Day 36

Today we had a very long trip planned to get to the Netherlands, but part one of the odyssey was getting back to London. We took a taxi to Wells, then we took a bus from Wells to Bristol, and then another bus from Bristol to London.

As mentioned in Week 5, we had our man for getting about towns near Wedmore, Ian, from Zero-Nine Taxi. We arranged for him to pick us up at 10am and drive us to Wells. As per usual, he was a wealth of knowledge and told us all about Wells and the cathedral there.

After we arrived in Wells we had time before our bus so we checked out the Cathedral and the city.

From Wells we took the bus to Bristol bus station. We saw lots of countryside, more farms with cows and sheep all along the way. We waited around the Bristol station for a while and had lunch before we took the second bus to London.

There was a little bit of a layover in London so we went to get dinner close to Victoria Station Bus Station. We went to Sri Suwoon, a Thai restaurant, toting all of our earthly possessions with us in our backpacks. The bags made it a lot more obvious than usual that we are backpacking and we struck up a conversation about it with the guy sitting at the table next to us. He had some travel suggestions and a lot of questions about the fact that we had all of our stuff in our two backpacks!

We waited for our bus for about an hour at the bus station (a much more diverse cross section of humanity) and then we were off towards the Netherlands. The bus was packed and we got the last two seats available by each other in the back of the bus. We settled in for the 10 hour bus ride, over night.

When we came to the English border we had to exit the bus to get our passports checked by the French Passport Control agent. It was about midnight, there was only one agent working, and he had to check our entire bus load of peoples’ passports from various countries. To say the check was perfunctory would be an understatement. We then got back on the bus, which drove onto a ferry boat that would take us across the English Channel. As the driver parked, he announced that everyone had to get off the bus and be back in two hours. Until 15 minutes prior to this we had no idea we were even taking a ferry so we were very confused. We grabbed some of our stuff and followed the rest of the bus passengers to the main deck of the ferry.

This ferry was huge. There were multiple levels for passengers including a kids play area, multiple restaurants, a casino area and a duty free store. It was about one o’clock in the morning and people were passed out everywhere. Under the stairs, in every corner and on most chairs, people were sleeping or trying to sleep. It was surreal.

We went out on the outside deck to try to get away from people. We saw (an outline of) the Cliffs of Dover. In the future we would have done this ferry ride in the daytime for the views. We also enjoyed some stargazing and pretending we were flying (like Jack and Rose). We had some mediocre food and enjoyed people watching until it was time to get back on the bus.

The rest of the bus ride was pretty uneventful. We were a little disappointed to realize that we won’t be getting any other stamps in Europe because of the Schengen area. We tried to sleep and get ready for our first day in the Netherlands!

Day 37

We arrived in Amsterdam around 10 AM. To say we were a little tired from over a day of travel is an understatement. Unfortunately we weren’t able to check in to our AirBnb until the afternoon, so the adventure continued.

First things first, a restroom was needed. Right inside the station was a Starbucks. We ordered drinks, set our stuff down and Katie headed to the restroom. Lo and behold this Starbucks did not have a public restroom. They instructed us to “go to the one in the station.” After a lap around the station, the restroom was found, as was our next obstacle. It cost money. A kind of money we did not have yet, i.e. Euros… All we had were pounds. We hit the ATM, Cameron bought some snacks to make change, and the restroom crisis was averted.

After our station adventures we headed in to Amsterdam to figure out data plans. Data has been pretty easy overall. We are glad we got the advice early to buy new sim cards rather than topping up.

Next we tackled another logistic we had been needing to do, printing our absentee ballot registration. We handled that without trouble and we are ready to voting in November.

We had lunch by a canal. We were both so exhausted and hungry that we didn’t really pay attention to what we were eating but it was satisfying. At the end of the meal we tried to pay by credit card like we had been doing in England for the last month, but that was a no go. We paid with cash and headed out with fingers crossed that the credit card thing was a fluke.

We still had time to kill before we could check into the AirBnb so we took advantage of the time and visited Vondel Park. It was a beautiful sunny day today and we enjoyed relaxing in the park until it was time to head to the AirBnb.

We are staying outside of Amsterdam in Bentveld. We figured out the bus that would take us there and headed out. After an accidental walk around the block we arrived at the AirBnb. Our host, Erick, is really thoughtful and kind. He gave us tips and let us borrow bicycles to go to the beach (hopefully there are fewer hills than in England!).

After settling in at the AirBnb we headed to the grocery store on the bikes. The Netherlands is pretty flat so no complaints about hills. It was also very interesting to see how much the Netherlands had invested in the infrastructure necessary to make biking a viable day to day mode of transportation. (We quickly discovered that, beyond crossing the road, you also needed to cross the bike lane, before reaching the safety of the sidewalk.)

The grocery store was a fun adventure. We used pictures and Katie’s limited Dutch to figure out what we were trying to buy. We then got to the checkout and two things happened. First they didn’t speak English because we are way outside the touristy area of Amsterdam. Second they didn’t take credit cards, only the local Maestro card. So it looks like we need to work on our Dutch and start using cash more often.

We went back to the AirBnb ready for a good nights sleep after a very long trip to get there.

Day 38

Today was our first full day in the Netherlands. Our AirBnb is close to the beach so the first thing we decided to do was bike there. The path to the beach seemed really easy and convenient on the way there (more on this later).

At the beach we enjoyed the water, sand, and sun. Cameron went on walks up and down the beach to explore.

We were getting hungry and decided to figure out dinner. Understanding signs written in Dutch is not our strong suit yet. We have been working on Dutch with Duolingo but its not quite there. After a few language struggles we decided on a fish stand that was at the top of the beach.

The fish was fried to perfection. They also gave us 4 different sauces, all of which were interesting in their own way. The cabbage that came with the fish was even pretty tasty.

After dinner we waited around for the sunset. It was worth the wait. The clouds did cool things to which words (and pictures) can’t do justice but we tried to get some pics and a time lapse.

After sunset it was time to head home. We weren’t familiar with this area quite yet and it was dark once we got back on our bikes. We were also in a different area of the beach. We decided to trust google maps/city mapper as they hadn’t led us astray yet.

Big. Mistake.

We ended up going all the way around (and possibly through) this nearby golf course rather than just going past it on the short side like we did on the way to the beach. Halfway through this “route” that we were on we enter a bike path (very well lit at the entrance), we go under a bridge (also well lit) and on the other side of the bridge is darkness. Like, you can’t see your hand in front of your own face darkness.

Cameron seemed confident so we continued on this route, rather than turning back and finding the way that we came.

Now these bikes we are on are old and borrowed. They do not have lights. Cameron’s bike doesn’t even have hand brakes (it has the backwards pedal kind). The no light thing was an issue on these winding paths, but we made do with the flashlights on our phones. So there we were biking through who knows where, each holding up our phones as flashlights and racing into the darkness. It. Was. Creepy.

But we made it home to write about it! Another day another adventure.

Day 39

After our late night bike ride and adventures in the dark, we needed a lazy day. We woke up later than usual, around 10 or 11. Katie glanced at the Hopper app and notices there were some good deals on flights. We got quite a few travel details squared away including an AirBnb for the rest of our time in the Netherlands, another couple of weeks booked in France near Nice, and our flight/AirBnb for Morocco. A pretty productive morning for a lazy day!

We went to the beach again because it is delightful. It isn’t clear blue water or anything but the sand is soft and the water isn’t too cold. So its a win!

We went to the store to get food for the beach. You don’t realize the impact of language on your day to day life until you don’t have the language you rely upon available. In Amsterdam most people we interacted with had been pretty fluent in English. But we are staying out near Haarlem where there is less American/English tourism. At the grocery store its pretty easy to get through without speaking to anyone until the checkout line.

Katie was doing a great job nodding and smiling (not understanding a thing…) until the cashier asked, “*indistinguishable dutch* …bon?” The deer in the headlights look that Katie gave the cashier made the women pity her enough to try to find the English word. Even so, the cashier couldn’t come up with the word receipt, but eventually they figured it out with motions.

After our store adventures (who knew that even the grocery store could be an adventure!) we headed to the beach. It was HOT! From the store to the beach was a couple blocks and we were both all kinds of sweaty by the time we were parking our bikes. After we got the bikes locked up we looked out at the beach and saw… (I’d like to say we saw miles of beautiful beach but thats not a reality.) We saw thousands of people. The side of the beach we had picked was even more crowded that the beach yesterday.

We found a little piece of sand to call our own, set down our stuff and immediately headed for the water. It was cool and refreshing. It felt great after the sun beating down on the ride there.

We spent the rest of the day playing in the water, enjoying the beach and eating all the yummy snacks we bought from the store.

After another beautiful sunset we headed home. It’s about a 15 minute bike ride from the AirBnb to the beach (assuming you don’t get lost). We started off towards home and quickly found the correct bike path. We were determined not to get lost today.

Halfway through the ride home it started to rain. Huge raindrops were spitting from the sky. There was a bridge a little ways ahead on the bike path. We stopped for a minute but then decided to ride through the rain. There was no singing, but biking in the rain was fun. The rain was a warm summer rain and it wasn’t pouring. It was just sprinkling huge raindrops that exhilarated your soul as they landed on your skin.

Day 40

Today we rode our bikes into Zandvoort. The bike ride is getting pretty familiar. We ate at an Italian restaurant called Contigo. We had the bolognese (Cameron said it was pretty good, the new number 2, but not good enough to knock Piazza’s out of the number one spot) and the gnocchi. Fun realization we had was that even when we can’t speak the language of the country we are in, we can still read the Italian on the menu. This was also our first sit down meal outside of Amsterdam (where more people speak English). We had to do some googling…

Yay learning new things!

Earlier in the day Cameron looked up some info on the blood moon/lunar eclipse that we would (read: should) get to see being in Europe rather than the states. After dinner we went looking for a spot where we could see the moon.

At first we had some challenges figuring out where it should be. It turns out we had been looking in the right place, but the clouds almost completely covered it. We were about to give up and we were walking away when it peaked through a gap and Cameron spotted it!

The moon looked small but it was definitely red. We took some pictures. Wandered closer. Took some more pictures. Wandered up on top of a sand dune for a better view and then took more pictures. The clouds had squandered the beginning but we did get to see the moon come back from the eclipse. It was fascinating seeing the light slowly creep back over the face of the moon.

We then headed home. On the bike ride home there were some more fantastic views of the full moon.

 

Day 41

Today was a lazy rainy day. We didn’t want to ride the bikes in the rain so we hung out around the Airbnb today.

Day 42

Another rainy day but we had to adventure out because we ran out of groceries. Bikes in the rain isn’t ideal but the rain was more misting than real rain, so not too terrible. We went to the store we went to on our first day. We knew we needed to get cash (because the grocery stores only take local bank cards).

After trekking through the rain to the ATM near the store we discovered it was not in services . 😒

Google told us there was one close by aka over a kilometer away. We bike there, get cash and on the way back Cameron spots another ATM (basically across the street from the broken ATM) .

Moral of the story, sometimes it’s better to look around and use your eyeballs rather than asking google.

We did our shopping and headed home.

Netherlands