Little old town, Big old town

Wednesday 20/6, we headed off for Brugge today and chose to go via Poperinge (a little town along the way). We have found that choosing a small town along the way, away from the freeways and expressways causes Annie to take us along country roads. Here we see the real scenery, not hidden by sound barriers. Another thing Annie is good at is taking us to the actual “Market Square” centre of the old town. This usually involves bouncing along very old cobble stone streets, some one-way and just wide enough for a car and a bicycle to pass. Some of these streets don’t even have foot paths. The ones that do have foot paths, have sacrificed ¾ of the footpath to car parking space. Poperinge was a very nice little old town. Here we had a coffee and a very interesting chat with the owner. Poperinge is in Belguim, and we have found them and the Dutch very fluent in English. Actually, we found this true in every town that we visited while on the river cruise. This is even true for older people, especially if they are involved in hospitality or tourism. On the other hand we have not found this true so far in France. One of the waitresses (about 20+) in the restaurant at our hotel doesn’t appear to speak English. The other one, speaks English the way I spoke French in year 10, 45 years ago. In many countries, school students learn English from age 10, and in some countries they learn several languages. I don’t think this is true for France. Back to the coffee shop owner in Poperinge, one of his friend’s daughters lives in Australia somewhere in the outback where her neighbour is a one hour drive away. He finds this hard to comprehend as it takes less than 3 hours to drive from one side of Belgium to the other. After our coffee and chat, we headed for Brugge, a big old town. Parking on the streets in the centre of Brugge is non-existent. We eventually found an underground car-park, the entrance to which is off a tunnel. Our map showed where the car-park was, but not where the entrance was. It took quite a lot of round and round driving to find the entry, and to make things worse, I kept avoiding the tunnel, because who would expect to find a car-park entry in the wall of a tunnel? We spent all of the afternoon walking around Brugge. Again many spectacular buildings, but a big cathedral doesn’t look quite as impressive in a big town, as a big church does in a small town. The upper chapel of the Basilica of the Holy Blood was especially impressive inside, but unfortunately we were 10 minutes late so we did not get to see the venerated relic, a phial said to contain cloth with the blood of Jesus Christ. After a late afternoon snack of warm apple tart for Jean and a Brussels waffle with ice-cream and chocolate sauce for George, we headed back to St Omer, the quick way via a 130 km/hr expressway. Upon arrival back at St Omer, we walked across the road and then around the outside of a magnificent white stone cathedral, the Saint-Omer Cathedral known in French as Cathedrale Notre-Dame de Saint-Omer (a national monument of France). 

A day to forget, but so many memories

Tuesday 19/6, today we planned to head west to the coast then northward through Calais and Dunkerque and onto Brugge; well that was the plan. Yesterday Annie started misbehaving, proof that all women can’t do more than one thing at a time, whenever Annie was giving spoken instructions she never moved the map and after she finished talking it took several seconds before she updated the map; so, often 600 metres or more passed before the map was updated. This meant that visual cues were not available at intersections. Yesterday, a couple of times, I missed the correct corner; but that wasn’t a problem, just do 3 sides of s block and we are back on course. Today, without the visual cue, I missed a corner and ended on the entry ramp to a toll-way. OK, I pay the $2.40 toll and then find that the new route to the destination is now 20km LONGER. Next, I miss our exit and find that we are now on the way to the Calais-Dover tunnel. Luckily, we find a last exit and head off towards Dunkerque. We arrive and find the Tourist Info office is closed for lunch, so we go exploring on our own. Oh, a Kodak scene, out comes the camera, point and NO PHOTO, the battery is flat. I knew I forgot to do something last night. Well, we just have to rely on Jean’s camera for the day. It too has been misbehaving, sometimes just refusing to take a shot or waiting 4 or 5 seconds before doing so, and missing a great opportunity. Time for a coffee, then the Tourist Info office is open, so we get directions to the Dunkerque War Museum for Operation Dynamo (the evacuation of the Allies from Dunkirk in WW2). Well, Annie made the 1km drive into about 5km and 20minutes. If she keeps misbehaving like this, we may need to rename her Fanny. Anyway, the Museum was very interesting and moving. While having lunch, I did a reset of Annie, unloaded the European maps and reloaded them. After the museum visit, we decided that we didn’t have enough time left to visit Brugge, so we set a course north along the Belgium coast to a small town of Veurne, and Annie got the message, she behaved well. Veurne is a beautiful little town, and guess who sniffed out a fabric and patchwork shop? From Veurne, we headed of towards Ypres, yet another magnificent town. From here we headed to Armentieres (with my eyes open for a Mademoiselle or two). The old churches in these small towns are just amazing, and again we weren’t let down, well almost; because now the battery was flat in Jean’s camera, thank goodness for phones that can double as cameras. Then it was off back home to St Omers, a great dinner and soon a sleep to prepare for tomorrow on French roads, and hoping that Annie continues to behave. French roads are reasonable but their signage leaves something to be desired. French street name signs (if they exist) are small and hard to read, but there are numerous speed signs. On an open country French road we get 110, then 90, then a warning of an impending 70, then the 70, and a 50 and maybe a 30 followed by a 50 and then an “End of 50”. What does this mean? 70, 90, or 110? But don’t worry before you get to 100, there is another warning of an impending 70. Some freeways are 130, but there are few service stations. Belgium roads are far better. All freeways are fully lighted for night travel; there are regular service stations, and the road surface is better than the French. Also, there are distance markers every 100 metres! The Dutch roads aren’t fully lighted, but the surface is even better than the Belgium roads, again regular servos, and their 100 metre distance markers are on both sides of the road or freeway and also contain the Freeway or highway number and the current speed limit. What an expense, but so good to drive with. Lane discipline is also very good here, except for trucks in France where they are not limited to which lanes they can use. In Belgium and Holland trucks are limited to the slow lane, and only occasionally the middle lane when there are three. It is similar in Germany. In Germany, trucks are limited to 80, buses to 100, and cars to whatever. Well enough of my ramblings. This has been prompted by the lack of internet at the hotel, but access is back again, so I will stop typing, and post this. Till the next episode, au revoir. 

Some Odd Photos

Jean and new Cologne friends

Jean and old Cologne friends

Jean and Gina

Amsterdam leaning building

Amsterdam new buidling

Amsterdam old building

Big boots to fill

Floriade Brom

Floriade Orchid

Exploring Gent then off to France

Monday 18/6. We were up earlier than the alarm, being woken when a locomotive shunted into a bunch of carriages and then to find that it was pouring rain. By the time we were ready to pack the car the rain had stopped. We headed into the centre of the old town of Gent and found an underground car-park right on the edge of the historic section of Gent. From here, we spent 6 hours wandering the streets and doing a one hour river trip. The trip was very interesting with the guide repeating everything three times, in the local Belgium version of Dutch, in French and in English. Gent is yet again another interesting old town. From around the year 1000 to 1550, Gent was one of the most important cities in Europe. It was bigger than London and second only to Paris. It had a population of about 60,000 in the 14^th century. Gent was fortunate to suffer little damage during the two world wars; so much of its historical heritage has remained largely intact right up to the present.

Around about 4PM, we left Gent and travelled about 130km most of it in France to arrive in the town of St Omer. 

Just a bit of a Haul

Sunday 17/6, we left Nijmegen about noon and set of for Gent in Belgium. We drove via Eindhoven, Turnhout and Antwerp. Antwerp was our only significant stop. This is a very interesting city with its mix of old and new buildings side-by-side. Jean had her first (and possibly last) introduction to Formule1 motels. She will have a story to tell everyone about this. Tomorrow we are planning to head for St Omer.

On the road with George, Jean, Gina & Annie

Friday 15/6, we head north out of Amsterdam and arrive at Zaanse Schans. A little village where there are still operating Dutch Windmills and demonstrations of cheese making and clog making. Wandering around here in the rain. After here, we head off to Monnickendam and then onwards to Marken with still the odd shower. Backtrack to Monnickendam, and then off further north to Volendam. We had accommodation booked in a B&B in Hoorn, so that was our next destination. We had the street name but no number, and when we found the street, the B&B was not obvious. Thanks to McDonald’s and their free Wi-fi we found the number and then met with our host, Donna and her little dog Suzy. Suzy is a long-hair Teckle, very nice and friendly.

Saturday 16/6, we head off through the old town of Hoorn and onwards to Enkhuisen. We stopped here for morning tea and while walking around the old town centre, I saw a Scout flag, then a banner which said “Scouting, 100 years”, and then an arrow sign which said “Scouting, street event”. Walking a bit further, I came across 3 “Rover Scouts” and they told me a parade was about to pass in around 20 minutes so we stayed around for that. We watched the parade, lead by the Town Crier, who announced in Dutch “Scouting in Enkhuisen, 100 years.” After here we headed along a dike which is 28 km long, and has two tunnels in it, which take the road under the boat locks, very interesting! Then we were off through Lelystad and on to Apeldoorn. In Apeldoorn, Ronald McDonald saved me again, as we then booked this hotel via their Wi-fi. Meanwhile Jean found a bead shop, and 45 minutes later left it after discovering that they should have closed just after she walked in. Then it was a quick trip down the freeway via Arnhem to Nijmegen where we stayed overnight and are about to depart for Ghent in Belgium, where we have our next night’s stay already booked. Holland is full of “Killer Bikes”, bicycles ridden by everyone with no helmets and no rules. Families go for a ride with children on the back carrier, and young children (about 1 year old) sitting on the handlebars drinking from their bottles. Thank goodness that The Netherlands is flat. At the Central railway station, next to our hotel, there is a 2 storey bicycle park. Each floor has twelve bicycle racks. Each bicycle rack is double height and each rack in total holds 100 bicycles. That’s 2,400 bicycles in the bike park.

Off the ship and into a car

Wednesday 13/6, we left the ship after an early breakfast and then went on a self guided walk of Amsterdam. Guess who found two patchwork shops, side by side. One was very nice and friendly and had lots of traditional Dutch fabric, and also a large range of USA fabric. The other had modern Dutch fabric designed here and produced in some cheap country. The owner was not very helpful and so we spent little time here. This made up for the longer time spent in the first shop. We then collected our luggage and travelled by taxi to our hotel. After checking in, we then returned to the city, this time by train, to have a final farewell dinner with 2 of the 3 couples that we shared much of the cruise with. The train trip to the city was shared with lots of backpackers and others travelling from the airport to the city, standing room only. The train trip back was just as interesting with a diverse range of passengers, but plenty of seats this time.

Thursday 14/6 was a house keeping day, luckily because we slept in till 8:45. After breakfast, we headed off by taxi to Hertz and collected our hire-car, a new snazzy little Fiat that I call Gina. With the help of our GPS that we call Annie, we negotiated the freeway back to our hotel with no problems. Then, Jean sorted our washing while George searched for Laundromats on the internet. Having discovered 4 Laundromats nearby, we headed off to do some washing and drying. The closest Laundromat had closed down, so off to the second, a “full service” Laundromat. The owner does the washing (40 mins), drying (20 mins) and folding for you and for 7 Euro for 5kg of clothes. We had about 9kg, so two loads were set off. Some of our clothes couldn’t handle industrial drying, but that’s no problem, just come back in 40 minutes time and sort out what needs to be rescued from the drying. We went and had lunch and came back for the sorting, then headed off to the supermarket whilst the drying was in progress. In the supermarket, we found some SE Australian white wine for Euro 2.99 a bottle; are we being ripped off somewhere? After this, it was back to the hotel, some ironing and re-packing of clothes, and then a nice dinner in the hotel’s dinning room. Our plan for tomorrow is to head north of Amsterdam and to see where Gina and Annie will take us.