close by and admired them.
There were lots more, but the forum doesn't appear to like panoramic photos, so here's a close up of one, would post the video if I knew how.
Also, here's a photo of my coffee and cake...
Onwards, across the Lek on one of the little chain ferries, costing (I've just realised I have a new Apple MacBook Air, which is clearly a post Brexit version as there's no Euro sign, there was on my pre-Brexit MacBook Pro... Brexit grrrr), anyway it cost 2.50 euros for anyone that's interested, I understand that almost all the river ferry fares are the same.
I 'raced', a loose term, one of the giant barges, the like of which Doc posted photos off from his trip, they are huge and travel at quite a rate, must take some skill keeping something so large on it's intended course. These two photos are out of sync I stopped to take a photo of it some half an hour before I crossed the river, it had caught me up, clearly moving faster than my Himalayan!
What followed was the best part of todays ride which was a small road, on which motorcycles are banned at some times of the year and days of week, it runs along the top of the dyke, single track for miles complete with 90 degree bends and hairpins along the river Lek between Schoonhoven and Nieuwegein, well worth seeking out. I think it might also form part of the Dutch TET route.
I stopped for a late lunch in Leersum, and came across what I initially thought was a fresh fish stall, but as well as selling fresh fish, they'll also cook what ever you want, so I had deep fried herring pieces with 'sauce', the seller assumed I knew what sauce was, no idea, but it was very nice.
This was not too far from the hotel I'm staying in for the next few days whilst catching up with foreign friends from all over the place. Hotel 't Paviljoen, seems nice, here's a photo, I'll give a fuller review later as I'm going for a wonder into Rhenen, have a beer and relax. Plus I'm concerned this might all suddenly disappear as I try to post it on the hotels internet!
