We're in Europe. I've always wanted to tour on a motorcycle, and Graham didn't take much (any) convincing, so we booked the ferry, packed all the camping gear, and off we went.
First surprise was the ferry - I've never seen one so big!!! My most recent experience of ferries was of the ones in the Outer Hebrides, but even the "big" one that went from Oban to South Uist was miniscule in comparison. This picture shows just one part of deck ten, there were twelve decks in all.
The next surprise was air conditioning, and en-suite facilities... Guess I should pay more attention when booking stuff! The boat was almost too big, as you didn't really get any sense of being at sea. We went to sleep in the UK and woke up in The Netherlands. We were very rudely awoken at 5:30 by the automatic wake up call. We disembarked, and just as I'd found when embarking, all my fears of sliding about proved groundless.
We rode out at about 8:15, to find it raining. It was just as hot as the UK had been, but wet as well; great. It was also rush hour, we hadn't decided where we were going, so we ended up sitting in traffic for ages. Eventually we found our way to The Hague, and tried to find somewhere that did breakfast, as we wanted to gather our thoughts and decide where to go. We found a Ben and Jerry's - closed. Not that you can really have ice cream for breakfast, no matter what Graham says...
We tried Burger King next, they were also closed. We then sat in the sunshine for a bit before deciding that we'd try McDonald's Guess what...They were closed too! By this time we were starting to realise how tired we were so we sat on the steps to the restaurant and settled down to wait until they opened, which was about an hour. We took it in turns to doze for a bit, and eventually they opened and let us in. I had coffee... Heaven, and a bite to eat and all of a sudden we were raring to go. We decided to turn left, as we thought it might be a bit cooler that way; Graham's bike was already saying the temperature was 31, and we were melting. We decided on Emmeloord.
We took the fastest route, as where we were was very built up and not really what we wanted to see. Our route took us past Schipol Airport and some very low flying aircraft, through Amsterdam and further north east. We soon got into rural Holland, but it wasn't very exciting. It's a bit flat you know, and there's a lot of water about.
One of the first things I noticed was the way traffic is handled. Cars, lorries etc and big bikes on the main road, separate roads for cycles and mopeds and scooters, with canals running alongside for boats! The scooters were great. Everyone just whizzed along, no protective gear, and apparently no speed limits. We had to obey the speed limits, and one kid took great delight in overtaking us on his scooter while we could only watch him whizzing past us while laughing! The other thing I noticed is the number of cycles. Every man and his dog was on a bike, they were everywhere. I'm still not sure if we're supposed to give way to them or not...
One benefit of all the cycles is that everyone is far more aware of motorbikes than in the UK. Drivers are also so much more considerate; for example, several times I've had cars wait for me to overtake something as they can see we're together and Graham has already overtaken the slow vehicle.
I can't explain how hot it is in bike gear. We were melting. The heat was giving us banging headaches, not to mention everything we wore was soaked in perspiration. If we went less then 60 mph you boiled, and your visor steamed up. It was impossible to ride like it, we couldn't stay hydrated plus concentrating on anything was difficult. Plus, we had to really concentrate the first day as all the traffic was on the wrong side of the road. Mostly it was ok, but roundabouts blew my mind, and after one incident "why's that car coming towards me round the wrong way.... Oh no, it's me that's wrong and I'm gonna die...." I started saying out loud to look left and go right. I'm just looking forward to driving on the left when we get home cos I think my head will just explode by then.
Due to the heat, which by 2pm was 33 degrees, we took the decision to swap bike jackets for fleeces. A fleece doesn't give you any protection if you fall off, but it lets the air in and stops bugs dying on your skin. It was a huge improvement, but still very hot. By the time we got to Emmeloord, we'd just about had enough.
The plan was to camp... this is our tent...
We pulled in to a large car park to try and cool off a bit, get our bearings, and to find a campsite. We were both very hot and sweaty and the energy boost we'd got earlier had all but worn off, so when we realised we were stopped next to a hotel with air conditioned rooms, hot showers and comfy beds, we decided to stay the night there instead of spending the next couple of hours looking for a campsite and putting the tents up. The room was lovely, the shower was the best one we'd had for ages, the air conditioning was just what we needed, so when we sat on the beds "for a minute", we both nodded off... what lightweights! We woke up an hour later, and went down to dinner. The restaurant was very restaurant too. All in all this hotel was the best all rounder of the whole trip.
We decided that night to give up the idea of camping. Mainly as it was so hot, but also because taking down the tents and putting them up again, along with actually finding a campsite would take several hours out of the day, and we decided that we would rather spend that time riding.
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