Well, I can’t believe how fast
time flies. I've been meaning to update
this for a while, and before I know it we've been back a month! I did plan to write it day by day but that
would probably have been quite boring, so I’ll condense it.
Day two we woke up a lot happier, having both slept like logs in our lovely air conditioned room.
We had a smashing breakfast, our first
experience of continental breakfast. We
tried very hard to make it as English as possible though, being typical
Englishmen abroad an all that, so we had cereal, toast, and eggs and
bacon. Yum!
We decided that we’d stay another
night at the hotel, and discuss camping later... I see now that the writing was on the wall for the camping gear!
We went to a place called
Harlingen, on the coast. There we were
again typical Brits abroad, and rolled up our trousers and went paddling. We expected the sea to be cold, but no... it was really rather warm. It was a bit disappointing really, as we were extremely hot again and were looking forward to a little chill. The temperature was mid thirties again, and we were already suffering in our biking gear.
We
spent a little while paddling about, then made our way back to Emeloord, total
mileage for the day was about 140 miles.
We had a look round the market, which was very colourful, crashed out
for a bit after a shower, then had another lovely meal in the restaurant.
While there, we discussed camping. It had become clear that it was really too
hot to be sleeping in a tent. Also, the
time needed to unpack and put the tent up, then pack and take the tent down
again the next day would seriously eat into our riding time, and as that was
what we were there to do, neither of us really wanted to lose time when we didn't really have to. So we decided
not to camp, but to find a hotel at the end of each day - after all that was
what credit cards were for, wasn't it?
Then of course there was the question of the camping gear, and what to
do with it. Did we carry it around with
us for the fortnight or...? In the end
we asked the hotel if we could store it there, and then send a courier for it
when we got home. The hotel was very
happy to do this for us. However....
when we got back and found out how much a courier would cost, we decided not to
worry as a courier worked out more expensive than it would be to replace the
kit...... a shame, but we were both a
hundred times more comfortable not carrying all the gear.
The next day we set out for
Germany. It was today that we realised
we weren't going to take anywhere near as many photos as we had thought we
would, as all we wanted to do was ride, ride ride... so there are no masterpieces from this trip,
but a few snaps. The first one is an example of one of the many times where we had to wait while a boat caused the road to be lifted in the air so it could pass through... even on motorways...
This was also the first
day we struggled with the GPS, and ended
up getting separated.... Riding along
the motorway, Graham says over the intercom “we’re coming off here”, then comes
off... I follow him. Then he says, “oh,
no wrong one, it’s the next one”, and jumps back on the motorway... I try and do the same, but there’s a car next
to me and the barrier fast approaching, so I had no choice but to continue down
the off ramp. No bother, I think to
myself, I can just go back on the other side.... only, there isn't an on ramp
the other side, and just before the headsets get out of range Graham tells me
he’ll wait for me at the next junction.
Ha bloody ha. I'm on my own, no
sat nav, no map, not able to read Dutch....
did I panic? No course not. I
bumbled around for a bit, looking for an on ramp. There wasn't one, so I decided the only thing
I can do is go back down the motorway the other way, at least I can get on that
side, albeit I'm now heading in the wrong direction. I come off at the next junction, only to be
confronted with a huge set of traffic lights and traffic going in all
directions. I turn left. I don’t know why, I just did; probably
because it meant involving the least amount of other traffic.
I still need to turn round, but
can’t find a way of doing that, so I continue down the road a bit more, and on to
another set of traffic lights followed by a roundabout. Hooray!
I go all the way round the roundabout and then try to remember how many
sets of lights I've been through, and which road I need to turn right
on.... Well I find it in the end, turn
right, go past the junction I went off at and breathe a huge sigh of
relief. I come off at the next junction
and look expectantly for Graham. I can’t
see him, and more worryingly, the intercom hasn't reconnected either. That’s when panic rises... then I see a bike, sat in the central
reservation, with its rider waving...
That’s when the intercom reconnects.
I pull over and wait.... then we go
for a coffee, in the first McDonald's of the trip. It’s too hot for excitement like this!
We got separated in Suffolk a few
weeks ago, and that was bad enough, but we had mobile phones that worked and we
could read road signs. None of that
applied here, and we didn't even have a destination in mind, other than
“Denmark”. Not really helpful when
you’re still in The Netherlands!
After coffee we headed back on to
the motorway, heading for Germany. About
4pm we crossed the border into Germany.
I was surprised, I had half expected to have to stop and show passports
and stuff, but not having ever been to Europe before (apart from a day trip to
France in my teens) I didn't know that you can just bumble about criss crossing
borders...
We were about to have a bit of a
shock. In The Netherlands, practically
everyone spoke English (the only exception was Mrs Grumpy in the BP Garage on
the motorway, I don’t know what her problem was), the food was ok, the hotels
and everywhere we’d stopped had been ok, the décor quite nice etc...
We pulled off the motorway at
Westerstede and looked for a hotel for the night. We found Heinemann’s Gasthaus (http://www.heinemann-wst.de/ ). I was partly looking forward to seeing how
much of my schoolgirl German I could remember, but I very quickly found that I
hardly remembered anything. The lady in
the bar spoke a tiny bit of English, enough to know we wanted a room and
somewhere to park the bikes securely.
They have an old barn the other side of the road, just for bikes,
special treatment or what. We put Henry
and Wanda in there to sleep the 180 odd miles off and went to try out the
shower. The best way to describe our room was
“tired”, like a 70s sitting room with a bed in it. Big chunky furniture. Dark old shower room, but that part was
forgotten when we tried the shower cos it was brilliant. Another bonus was the huge patio door which
we flung open, as this hotel did not have air conditioning. It was clean, and the bed was comfortable,
but it was a far cry from the posh ‘t Voorhuys (http://www.voorhuys.nl/ ).
We’d made friends with a little
ginger kitten when we’d arrived.
Apparently he was making a nuisance of himself in the hotel and they
were forever kicking him out, but he soon sussed out that we were complete
softies, and followed us everywhere. He
even found our room, round the back of the building, and as the door was open,
in he came. We had crashed out again, the heat mostly, and
when we woke up there was a little ginger mog curled up between us. He was our little guilty secret cos we knew
all three of us would be in trouble if we got found out. Graham called him Stuka, cos he dive bombed
everything, and I could quite happily have brought him home. He had absolutely no road sense though, so I
don’t know how he will have fared living on that busy road...
Anyway, after our nap, we went across to the
bar to have dinner, and there the fun began. There was a different lady there
now, and she spoke even less English than the first lady had. The menu was all in German too. This is what you get when you go off the
beaten tourist track I suppose. She
gave us a menu each, which might have well been written in Chinese. Graham and I just looked at each other and
laughed.... we could have just shut our
eyes and pointed at the menu for all the difference it would make. One thing that did annoy me was
we had no phone signal whatsoever, so we relied on wifi if we wanted to use
them. Our difficulty now was getting the
password etc to the hotel’s wifi so that we could use our translating apps... ha-ha we didn't think that bit through, did we!!
I don’t know how, but eventually we got the password, and we were
off. One of the apps was useless, it
relied on using the phone’s camera to capture a word then it would translate
it, only it kept picking up bits of words and saying it didn’t know. The other one was more useful but boy was it
slow work. I think it took us an hour to
translate the menu (ish) so that at least we knew what we would be eating. Graham ended up with turkey strips and a
funny salad, and I had rump steak with onions and chips. There was about a ton of fried onions on it
! The steak and chips were alright
though, but I shared the chips with Graham as his salad had been contaminated with
funny dressings.
I’d started getting a bit cocky
with the translating thingy by then, so I found out how to say “how much is the
room please”, and “does it include breakfast” (although I didn't think to ask
where breakfast would be served). The
room was 66 euros, so we said we’d settle the bill altogether now.... which is
when we found out that Germans don’t do plastic. Of any kind.
Not even debit cards and certainly not credit cards. Cash please.... errr... we only have 40 euros between us and
the bill was 110!!!
It was one of those comedy
moments. Graham and I just looked at
each other with a “what the heck…!” look.
In this modern age we had expected cards to be universally accepted, but
obviously not. We found out later that
in big, busy, international tourist spots, cards are accepted, but off the
beaten track cash is king. The lady
behind the bar told us that there was a cashpoint 2 kilometres away, in the
town, and it was easy to find. Graham jumped
on his bike, and off he went. Even
allowing for him getting a little bit lost, when he wasn't back an hour later I
was beginning to get concerned… I needn't have worried though, as a few minutes
later he turned up, along with several hundred Euros. We weren't going to get caught out like that
again! We paid the lady, now all smiles
and retired to our room for a hot sticky night.
We were up early-ish the next
morning, and found that the breakfast room was right next door. Breakfast was ok, much better than dinner
had been, and we had to laugh as our friend Stuka found us almost straight
away. We had a play with him while
packing up the bikes, then said farewell… cute little kitty, he was lovely!
We decided we were heading for
Kiel, as I wanted to see the submarine pens, or at least where they’d
been. To get there in one day meant a
lot of motorways, so we settled in for the day.
I was really loving my bike now, it was so comfortable, the only
“problem” being a sore bum after 150 miles.
That’s not that bad really! The
autobahns were great… we had a little
race…. Which of course on these
unlimited roads you have to do. It wasn't all unlimited though, just the bits out of town etc. We had both bikes in top gear, doing 70mph,
then opened the throttle. I am delighted
to say that on both occasions Wanda trounced Henry, not that Graham will tell
you that. He reckoned he “let” me win,
but he didn't…
We pulled over mid-afternoon to
refuel both bikes and us. We didn't stop
long as were determined to get to Kiel that night, and also as there was a huge
storm following us up the autobahns and we didn't want to get caught. We did though, but just the leading edge of
it as we pulled away. Even that wasn't fun, riding at 80mph in pouring rain isn't fun, and the rain pelting you at
that speed is actually quite painful.
We reached Kiel about 3pm. As we rode into the centre of town, I
announced I needed a wee. As you
do. We found some, conveniently next to
a car park, so we parked up and I went in the door. There were some funny looking things on the
wall, and Graham, who had followed me in, reckoned I’d gone in the gents. No way, I say, it says “Herren” on the
door!
Silly man. However, I couldn't see any cubicles so I
knocked on the door. The lady who opened
it was horrified, but I STILL didn't get it.
She was gesticulating wildly to me, I now know she was telling me to go
out the door and round the other side of the block and in that way, but I didn't understand, so in desperation she let me in through her office. Phew!
It was only while in the loo did I realise what she had been trying to
tell me…. So when I came out we had a good giggle about it. What a daft mare, since when have I been
male?! Do’h!!
Next step was a hotel for the
night. Again we were very hot, very
sweaty and very tired, we must have looked like riff raff. We plumbed “Best Western” into the sat nav,
and it dutifully led us to a hotel. The
hotel was “The Yacht Club Hotel”.
http://www.hotel-kyc.de/index.php?id=28&L=0 It was four star… and I have no idea what the
extremely posh lady behind the marbled reception must have thought as I trudged
in and asked for a room. I wouldn't have
blamed her if she’d called security! However, thankfully she didn't and we got a gorgeous double bedroom with
views over the harbour. Wonderful. No air – con, again, but we opened the
windows wide and enjoyed the sea breezes and the view.
We went for a walk before dinner,
but we didn't get to see any submarine pens.
Rather, we saw loads of boats.
Everything from tall ships to tiny dinghies and everything in
between. The police there have some
rather nice vehicles too, obviously some boats speed. Kiel is lovely, when they rebuilt it after
the war they put a lot of thought into it, and I would not hesitate to go there
again.
We wandered back to the hotel
and had the most wonderful dinner, no problems with English here, they must get
a lot of English yachtsmen!
Next day we set off for
Denmark. It wasn't that far, and we had
a little cheer when we crossed the border, again no passport control…. We didn't know it, but in that second
everything had suddenly got very expensive!
Our first experience of Denmark
was fuel. We needed fuel, as usual. Wanda’s tank was only good for 140 miles so it
was always me who needed to stop for fuel first. We found a petrol station, albeit
unattended. We couldn't see any “pay at
pump” devices either, so it was only when a local drove up and filled up that
we found out what to do. There was a
cashpoint thingy on the wall, which the local visited, filled up her car,
revisited and left. So, we ambled over
and had a look. Firstly, we had to try and get
stuff in English. Fairly easy. Then we had to find out which pump… yes,
that’s pump number 2. Then it asked for
payment, so we put the card (the Danes take cards, hurray!!) in the slot with the
flashing green light and waited. After a
second or two, the machine spat the card out.
We put the card in again, only the other way round. The card was ejected again. A bit confused, we stuck the card in a third
time, short side first. Again it got
ejected. Again, we put the card in, a
different way again. This time, when the
card got ejected it was chucked out so violently that it landed on the ground
at Graham’s feet. It was at this point
we noticed that the slot for cards was above the CASH slot we had been
using. I really do hope that there wasn't anyone watching the CCTV footage, at least while we were still
there! Eventually we filled up and
paid, and made a quick getaway.
We were aiming for Esbjerg,
Denmark’s main fishing port. We booked
into the Hotel Britannia, in the centre of town. http://britannia.dk/. This hotel wasn't 4 star, but was a lot more
expensive than the very plush Kieler Hotel.
However, it did boast air-con so we booked it for a couple of
nights. The air con was aptly named,
and it was indeed a con. It circulated
the air, but cool it? No chance! We turned it off.
That night we decided to eat in
the restaurant. Bad move! Being a fishing port, it was natural that
there would be fish on the menu, so after being advised that the fish of the
day was Plaice, I ordered it. My first
thought was that it was the biggest plaice I’d ever seen… It got worse. When I ate some, it tasted like fishy slime,
and nothing like I remembered plaice. I
kept eating, this tasty fish was 230 Kroner so I wasn't about to waste it, but
it got harder and harder to eat. That
was when I found out that it wasn't plaice but flounder! No wonder!
I ate most of it, but the meal wasn't just manky fish. It also consisted of a pot of sliced cucumber
soaked in vinegar, and some undercooked new potatoes. Yuk.
Put that one down to experience I think!
As we had decided to stay for a
couple of days, we spent the next day being tourists.
We gave Wanda the day off and chained her to
the railings in the car park and headed out.
We wanted to find the fishing harbour, as I had romantic ideas of little
fishing boats etc. It wasn't like that
at all, and wasn't at all photogenic, although we did find a nice looking boat
in a harbour overlooking the town.
Being on the back of Henry was great fun! We were still connected by intercom so we
giggled and chatted all the way round town and along the coast.
We then went to the Fisheries Museum, and spent a
very pleasurable few hours there. It
was again very hot – isn't Denmark supposed to be cold?! – so we took our
time. Here we managed a few pictures,
hooray!
After the museum we went along
the coast until we spotted some wind surfers.
There were also a lot of groynes – tall ones – along the beach, so we
spent the rest of the afternoon there, taking pictures at long last. 
After a cuppa we made our way
back into town, and to the sculpture. It
really was quite something close up, the pictures don’t do it justice.
We avoided the restaurant that
night and went down the local pub and after that for a walk through the
town. We liked Denmark, the people are
lovely, and almost to a man speak perfect English. The towns and architecture were interesting,
and some language differences were quite hilarious!
The next morning we left, having
reached half way. We would have liked to
spend longer in Denmark, but we had pushed it getting here in the time we had
and so had to leave. We followed the sat
nav who took us back a different way as we had specified “no motorways”. That wasn't really fun, although we did find
some nice back roads at one point. We didn't at any point really find any of the motorcycle routes that we had read
so much about before we left, but although we wouldn't repeat it, we did enjoy
what we did. The sat nav took us to
Freiberg, and over the River Elbe.
This
entailed a ferry… yikes! It wasn't a huge ferry like the one that had
brought us to Holland but a tiny 12 vehicle one with slippery gangplanks – my
worst nightmare! However, as these
things tend to be, it wasn't as hard as I imagined and as long as I followed
Graham I was ok.
The fun began when we got on
board and moved off. Several of the passengers, including me, had decided to
stand by the front of the boat and watch our progress.
This was fine until the boat turned into the
wind. To start with, the waves that hit
the front were quite small, as, I later worked out, they weren't full on. As we continued to turn, the waves got bigger
and hit harder.. Each wave was
accompanied by a loud squeal from the now wet passengers… Each time one hit, we all moved back a bit,
then as the next, bigger, wave hit, we moved back a bit more. Eventually we all ended up at the stern of
the boat, soaking wet and giggling like loonies. You just don’t get this much fun on the big
ferries!! Graham of course had to be different,
and he stayed with the bikes in the bow of the boat getting wet and laughing at
everyone else. We met some lovely people
on that ferry, a couple of them came over specially to talk to the Brit Bikers
on their “special adventure”. Was very
nice.
That night was the only time we couldn't find a hotel straight away. The
sat nav swore blind that there was a hotel down a single track road that was
occupied by one grumpy dog and nothing else.
As it insisted that there was a hotel there, we had to ignore it for a
bit and ended up in the middle of nowhere getting grumpier and hotter by the
minute. Eventually we found one,
although we think we went through a time warp to get there. This was where we had the second weirdest meal
of the trip. Toast, covered with ham, a
slice of pineapple and melted cheese on top.
Sounds ok so far… but then in the hole in the melted cheese caused by
the pineapple was strawberry jam……
We had an unsettled night, mainly
because every time we moved the beds squeaked terribly. If the squeak wasn't bad enough, each one was
accompanied by a giggle. I can’t help
these things! We eventually slept, had
breakfast, and went back through the time warp and on to Utrecht.
Now, I don’t know why we did
this, but at the time riding from Freiberg to Utrecht seemed like a really good
idea. The trip was a smidgen under 300
miles, and as we were heading south again, the temperature was up in the
mid-thirties.
We made it, very sore and
incredibly tired, but we stopped at a hotel in Woerden, only to find the only
available room was at the top of 6 flights of stairs, and that there was no
lift!!! My lovely bloke unpacked the
bikes and brought everything upstairs.
He’s great! We went out that night and sat in a pub on
the river, watching the local youth and generally feeling old! The river was very pretty, especially as
night fell.
The next day was incredibly hot,
and although we had plans to visit a nearby castle and generally do some
sightseeing, the combination of the heat (now in the low 40s) and the exertion
from the previous day meant that we spent the day crashed out in the hotel room
under the fan. Not the way we wanted to
spend the day, but anything else was too much.
We did go out in the evening, and spent the last of the euros on some
clothes and dinner at a local restaurant.
The next morning was our last on
the continent. The two weeks had gone
very quickly, and by this point we had covered about 1600 miles.
We spent the morning in The Hague, which we discovered had loads of
attractions, restaurants and the most fabulous sea view. We had been to The Hague the first day in
Europe, but somehow we managed to miss this!
It was actually a bit too touristy for us, but as we were waiting for
the ferry, we ambled about, taking a few snaps and having lots of tea and coffee.
Again we had problems with the
traffic lights, and at one point Graham nearly got me run over by a tram. I followed him through some lights which
changed just as I got there, and I suppose I really should have stopped as just
as I went through a tram came thundering (well whatever sound a tram makes)
through. That was close…
After that we headed back towards
the Hook of Holland, the ferry and home.
