Holland

Deleted account 210609001

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Why is there no Holland section here?!?

After once just nicking in to Holland on my "Six Countries in One Day" day trip a few years ago, I've just come back from a long weekend at the Dutch TT in Assen. We were lucky with the weather - entirely dry, daily max temperatures between 25 and 33 Celsius.

The ride up from Eurotunnel to Assen on friday was a nightmare. What should have been five hours riding took eight hours, caused by volume of traffic and some long stretched of roadworks around Ghent and Antwerp in Belgium and Breda and Utrecht in Holland. Apparently we picked the worst day start of school holiday in Belgium and good weather forecast for the weekend meant the whole of Belgium was driving somewhere on Friday. We only came to a standstill a few times, opting for manic filtering whenever it looked even remotely possible on a K1600 with panniers. It was only in the last hour, approaching 7 pm, that the motorways cleared in the north and the landscape became a bit more rural.

Riding between the accommodation and Assen circuit on Saturday and Sunday was a much nicer experience. Away from the motorways the smaller roads are a delight - incredibly good surface, hardly any traffic apart from the odd gaggle of bicycles, and pretty scenery within the constraints of being billiard table flat.

Ride home was a lot better. If I was doing the trip again I think I'd plot a route away from the motorways and split it over two days.

Petrol is at least 1.65 (Euros) a litre.

All in all, I think I've answered my own question.
 
I go to Holland several times a year... ;)

Partly for Rallies, and partly to see friends.

The Dutch have always been very nice to me

I like the place, very friendly, & good food.

There are lots of excellent 'farm' campsites.

And Texel island is lovely. Er, that's about it.
 
Why is there no Holland section here?!?

I will get it fixed.

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All done.

There is now an all embracing Benelux section.

This requires the average bod on a motorbike appreciating that Benelux is an amalgamation and foreshortening of Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg. I do not hold much hope.
 
All done.

There is now an all embracing Benelux section.

This requires the average bod on a motorbike appreciating that Benelux is an amalgamation and foreshortening of Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg. I do not hold much hope.

Is Benelux a country then :D

Well the EU is ....

:beerjug:
 
I enter / exit through IJmuiden heading for Germany and beyond every year and have enjoyed Dutch countryside many times.

Arnhem / Oosterbeek is my favourite pit stop. Overloon Museum was great too.

And Mr Gibson is buried in Steenbergen.

My recent trip included a glitch while aiming to by-pass Antwerp, but I landed in the worst jam through and under the river in Antwerp. Grrrrr.
 
My recent trip included a glitch while aiming to by-pass Antwerp, but I landed in the worst jam through and under the river in Antwerp. Grrrrr.

Antwerpen and the approach to the Kennedy tunnel is a well known traffic jam. Still I found myself in it last September
 
Antwerpen and the approach to the Kennedy tunnel is a well known traffic jam. Still I found myself in it last September

That's one of the jams we got caught in. Apparently there are two tunnels (makes sense given that it is a ring road), one a toll the other free. There are significant roadworks on the Antwerpen Ring at the moment, so if it is already a known problem area it's no surprise that they were talking about 3hr delays.

(Antwerpen Ring - it is not a sex toy, but is the name given to the itchy, stingy fundament one experiences when sat on a sweaty bike for a few hours in 30 degrees.)
 
I will get it fixed.

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I did spend a lot of time at Assen smiling inanely to myself, as the Dutch commentators sounded exactly like Paul and Harry! Bono Estente!
 


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