Ghent

Ghent

We set up our tents, including one John borrowed from reception, and headed into town. It's great here! Churches, cathedrals, canals - the historic heart is well preserved and a nice surprise. The beer is excellent.

In the morning, John's tent is half wet inside, and his back is not loving the flat sleeping position. He's not going to camp any more.

Ghent

We headed to STAM the Stadt museum of Ghent - a history of the town. At one stage it rivaled Paris and Florence. It started as a wool textile centre, got smashed by Calvinists, the local park "had to make way" for a freeway in the 70s. Now it is into steel making, and has a big university. The outskirts are freeways, houses and industrial areas. Spanish took over from the Calvinists - Spanish Netherlands - part of the Habsburg empire, then destroyed by Napoleon. Finally there was a huge pile of lego to make the town. The boys went nuts.

John's happy we picked this town

The afternoon we went to town for a walking tour. An amazing revelation is that Flemish and Dutch are very much the same, just different accent, mainly. We see the canalside warehouses for cereal and wool. After wool got too expensive, they started using linen, then cotton, then everything went to China. Now they're into high tech materials. Finally we visit the amazing St Bavo's Cathedral with all its artwork.

The first thing we saw once in town

The ugly modern structures are "needed" she says, due to all the new people coming in. Oh well. We walk around the church some more, then go for sushi.The rain pours overnight and its windy. John's tent, which is a bit of a joke, has leaked a lot. He moves to the Holiday Inn at the old Expo site. A ghost industrial area, very bizarre. Multiple freeways, and so few things.

At the STAM museum

Walking tour. She lives the modern stuff

In the cathedral of St Bavo's

Been working out?

Karate kids

Rotterdam

Working on the kiddie crane

It's a big industrial area where it rains a lot. There's an important harbour. Once we got here, we went round in circles, stopped at a cafe to get internet, then found a hotel that was about 500m away. Was suffereing digital withdrawal by now.

John had his own room, so decided to eat 2 meals tonight, entree and main. It didn't last long, but was nice to eat. Got up at 5am for a fire alarm. Seems like someone was smoking. Trouble is that the smoking area was right out the front, so all the smoke wafts up the stairwell. Definitely able to smell it even up on the 4th floor. We all wait in the street for around 5 minutes for the firies to give the all clear.

Rotterdam is nice in parts

At 10 we got down to the maritime museum. If it the area, keep driving. In the first room, there's a model of Rotterdam. Ollie pronounces 'this is boring!'. So we go straight to the kids section where they can practice loading/unloading on a kiddie sized crane or two. Sex and the sea is a little bit interesting, but mainly just stories from the sailors about whores.

Sandwiches are bought to eat on the road to Ghent.

Time to check out the dog

Muiderslot castle

Muiderslot - nice!

This is the castle that Marie saw at the miniature museum. It's close to Amsterdam, about 15ks out.

It's a great castle, fully refurbished. You can see some furnished rooms. They've even left some spices and odd foods like nuts and fruit on a table in the kitchen, cooking gear, bedding. Then you can see the towers and watch ways in your own time. In one room, there's a pair of jousting seats to make a video game. Louis won that (best of 3) against Ollie.

John could live here

Then we tried finding the scenic route to Rotterdam, but sadly spent ages on the freeways instead.

Spices from the spice islands

The living room

A courtyard in the middle.

Ready to fight when the lord say so

Nice exterior

You need to be strong to wear this kind of thing

Den Haag and the Madurodam miniature park

Waiting to board the ferry in Madurodam

Set off late around 10 to the Hague/Den Haag. John thanks everyone and says no worries. Even when the wait people ask would you like to choose your side dish, he says no worries, I'm happy with whichever. Good, but you have to choose one!

Windmills galore

Got to Maduram miniature world. You can see all of the Netherlands here in an afternoon. Windmills, castles, churches, trains, power plants and office blocks all in small. The birds like smokestacks and ships. Marie took a photo of a castle which we then went to see the following day.


A quick trip to the World Court is v. interesting. Shame we're too late to get a headset for a proper tour of the museum. Great seeing all the famous people in the pictures.

Lovely castle

John lands

The flying fox near the camp ground

Spent the morning on a flying fox near the camp. Met two fabulous guys and their hyperactive dogs who got super excited when the boys flied on the flying fox.

Had beautiful sandwiches at the airport, then waited in the crowd near the magic doors for John to turn up. The flight was good no problems. He did not sleep too much as he was worried about getting through the flight with no stomach upsets.

Haarlem

Went to Haarlem for the afternoon. What a nice introduction to the place, apart from accidentally walking past the small red light street. Every part of town is beautiful.

At the campground, we'd hired a canvas one with 4 bunk beds. The boys slept toe to toe and by miracle it worked.

The next day we walked around Amsterdam trying to find bikes to rent. Finally got some, nearly crashing around, bells ringing. All riders get peed off as we go on the wrong side of the path, the boys wobble around etc. Ollie sticks to the left stopping motorbikes from overtaking and stopping the oncoming traffic.

Haarlem

After rolling through so many 4 fours, the guy told us after that you give way to the right. Wished I'd known.

Dinner is fried rice and chicken. John is surviving.

Louis in Haarlem

Back at the skate park near the camp site.

Lunch in the dam

Dinner at the camp ground

Landing in Amsterdam

It's finally clear - it's a gay parade.

This day was off to Amsterdam with John arriving the following day.

On the cycling beer bus.

We played soccer until 10pm with two local campers who were very good. They don't seem to speak English, then come out with whole sentences. One Dutchy in the pool, after me telling him the time, says "Do you ant to say when it is 8 hours", so he'd know when to go back for dinner. Not bad for a 10 odd year old. One father hits a ball with his son counting up . Some of the words sound so closish, like six seven arkt for eight, twelve thirteen and five-teen. Even the "nay" for no, is like "yea or nea." A bill is the reckening like the day of reckoning. Germans say donker shern (like that), Dutch say Dunk yer vell, then the Belgians later on say Dank You. The granpa says his car runs on "hash". I think he means "gas". When we were riding people would call out "you gobble" or something. Everywhere they're saying things but we've got no idea.

Today we went for a final swim. The big guy tried to take Ollie's board. Ollie ended up in the deep end trying to avoid him. Then he was almost drowning while the big kid simply grabbed the board. I dived in to hold Ollie and take the board away. Kids have no idea. It's scary. Maybe Ollie would have been fine.

Eveyone was piling onto the canals

We pack up, and Marie's finishing some washing up. I asked where my ring was, and she looks a bit horrified, explains she's left them behind, and runs off back to the wash up area. When she doesn't come back for a while, I thought oh well, we can just get cheapo replacements. Finally she comes back. Someone handed them into reception. We relax again, and buy them a bottle of wine to thank them and leave it with reception. I've given Marie my wallet, and now am really horrified as she has no pocket, and we'd be truly up the creek without that. Marie is really annoyed when I ask for it back.

Skate hero

The boys watched a movie til we hit the Amsterdam, rolling along the freeway all the way. Even about 10k's out it was still farm lands and green spaces. Found the camp ground at last. It's a shitfight to get to reception. People are everywhere. There are tents all over the  place. The smell of wacky tobaccy comes from every 2nd tent. The toilets have the special bluish lights. A nice place otherwise.

Walking to the free ferry into town, a quick crossing, and we're in. All the streets were packed. I noticed a couple of pink gay for a day t-shirts. Then we found out it was the big pride parade today. So everyone getting ready, and all the crowds at the camping finally made sense. It poured again. We stopped for some mini desserts.

Getting back to the camp, we met 2 guys from Paris, 2 girls from Germany wh ocooked a pile of meat.

Hoge Veluwe national park

Big cat

Cycled to the national park, and around it all day. Lucky the bikes had kid attachments so the kids did not need to really pedal. Ollie could push me, him and the whole rig just by himself, the little beast. At the end of the day, they were tired of the whole thing, and complaining, so good we could get them home easily.

On the way in the park

The park is lovely, green, and with a nice kids park in the middle. Ours really liked the sand dune, which has to be maintained "otherwise the forest will take over again". They like the reminder of the pioneers.

The streets around town have a path beside, or one car lane and two bike lanes. The cars have to swerve into the bike lane to get past each other, then they go back into the one and only middle lane to keep going. Seems to work ok!

On the way to Hoenderloo, near the park, awkward for the cars

Hoenderloo

The bikes with tag alongs at the campsite

Multi coloured tatts, nice work Marie

Then we went to Hoenderloo, near Hoge Veluwe national park. After we set up camp, then the music started up at 7pm. 3 people wheeling a stereo rounded up the kids. Then they went to the pool for aerobic type dancing fun. The kids here are used to the routine, and chant something, until eventually the guy climbs out then bombs into the pool. It's a nice difference: in France you can't swim in shorts, you have to use budgie smugglers. A lifesaver is there to make sure. Maybe they're a budgie smuggler saver. In Germany you can wear what you want, but there is no strictly no diving and ropes are right around the pool, so can only enter at the ladders. Dutch have no such rules. Even the kid minders are bombing in the pool wearing normal swimming shorts.

Hired bikes this day. Had a Mr Whippy style ice cream. Me and Ollie went for a short ride into the forest just near the camp. It was a bitumen path in there all the way, and super smooth concrete on the other side. Kids are having the greatest time ever in the pool.

Rocket tatt by Lou

Hoenderloo main st. One lane for cars, t. rific!

Crossing the border into cycle central

Arnhem

As soon as you cross over into the Netherlands, bikes are everywhere, as are the orange paths. All the time in all directions, there are odd ones, couples, bunches. It's a huge difference to Germany. Driving is a nightmare as we don't know where we're going and don't know where to stay. It's like driving in an endless suburb of Canberra at 50km/h.

Arnhem after WW2

For us the nightmare continued for an hour as we just get lost looking for a camp site in Nijmegan, which looks great in the pictures, but seems like an industrial dump where we are. New roads appear, old ones are blocked off, and the canals block all. We keep rolling out of town, then give up and stop at the first B&B. This is in some bizarre backstreet, nowhere and is the first one we saw. The owner is not expecting anyone, so goes off down the road to buy something for breakfast tomorrow.

She tells us where there is a restaurant that's open in the seeming suburban desert. The pancake place is really beautiful, next to a canal, perfect hedged fields - it would be impossible to find unless you know it's down one of the country lanes. It's called Aan de Linge. It seems like a chain, but I like it.

The historic centre of Arnhem

Today we drive to Arnhem, 18kms away. On the way there's couples cycling together side by side. Most seem to be making great efforts to get moving, bowing down to the steerer. We saw 2 guys in lycra even. The more I see of the place, the more it reminds me of Canberra. 4 lane roads in the city and not enough cars to fill either lane. Speed bump intersections are everywhere. Would be harder to smash at speed.

In Arnhem, there's a nice pedestrian area that's a big version of a suburb of Sydney, like the shops at Lane Cove. The nice historic centre is surrounded by 60s style 5 story office blocks.

Driving here is also a nightmare because everyone is so impatient. Everyone wants to tail gate and to break the speed limit.

More industrial museums

Aquarius water tower

Today was the Aquarius Water Museum in Oberhausen. It's in an old water tower. They are still used sometimes in case of over pressure in the system. This museum explains where drinking water comes from, how it is gathered, how much it takes to make a car, how the tower works etc. Lots of touch screens. The boys liked it. Lunch is outside at the curryworst van. The lean to side is handy when it starts up raining again. Bratwurst, curry wurst, chips, tomato sauce, and a chat to a local lady truckie.

Arvo is the industrial museum at Oberhausen, not bad. Big presses, drives, drill stands, casting moulds and a ladel/pot thing for molten cast metal. Then we drove off to the Netherlands.

Another cog in the machine

Interesting large drive

A magic steam engine made in Essen

Holding up the tower

The only UNESCO listed coal mine around

Near the cafe at the coking plant - awesome!

This day we visited Zeche Zollverein, an old coal mine + wash plant + coking plant. It's been painted, stabilised and cleaned up. Trees, bike paths, old train lines, huge machines and odd parks dot the 100Ha site. It's a UNESCO world heritage site, chosen as an excellently preserved example of an industrial site. The coke plant is enormous. Lunch is excellent, and the view along the coking plant is oddly magnificent. We got lost and walked right around the site.

How's it hanging on the spinning wheel.

Next day we went to Dortmund. The industrial museum is closed. Now we know all museums are closed on Mondays in Germany. The city is modern, no historical centre. It's rainy today, and we're not hanging around. So we go back to Zech Zolverein and the Ruhr Museum there, which is open and interesting. A history of industry, the area and the people. The view from the top deck is awesome. You can see smoke in the 3 stacks of a coking lant nearby. The valley is still pretty brown in the air. Still raining. Shame we couldn't time it for the tour in English.

One cool coal mine.

The other end of the coking plant

About 2 hours walk later...

The boys and Marie at the left

Where's Willy Wonker? At the top of the wash plant

Some of the amazing old machines in the wash plant