Sat, 15 Nov 2003

author Tim	location Hornchurch, Essex, England
posted 12:41 GMT 18/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 4 ( all photos )

Mad Rush of a Morning ( )
We had left plenty of time to get ourselves organised, but it never seems to be enough in situations like this.
Things which somehow managed to get worked out were chucking out lots of rubbish, more clothes to the clothing bin, a final check of every cupboard and nook and cranny in Rosie, and then signing a contract for the sale on consignment to her next owner after repair.
Once we had all our bags attached to our bodies, the scale of the task ahead of us became apparent. The walk to Utrecht Centraal to catch the train to the airport was probably the hardest either of us have ever done. Both our bodies were shaking, our hands were red and swollen and we were very worn out. The worst part was over by this stage, but we still had a long way to go.
We had just missed the train we wanted, but they were running well and frequently so the next one wasn't far away. It rattled us to Duivendrecht where we had to change for a very full train to the airport. With that much gear there's not much point finding a seat, so we just waited in the vestibule areas all day.
When it came time to put my pack on, a nice Dutch lady helped me get the strap onto my shoulder - obviously not jealous of all we had to carry and wanted to help us out.
At Schiphol station (I just love the idea of combined airport and station, makes so things so easy for travellers), we stumbled straight into a luggage cart! Needless to say, we dumped our bags onto it quick as a flash and took stock of how most of our muscles in our bodies no longer wanted to behave themselves.
Next target was the check-in desk, where the line was short and the girl at the end confirmed that our reading of the fine-print had been correct and we could bring three bags between us, as long as the combined weight was less than 40kg. Infact, we had been carrying 36kg between us just in hold baggage, and I'm quite glad that she chose not to bother us about the weight of our cabin baggage as I think it would have topped another 20kg, double the allowance.
We were glad that all this had gone so well, and with boarding cards in hand and big bags gone, we wandered off to find our gate in the huge airport. This done, the nearest café supplied us with a slice of pizza and huge coke, which we complimented in true backpacker style with some peanut butter sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs!
There was about six euros left in coins in our wallet, which I let Liz go off and wander to spend since banks won't change them at the other end. Not too suprisingly (it is what she does on pretty much every international journey), she returned with a giant Toblerone! The rest of the change made it to a donations box (which, out of interest, seemed to contain more currencies than we have ever seen in any one place), then we packed up and went to wait for our plane.
It was delayed about fourty-five minutes, but eventually it came, we all filed on (quite orderly considering there are no allocated seats, it's just first-in-best-dressed) and went through the standard pre-flight checks. The crew on EasyJet are always so relaxed, easy going and play jokes over the intercoms regularly. Makes for a fun trip.
The flight was just fine, nice and smooth as we headed once again for England, waving goodbye to "proper joined-on Europe".

author Tim	location Hornchurch, Essex, England
posted 12:59 GMT 18/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 4 ( all photos )

Posting Rosie's Contents ( )
Awaking from the excesses of the previous night rather late, we spent the day getting ourselves organised. The contents of Rosie needed to be extracted. The array of stuff we have accumulated is quite bewildering, and it is at this stage of the trip that we pay for wanting to buy so many nice things and bring the home!
We ended up sending off two separate boxes, the first 14.5kg and the second 8.6kg via post back to Oz. Each had to be packed, and then I lugged them the three kilometres or so into town though the Westfield-like centre on top of the station, out the other end and the into the main Post Office.
There, the queues were about twenty minutes, and the staff at least spoke English, and were mostly helpful. The prices weren't too bad, and since they are going sea mail it will take six to eight weeks for them to arrive back home. It will be just like Christmas, only we know what is in the boxes!
Once we had both of those out of the way, the rest of our bags could be packed. So much stuff was being left with the van, but there was no way we could have taken everything. The next owners are going to love it, because it is fully kitted out with crockery, cutlery, saucepans, gas, electric cables, bbq, outdoor chairs, pillows, dooner, sheets, soccer ball and even a frisbee, all of which we added from when we purchased the van.
The dinner was great, Liz cooking up a great risotto and both of us putting in a last big effort to get through the alcohol backlog. No waste here!

author Tim	location Hornchurch, Essex, England
posted 13:09 GMT 18/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 4 ( all photos )

Ticking Off the Countries ( )
(Continued from Deutschland 4)
Not suprisingly, there were no border formalities as we crossed back into The Netherlands. The Dutch don't have much to fear from outsiders - there's nothing that is illegal there which is legal elsewhere anyway, plus they are very tollerant of foreign people. Oh, and also, they respect the Schengen agreement which they have signed, unlike the Germans the other day!
The remainder of the journey passed un-eventfully, neither of us drifting off into sleep but that was ok - we had a bed to get to at the other end, and night was approaching.
Back at Utrecht Centraal, we just had a short wait for our bags before walking through the cold back to Donna's house and Rosie bus. We had a little bit of a shock upon opening the gate to see a different, much larger van where Rosie had been, but she had just been moved back to make room for some other people to camp there for the night.
The were a nice Canadian couple, also finished their travels, also with a blown engine, theirs the fault of Italian mechanics! That's not a good average for the mechanically-inclined people of Italy.
We cooked up some pasta and sauce for dinner, then slept to recharge for the big packing day.

author Tim	location Hamburg, Deutschland
posted 17:27 CET 12/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 3 ( all photos )

Still Waiting... ( No photos )
Just under an hour late, the bus arrived heading to Hamburg. We had been standing for too long in the cold (no bus shelter or even seats), and even I with all my warm clothes was starting to feel it quite badly.
Not unsurprisingly, no apologies were forthcoming from the driver, as he grabbed our bag and ushered us upstairs - apparently the heating wasn't working downstairs. Great - half the bus not usable, which of course meant that upstairs was packed.
So packed infact that Liz and I ended up having to sit about ten seats apart - her towards the front next to a huge rude guy who refused to let her have any more than about half of her own seat, while he spread his legs wide in comfort. I fared a little better back in the middle of the bus, next to a quiet girl from who knows where.
Infact, the variety of people onboard was quite interesting, as we were to discover a little later.
The bus pushed on, but neither of us were able to grab much sleep. Liz couldn't even get her seat to go back, not that she would have wanted to fall asleep incase her head rested on her seating 'companion' anyway.
As we passed various stops and people got on and off we looked around for seats together, but there were so many others hogging two seats for their bags or whatever that never seemed to happen.
While I was dozing off, we crossed the border from The Netherlands into Deutschland.

author Tim	location Hamburg, Deutschland
posted 17:20 CET 12/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 3 ( all photos )

Around then out of Utrecht ( No photos )
We awoke to a lovely Dutch day - apparently Penny and Jono didn't sleep too badly, but were quite cold all the same. They can't say we didn't warn them! After doing very little for quite some time, Jono and I eventually dragged ourselves up to the supermarket to grab some breakfast gear. Also there was a large clothing bin, into which we put an amazingly large number of items of clothing that Liz and I had decided were not going to make it home. Quite a score for the recievers of such things as the clothes are still fine, but the task of getting tatty yet warm clothes to the other side of the world was going to cost us too much.
I cooked a bacon and egg breakfast for the hungry masses - much appreciated after so much baguette and bread!
After probably the most touristy photo we've taken in a place tourists probably never get to, we headed into town as we all had things to sort out - Jono and Penny tickets to their next destination Frankfurt, and Liz and I further north in Deutschland, once again back to Hamburg to visit Sebastian and Jessi. This was all done through Eurolines, the big daddy of bus companies over here.
After stopping to sample some local cuisine known as Oily Balls (kind of like donuts with fruit pieces and much oilier, covered in icing sugar), we went further into town, where Jono and Penny went off to check their emails while Liz and I put on a much needed load of washing at a laundromat. We also checked out postal rates for sending stuff home from the van - sea mail is quite cheap, so we purchased a large postpack to fill with stuff and post when we return to Utrecht in a few days.
The town overall was actually much more scenic than I at least had expected - nice canals and old buildings everywhere, even the post office was quite an impressive building inside.
While we were waiting for the laundry to finish, we found a café across from it, staffed by some very friendly locals and a huge cat called Tom Cat. We still miss our animals! Not too suprisingly, we played a few rounds of cards while there, and eventually decided to head back to the van to organise a cheap dinner.
The chosen meal was spag bol, so we got some mince for that and a large serving of frites (hot chips) to snack on, eaten as by the locals totally smothered in about a jar's worth of mayonnaise.
Back at the van, Jono and I did the washing up while the girls prepared dinner, but the 240v light in the van was knocked down (again), blowing the bulb and taking the fuse of half of Donna's house with it! Apparently that's fairly common as her house does support a mechanic's workshop, lots of people and now us sitting in the driveway.
So, we ate our dinner candle-lit, which was rather nice anyway, and everyone pitched in with a big effort to make a dent in our rather large alcohol collection which will never make it back through customs. We had a great night in the van, just chatting, laughing and enjoying the last time we would all see each other until at least August next year, when they return from their round-the-world trip.
Just before eight, Penny and Jono saddled up and walked up to the station to get their bus - it's been great being able to meet up with them here and there, share tales and suggestions. Enjoy the rest of your trip guys!
We convinced Donna's Turkish mechanic to have a look at the blown fuse, and the power was restored. We installed a light-bulb that Penny had generously walked up in the cold and purchased from the supermarket, and then we had light! In retrospect, the candle-lit dinner was cooler anyway.
Liz and I now had some packing to do, and then we read until it was time to head off to the bus stop at Jaabersplein at the front of the station for our turn. The bus was due at 23:55, but by midnight there was nothing but people waiting in the freezing cold.

author Tim	location Hamburg, Deutschland
posted 18:09 CET 12/11/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 3 ( all photos )

Re-United with Rosie! ( No photos )
The first ones out of bed, we packed our gear and trudged to the nearest Metro station, using up some of our already-purchased Metro 'strips' in the process. Plus, it would have been quite a long walk to get there.
Emerging once again in Rotterdam Centraal, we had a quick look around the place but generally settled on two train tickets to Utrecht Centraal, electing to get there sooner rather than later to see our beloved bus.
As it happened, the train that we picked was an infamous "Stoptren", meaning it was an all-stations one, stopping at every little no-horse town along the way. No real matter, we weren't in that much of a rush and we both have books to read now, although the scenery is always interesting in the endless flat Dutch landscape.
It shuddered us into Utrecht, and we started to get our strange sense of deja vu - this is where our trip 'started' when we first picked up Rosie all those months ago. We half-remembered the way out of the station, and the GPS did the rest, and before long we were walking along the beautiful canal-lined street with windmills and fold-up bridges that leads to Krugerstraat, Donna's street. This walk was quite scary, ramming home the fact that we are really coming to the end of it all after so long.
We rounded the corner, and there our big bus was! The elation was pretty amazing, seeing her safely parked in a back street, not a scratch on her. Liz gave her a hug to say hello, and then we checked and noted that inside nothing was even slightly out of place. Amazing. The thing has been towed half-way across Europe and with no hassles at all. Such a relief!
The rest of the day was spent organising all of our belongings into various categories based on whether they are definitely coming back to Sydney with us, maybe, or were going straight to the bin. There were also plenty of clothes we put in bags to take to a nearby clothing bin.
It was so weird to be in the camper once again, and we both temporarily wanted to do it all again - driving over mountain passes, stopping wherever we wanted, camping when we felt like it and cooking whenever, wherever it took our fancy. But then reality hit us - running out of gas to cook with, the cold weather now with no working heater, and of course the fact that the engine is cracked somewhat in half combined to make us once again happy to be packing our things, heading for home.
After a while, Donna's mechanic came out and put a spare battery in Rosie, started her up and drove into Donna's driveway. We didn't think it would start at all, but it did, albeit with some truly horrible sounds to let us know all was not right. The mechanic's English isn't that good (although, as always I have to say far better than my Dutch), and we thought perhaps he wanted to work on it, but it turned out he just wanted us off the road, safely inside. That also meant that we could connect the electrical hook-up cable up, giving us light!
No need to find a supermarket, as we had so much food still left in the van. Starting on the long process of using up as much as possible, Liz cooked risotto and we got stuck into the Czech beers.
Just before the final scene in the DVD of Saving Private Ryan, the mobile started ringing. Very strange - it turned out to be Jono and Penny, back at Utrecht Centraal station! They were supposed to stay with a friend but she wasn't answering the phone, so they wandered if they could use our Lonely Planet to look for hostels.
I rugged up against the bitter cold, and walked up to the station. Seeing them in the third city around Europe was great fun, and we attempted to work out some accommodation for them. They tried once more and were able to get through to their friend, so madly we dashed around, found the bus stop to get there, dashed for the last bus stop and I waved them farewell, picking a meeting spot for the next morning.
I was just about to turn off the canal street into Krugerstraat when my mobile rang again! Apparently the bus had just gone back to the station and sat for ages, and they wouldn't make it to their friend's place in time. So, only remaining option was one we had discussed a little earlier - they came back to sleep with us in Rosie!
It was a bit cramped, but we made it work. After a bit of manouvering, all four of us fitted in - Liz and I in the bed (although the wrong way around as it was on a slope), and Jono and Penny on the floor. They had sleeping bags, but even in them and with beanies, scarves, jackets and gloves fully deployed they still felt the cold overnight.

author Liz	location Sydney, Australia
posted 09:52 AEDT 14/02/2004	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 3 ( all photos )

Rotterdam ( No photos )
On Saturday morning, it was sunny in Rotterdam, but very windy and cold. Breakfast was provided by the hostel, so we stocked up on lots of food before putting on our warm clothes and heading outside.
We had decided that as we were now so close to the van in Utrecht, we could take our time getting back there, so we thought we would stay in Rotterdam a second night. But the hostel was a bit more than we wanted to pay, so we walked up to the train station and found a place called Use It. It is basically a tourist information centre, but much more helpful than the usual travel infos, and more importantly it was aimed at budget travellers like us. They were really helpful, and found us a much cheaper place to stay, and although it was a bit further from the middle of the city, it turned out to be not too far from the hostel where our bags were.
Once that was organised, we walked through the wind back to the hostel, got our bags and checked out. From there we made our way to the new place, which seemed to be a privately-run hostel. It took us a while to get there, partly because our bags were so heavy, and partly because we got a bit lost. Anyway, we found the place, and were shown to our six-bed room. It seemed like a nice enough place, so we claimed two beds and gratefully put our bags down.
While we were at the Use It office, we picked up a walking tour of Rotterdam guide, so we used that to have really good look around Rotterdam. The guide, which is produced by the Use It people, turned out to be very informative, and I think we say nearly everything in Rotterdam!
We skipped the first part of the tour, because it was about the area around the train station, which we had already seen. Instead, we walked from our new hostel into town, and into one of the busiest earliers, with shops bars and restaurants.
We stopped for some food because we were already quite hungry, and then we started the walk.
The first part took us around the area we were in, pointing out popular squares, the best street for shopping, and a huge square called Schouwburgplein, surrounded by modern buildings and complete with a few huge red lamp-posts. Using some buttons on a stand in the square, you could move the lamp-posts around in different positions - quite bizarre! Nearby we saw The Beurs, otherwise known as the World Trade Centre.
Next was the Hoogstraat, a street lined with shops and on Saturday lots of market stalls. We bought a book from one of the stalls, and then continued on down the length of Hoogstraat. At the far end were heaps of market stalls, and the area was crazy with Saturday-afternoon shoppers.
In this area we saw lots of modern architecture: the city library with huge yellow pipes curving over the roof and down the sides. Then there is the "spaceship", the roof of the train station called Blaak, which looks like a flying saucer that has crash-landed. Next, and most interesting, were the cube houses which were build between 1978 and 1984, and are probably some of the most interesting buildings I have ever seen. They were much bigger than I had thought they would be, and are still used as residences today.
From the cube houses, we walked out to river Maas, where we had the big red Willemsbrug to our left and further up to our right Erasmusbrug, two bridges that stretch across the Mass. We walked along the river-side, up towards Erasmusbrug, with the sun making the bridge a pretty silhouette. Once we reached the bridge, we turned away from the water and walked down a road that has a Rotterdam "walk of fame" with lots of famous signatures, hand-prints and foot-prints in the cement. It was quite fun picking out names we recognised, like Jackie Chan and Tina Turner.
The next part of our walk took us through some crowded back streets, and then through too big parks. The first one was Museumpark, and as the the name suggests, it has quite a few museums around its edges, or in the streets nearby. The second park, called "The Park", was full of lots of pretty autumn colours, with lots of brown and yellow leaves on the ground.
We had to walk a little way along the edge of a busy road, but then we came to a nicer street, where we chose a busy but nice bar to sit in. We had a few drinks and a nice long chat, before deciding that we were quite hungry. It was dark outside, but the wind had died down a little.
We walked a short way to West Kiurskaed, otherwise known as Chinatown for its many Asian restaurants and grocery stores. We found a cheap but nice little Asian eatery, and the food was really tasty and filling.
After dinner we walked back to our hostel, and spent the evening relaxing and watching the TV that was in our room.

author Liz	location Sydney, Australia
posted 09:46 AEDT 14/02/2004	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 3 ( all photos )

Back to NL ( No photos )
(Continued from Belgium)
We recognised Dutch signposts and lots of Dutch numberplates as we crossed the border.
We got off the bus in Breskens, and found ourselves conveniently outside the ferry terminal. I went and asked the bemused ticket seller how long it would be until the ferry left, we quickly bought tickets and boarded the ferry.
The crossing took about half an hour, and the boat hardly had any passengers. On the other side of the channel, we were in Vlissingen. We walked off the boat, over the road and into the train station.
We hadn't decided where to go next, so we sat in a nice café and had a cup of tea and a snack, and spent a while working out where to go.
After much discussion, we bought tickets to Rotterdam and then boarded the "Stoptrein". As it implies, it stopped at lots of stations, but the scenery was beautiful - very flat with lots of farmland, canals, villages and towns. I saw pheasants in the fields and a rabbit racing away from the train in fright. We were quite excited when we recognised a spot where we had been before - a huge lock where we had had to wait a long time in the van for the bridge to open. I think this was where we spent quite a while searching for a supermarket.
At Roosendaal, we had to change trains and by the time we made it to Rotterdam, it was quite dark. We didn't have a map of the city, but somehow we found our way to the tourist office, where we were given directions to the hostel, and half an hour later we had lugged ourselves and our bags there.
For dinner, we ate at the hostel, buying our meal at the bar there. After a couple of drinks and a game of pool, we headed upstairs to bed.

author Tim	location St. Pauli, Hamburg, Germany
posted 18:53 16/07/03 CEST	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 2 ( all photos )

Groeningen and Surrounds ( 2 photos )
Since the weather is so fantastic at the moment (25-30 degrees each day), we decided this morning would be a great one for sunning on the beach. This we did before breakfast, taking the short walk down to the river beach and reading books for a while.
We considered a swim but the water was quite murky (ok, and too cold), so we just relaxed for a while instead.
Finally getting ourselves organised, we cooked breakfast then headed on the road to find a supermarket which would now be open. This search brought us to the city of Groningen, where a few driving manouevers of questionable legality and waiting a long long time for lock gates to open brought us to a supermarket. It had taken Liz's sharp eyes to find it, as we have no idea what the names of the supermarkets are, and this one only gave away its presence by the posters offering cheap deals on Pringles on the outside.
Wandering around the place was great fun - some things are easy to pick while others remain a total mystery. Also strange is that this place took no credit cards, or our EFTPOS-style switch card! We had to delve into the secret cash stah we have to pay for our goods at the checkout, making it by one euro cent. Phew!
After a lunch in the carpark, a drive to the bank was high on the priority list, so we stumbled across one of those which conveniently allowed us to execute a U-turn and get back on track.
There was not much more for us to do now except drive East into Deutschland (Germany).

author Tim	location Bremen, Germany
posted 09:39 15/07/03 CEST	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 2 ( all photos )

Northern Netherlands ( 8 photos )
A bit of a driving day this one, we headed first for an interesting feature on our map - a fourty kilometre or so long causeway joining the provinces of Noord-Holland and Friesland. Called Afsluitdijk, it was quite interesting to drive along. About a third of the way across there was an information centre where we found out that it was actually a dam, created to increase farming land. The scale of the thing was quite impressive, and driving along it the road in the distance shimmered as if not there. As in many other places here, there are bridges that open up while yachts sail through, leaving the motorists to get out of the cars and wander around for a while, which is a pleasant change from the monotony of diriving around.
With no fixed plan and only knowing that we needed a supermarkt to take on supplies, we headed into the town of Leeuwarden for a bit of a wander. Finding a supermarket when you have no idea what they are called can be a bit tricky. Eventually taking the easy option and pulling into a service station, we were directed to one but told to expect it closed as it was a Sunday. This turned out to be true, so we headed onwards.
Heading up to the coast, we pulled into the town of Holwerd for a look around. Seemingly completely devoid of life, it was still nice to look at the way the gardens are all immaculate and the streets perfectly clean.
From there, we headed out to the ferry port for the little island of Ameland. There was a huge car park, almost completely full for day-trippers to the island. Being reasonably late in the day by now, we had no real desire to head over. Instead, we marvelled at the children playing in the mud, while their respective adults sat on the wharf as if were a beach, getting a tan.
We headed a little further along the coast to the holiday town of Lauwersoog. Like almost every town along the coast here, it had a caravan park which looked good enough for us. For no real reason over any other, we pulled into Camping Lauwersoog. While Liz negotiated to get a site in the reception, I negotiated the children on ride-on toys and adults with much bigger toys in the form of massive caravans to hold a place in the entry queue.
This done, we pulled into a cosy spot where someone else had taken our power connection. The standard "do you speak English?" asked, we had actually found someone who didn't very well for the first time. We managed to gesticulate and use nouns and verbs enough for me to discover that his connection wasn't working. After he plugged back into it though, it seemed fine this time.
While Liz had a walk around the site, I managed to fall asleep in the afternoon for the first time in ages, soaking up the sun and narrowly avoiding getting burnt.
Dinner cooked from what little supplies we had remaining, we watched half of Lord of the Rings on DVD before night-time beckoned us to sleep.

author Tim	location Bremen, Germany
posted 09:11 15/07/03 CEST	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 2 ( all photos )

Amsterdam ( 16 photos )
Getting ourselves organised, we were on the road again for the reasonably short drive to Amsterdam. Of course, we had been here before, but that was mostly a social visit, where we had decided not to see any of the touristy sites. That's why we were back this time.
As always, we needed a place to stay, so we drove to Camping Vliegenbos, the only camp site in Amsterdam. As you might expect, this meant that the prices were high and conditions not ideal. Infact, we were camped in no better than a parking lot, surrounded by other people in tents and a few in motorhomes. That's what you can get away with if you are the only camp site in a big city, I guess.
Still, it was a convenient ten minute bus ride from Centraal Station, which we took to start our wandering around. Without going into "we walked left, then turned right" detail, our day was a lot of wandering, sitting in cafes, enjoying the amazing hot weather in a beautiful city.
We took in some of Amsterdams more interesting museums, the Schuttersgalerij (Civic Guard Gallery withh huge paintings), ate some hot chips (they seem to love them over here), tried to get into Anne Frankhaus (the house of Anne Frank of "The Diary of Anne Frank" fame) but thought the hour-long queue was a bit excessive, especially since the place looked more like a modern art museum from the outside than a well-preserved historical building.
Lunch was at a nice back-street cafe-bar on Spuistraat.
There was a strange guy in a little boat on one of the canals who played the organ and trumpet at the same time, serenading a wedding party in a most unusual way. Great entertainment.
We found a modern bar which also doubled as an Internet cafe where I did some uploading and email sending while Liz wandered the streets taking it all in. She located a part of the city where there was some good foot to be had, so we headed there and found great Tapas for dinner overlooking the busy Nieuwendikj and sipping sangria at Joselito Tapas cafe.
For our return home, we tried the free method - a ferry across the picturesque harbour with the locals, then a GPS-aided walk back to the campsite. Worked a treat, gave us some exercise and proved a good way to see the city.

author Tim	location Lauwersoog, Netherlands
posted 11:01 14/07/03 CEST	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 2 ( all photos )

Den Haag ( 19 photos )
Getting ourselves out of bed and organised, we checked out of the camp ground and parked about 100m up the road. We did this due to the fact that there was a bus from the campsite right into the centre of Den Haag, which we spent the day looking around.
The city is amazingly beautiful, there are tree-lined cobble-stone streets, sculpture exhibitions all around, and plenty of on-street cafes to while away the hours.
Our bus dropped us off conveniently not too far from our first museum of the day - one of the three royal palaces (Het Paleis Lange Voorhout) which houses exhibitions. The walk there was along one of these nice streets with lots of interesting sculptures to look at.
The one we were looking at was Escher in het Paleis. This exhibition was of original prints, drawings and sketches of Escher, famed for his perspective drawings and metamporphisms. Great stuff, and by the end a couple of prints. There were some clever interactive displays around.
The accordian player right outside the door encouraged us to sit and have a light lunch at the cafe there, complete with its own funky sculpture. Interestingly, after being in the UK for so long everything here seems reasonably priced.
From there we basically wandered around the city for a while, up to the tourist information centre, or VVV as they are called in The Netherlands. We were trying to find an Internet cafe but decided to wait another day.
Eventually, we found our way back to the bus stop (via the very pretty houses of parliament - Den Haag is the political capital of The Netherlands - set right on a lake-with-fountain in the middle of town). Three more strips on the Stripkaart each later (that's how you do most public transport here), and we were back at Rosie.
We had a quick wander along the beach there, but it appeared to be closed, so our swimming had to wait until another day. Plus the water was cold too, which may have helped our decision just a little.
We had found another caravan park on the other side of town, which was more of a "just the site, thanks" park than the all-singing, all-dancing, all-charging one we had stayed at the previous night. On the way, however, we stopped off to take in a couple more of the museums that Den Haag is so famous for - Fotomuseum Den Haag and the contemporary art museum GEM. These easy to find but hard to park at museums, which we accessed by dodging across the ever-present tram lines, were interesting, but not amazingly so. The exhibitions in both were fairly startling to say the least, but proved a pleasant way to kill a few hours before heading to our new campsite.
Camping Duinhorst was tucked away in a wood on the outskirts of the city, but the signs once again guided us in with no problems. Another busy site, we spent the evening trying to play table football (it didn't work properly though), reading, doing lots of what holidays are about - nothing.
As an aside, the North Sea Jazz Festival started in Den Haag this evening and ran through the weekend, but the prices were way out of our budget. Quite a shame, but it would have cost us something like 75 euros each to see some of the big names. Next time maybe.

author Tim	location Amsterdam, Netherlands
posted 23:02 12/07/03 CEST	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 2 ( all photos )

Another Ferry ( 3 photos )
(Continued from Across England)
This ferry was different to the one that took is to Ireland and back in several respects, not the least that all our meals were included in the price. We had actually organised quite a good deal with the Caravan Club, and this was a nice suprise.
We ate a hearty breakfast in the sun, watching the world go by, before having a look around the ferry itself, which proved to be rather boring.
Due to the lack of trade restrictions in the EU, there is no such thing as Duty Free, so shopping is a waste of time too.
This left writing emails and sleep. I chose the former, Liz the latter. There was a place to plug the laptop in, so for the trip I caught up with some emails which have been waiting for replies since March (sorry Kim!).
The sailing was almost dead flat, far less rough than the Ireland trips were, to the point that most of the time you wouldn't have even known that we were moving. Move we certainly did, however, and six hours later we saw "proper joined on Europe" once again, sailing into the port of Hoek van Holland (Hook of Holland).
The call came to return to the vehicles, which meant wandering back down into the rather spacious bowels of the ship, where upon returing to Rosie a kind soul pointed out that we had a flat tire! Uh oh, not good news.
A quick consultation with the staff later, we got out the gear to organise a tyre change. The jack on this is unlike any we had ever seen, but we soon had it sorted out. Next task was to get the wheel nuts off. Much harder. The problem was that the spanner device we were using is one size too big, and also the nuts were of course put on with a pneumatic tool which is far stronger than I. We got three of the five off by standing and jumping on the tool, but the other two kept slipping (since the thingy was too big).
No problem, as by now we were the only vehicle left on the boat, so we were attracting plenty of attention from the staff. Their replies to our worried querying of "when does the ship sail again???" were along the lines of "no worries, we'll sort it out". A few minutes later, someone appeared with a socket set with the correct size bit, and before we could blink, a new tyre was on and we were quite literally ready to roll.
Since this was the first time we had used that tyre, we were cautious, especially with all the bumpy driving off the ferry, but no problems with it so far.
Our next problem was where to go. We needed to get to a service station to put air in the "new" tyre, so we headed off randomly looking for one, once again on the right-hand side of the road. It actually feels correct again, even though we keep looking the wrong way at intersections. The simple rule is "follow everyone else", which has worked just fine thus far.
We eventually found a service station, where we filled up the tyre and were free to wander. It's strange driving here, because we have Dutch plates, so people actually don't look twice at you. Not used to that at all.
So, where to go? That question was answered by the road we ended up on, which showed that the closest big town was Den Haag (The Hague). So, that's where we aimed. There was also a campsite listed there, so all the better. The sign posts here are eons better than in England (don't even get me started on Ireland), so finding the place was a doddle, even through the rather complex intersections that seem to dominate the landscape.
The place in question was Kijkduinpark, best described as a holiday town. It has a swimming pool, bar, kiddy play centre, supermarket and pretty much everything you would ever want should your idea of a holiday be "go somewhere and do as little as possible". As such, the price tag matches well. Not having any other information and not wanting to drive much further (our body clocks were further thrown out by loosing an hour). Half an hour's check-in process later, we were ready to roll.
The place was absolutely packed, so finding our spot was a little challenging. This first problem solved, we were ready for the pool. If we are going to pay for this stuff, we are sure going to use it. The pool turned out to be very difficult to get in to (they're good at this here), meaning that we actually had to walk through what looked like toilet cubicles and out the other side to gain access. We were quite confused for a while, but just tried to look like we knew what we were doing. The swim was nice, but too warm, and there were too many kids, so we were soon back at Rosie, doing some journal updates, getting changed, then back to try the strange Dutch beers in the sunshine.
This was enough for the day, bed called out loudly.

author Tim	location Spittalfields, London, England
posted 19:26 BST 16/04/03	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 1 ( all photos )

Across a few Countries ( 4 photos )
Awaking somewhat painfully on Monday morning, it was nice not to be at work, but instead three countries and a big lump of water away. Still, our aim for the day was to get back there in time for work the next morning, so that's what we did.
Choosing to bee-line it straight for Calais, we stopped only twice for brunch, fuel and the like as we crossed through the bottom of the Netherlands and then the tops of Belgium and France. It would have been nice to have taken longer, but plenty of time for that later. Today we had to get home. Sure, the scenery was nice and varied quite a bit, and the road signs were all different, but it was just a long, if interesting, drive on a motorway to us.
We arrived at Calais very early, 3pm for a 6:40pm ferry. After asking in my worst high-school French if the man there spoke English (I expected he would, but thought it might have been rude to presume so), everyone in the office laughed at me! Well, I think I said the right thing...
Anyway, he asked if we wanted to go on the 3:15pm ferry instead - so we did, eager to get home earlier. The trade-off is that we didn't have time to sample any of the famous Caliais cheap produce that the British love to come and bring back in huge quantites on day trips. There's always next time.
So, Rosie rumbled her way on to the ferry, where we had a relax in the bar before a bit of a wander around the ship as we waved goodbye to "big proper joined-on Europe" for the moment. We grabbed a few essentials at the on-board shops, and before we knew it (1:15, actually), we were back in Britain.
No problems with customs on either side, and in fact for two Australians arriving in a Combi on Dutch plates we expected a lot of scrutiny. Both sides of the channel were happy to see us, and we drove basically straight through, back onto English soil.

author Tim	location Platform 4, Farringdon Station, London, England
posted 22:49 BST 15/04/03	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 1 ( all photos )

Amsterdam Botanic Gardens ( 42 photos )
Sunday we awoke later, our first real day off as we had no firm plans until the afternoon. Sebastian suggested that we wander towards the city's botanic gardens, one of the few things he hadn't seen in his many trips to Amsterdam. This we did, taking a nice ambling walk in the once again perfect weather, eventually navigating the insane street names to arrive at the gardens.
A little disappointing overall, since most things were probably just about to bloom, their collection did however contain a strange collection of plans - even some Australian ones! The heat almost became too much as we wandered into the greenhouse, but the spraying mist made it bearable. Anytime we thought it was getting to hot, a little chill reminded us that we weren't in Sydney's botanic gardens after all.

Well, I think our train is almost here, so I'll try to get up to date in time to upload it all at work tomorrow.

(More 19:26 BST 16/04/03, from Spittalfields, London, England)

I will try to make this this last Amsterdam entry as it is almost time to go to Turkey!
That afternoon it was time to say goodbye to Jessi and Sebastian, and head once again to Utrecht. We did it in the best way, with one last beer in the Old Nickel Pub where we had been staying. We should meet them sometime soon on our way through Germany, and even have an offer to stay with Sebastian's parents!
Heading back to Amsterdam Centraal station (gee we were glad that it wasn't far from where we were staying), we had all our gear with us this time. This time managing to find a non-smoking carriage and a fast train, we arrived not much later in Utrecht.
Walking down from the station to Donna's yard where Rosie was waiting for us, we stopped along the canal for an obligatory windmill photo, our only one the whole trip!
After spending a good half hour working out with Donna what all the gadgets did in the van (even though that's her job, there were still a few which kept her guessing). We discovered that it has a warm-air gadget which is quite expensive, and we think Donna may have charged us more if she had know it was in there!
Since we had been backpacking thus far, we didn't have any quilts or pillows to sleep with for the night, so once again Donna helped us out by lending us a quilt for the night. Directions to the local camp-ground followed, and then we were on the road!
As Liz will hastily tell you, the first corner that I had to take found us on the wrong side of the road. A quick adjustment, and we drove onwards in search of our destination for the night - Berekuil Camp Ground in Utrecht. Between Donna's directions, the local signs and a bit of help from the locals, we found our destination. One of the wrong turns found us in a huge car-park where Liz happily jumped in the driver's seat for a quick spin, only to quickly declare that she would never get the hang of it. I'll convince her yet!
The camp ground turned out to be a beautiful place hidden away off the road, and surrounded by water (as so much of The Netherlands is). We had to get the bar-tender to open the gate for us (being a Sunday, the reception wasn't open), and while asking there Liz discovered the wonders of the self-cleaning toilet seat! We meant to get back there to take a movie of it since it really defies description and scared her senseless, but we failed to do so.
Next we parked Rosie in a nice little area, and rapidly started to play with all of her goodies. I just love the rotating front passenger's chair, very comfortable after a long day on the road, or indeed a short one.
We walked across the road to the service station for a snack, fed some of that to the ducks, and took a slow walk to the nearby hotel for dinner. Next time we can cook our own, but we didn't have the gear with us at this stage. The hotel was quite a bit classier that we expected, which was strange after walking through a bowling alley to get in there. Dinner was great (steaks for the first time in ages), and a suitably slow walk back to the bus followed.
The night was a bit uncomfortable sleeping, due to the multiple cushions you use as a bed, not having any real pillows and only a single dooner, but it worked out in the end. Much better next time we sleep in her.

author Tim	location Berekuil Camp Ground, Utrecht, The Netherlands
posted 21:30 CEST 13/04/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 1 ( all photos )

Getting to know Amsterdam ( 15 photos )
Liz and I awoke quite early on Saturday since we had to get to Utrecht, about half an hour train ride south of Amsterdam by 10am. Sebastian and Jessi managed to drag themselves out of bed for breakfast (a strange all-in-one bacon and eggs mixture which worked suprisingly well) back at the hotel (we were staying in an annex building up the road), but later we found they went back and slept until midday!
Then Liz and I wandered up to the station once again, now experts (or so we thought) at navigating the Dutch transport system. We did make it fairly successfully through to where we were going, albeit on a train which stopped at places with only one other building besides the station.
Utrecht, our destination, was where we were to meet Donna, who runs a website which we had chosen as our source of campervan. After withdrawing yet more cash from the bank at the station, we rang her and she helpfully picked us up.
After quite a lot of stress the other week when she didn't have a van for us yet we had booked ferry tickets back, she managed to find a van down in a small town called Sprang-Capelle about seventy kilometers away from a dealer she had previously got vans from. She has been so helpful for us, driving down there previously to take photos and send to us, and this day was no exception. She again drove the seventy kilometers, this time in a blue campervan with me in the front and Liz in the back.
This was our first ever experience of being on the "wrong" side of the road, and boy are we glad that someone else was driving! Before she moved to The Netherlands in 1971 she was in America, and hence has always driven that way. A few hairy moments of tourists(!) not quite knowing where they were going and we eventually made it. Along the way we had seen some great little back streets of the country that we never expected to see.
The dealer in Sprang-Capelle, a Mr Timmermans, spoke only Dutch so whether he and his workers were laughing at these silly Australian tourists buying a van we will never know, but he took us for a drive in it to the post office (registration documents had to be organised), and all seemed ok.
Liz is hassling me to put the computer away and go to sleep now, so more news later!

(More 22:49 BST 15/04/03, from Platform 4, Farringdon Station, London, England)

It seems that my stop in journal-writing lasted a little longer than expected, since we are now safely back in London, so I'll try to pick up where I left off.
It's a NEW CAR! (or bus/van)

After various transactions and a quick look-over of the bus, Liz and I said "yes", and the deal was done! We were now the proud owners of a Big Red Bus, which, contrary to earlier plans, we have decided deserves the name Rosie. Bet you can't guess why. Various other names were tried but didn't quite fit, including a close second of Mr Whippy, but Rosie it is!
The next task was to get her from Sprang-Capelle to Utrecht, my first ever experience of driving on the left-hand side of a vehicle and the right-hand side of the road. I have to say that I didn't really do much other than follow Donna in her blue van in front of us, oblivious to road signage and speed limits (made more interesting as Donna's speedo didn't work) as I got used to driving the bus.
Changing gears with my right hand proved reasonably easy, and overall it was quite like driving the big SES truck (quick mention to Kogarah for winning the Rescue comp - yay guys!), only backwards and with no power steering. And Liz sitting next to me giving a running commentary of everything I was about to hit!
But no disasters came, and we made it back to Utrecht with a quick pit stop to relax in the sun at McDonalds (can't get away from them).
It wasn't quite time for our adventure in the bus to begin, so we jumped back on the train to Amsterdam, hoping our newly-purchased expensive posession would be ok parked there in Donna's yard.
Back in Amsterdam, we caught up with Sebastian and Jessi who had slept in until 12:30 (still used to the uni lifestyle - it will be all over soon...), and then wandered around the local touristy flea-market. Like other places all around Amsterdam, there is plenty of live entertainment in the squares, and even more people waiting to relieve you of your wallet while you watch it.
The remainder of the day was spent having a few relaxing pilseners and coffees in various local establishments - a great way to soak up the local culture as it unfolds around you. Dinner was Mexican at a nice little place, far better than the terrible service we recieved at a Haagen-Daas earlier on.

author Tim	location Nieuwe Brugsteeg, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
posted 16:30 CEST 12/04/2003	section Europe2002/Europe/Netherlands/Netherlands 1 ( all photos )

A Flight into Amsterdam ( 15 photos )
(Continued from Working in London 1)
It was strange flying out over the UK, as we were up quite high and hence couldn't see the ground for the cloud-cover. We joked that the end of the clouds we could see up ahead was where the UK's own ever-present personal layer of cloud probably ended. But it was true! We looked back under the clouds to see that indeed, we had now left the UK for what I termed "proper joined-on Europe". Depending on who you ask, UK people don't think they are in Europe at all anyway.
Mark from work was joking the other day that the flight to Amsterdam was very quick, since you climb, the flight-attendants rush around with sandwiches and the like, then you buckle-up for landing. Very true.
Flying in over "the continent", we saw just how amazing a place The Netherlands is in terms of water. They have Europe's busiest port in Amsterdam, as the huge queues out to sea of ships showed. The harbour areas go on and on. We were of course very excited to see our first cars driving on the "wrong" side of the road from the air!
The humorous American pilot talked us through our taxi into Amsterdam Schiphol Airport, as we did a few U-turns while he tried to find the correct bay to "dock" in. Good-natured airline, EasyJet.
Our first Dutch language signs served to confuse us greatly, but luckily almost all have English equivalents, and most people speak English at least a little.
No hassles getting bags or through customs, although since Liz was showing her UK passport, she just went through the "fast" lane, and didn't get a stamp. Most annoying, since that's part of the fun of travelling.
So we wandered through the airport, following the little picture of a train as we needed to get from there (a little way out of the city) to Amsterdam Centraal station. This proved quite simple to locate, and the ticket-machines easy to use once we worked out where the English button was, and that it didn't take cash.
The trains run quite frequently, so no major problem waiting for one, after we had worked out that platform 7a and platform 7b are different ends of the same platform. We fumbled our way onto the train, noting immediately that people were smoking on it. Everywhere. It seems that there are little signs on the outside of the carriages telling you whether they are smoking or non-smoking. Although, it's a pretty nominal suggestion - there's just less smoking in the non-smoking carriages.
The train only stopped at Amsterdam Centraal, although we weren't really sure since there were no signs on the platform. We just wandered around a bit until we realised that our location fitted in quite well with the map we had.

(More from 21:30 CEST 12/04/2003)
We wandered around for a while, attempting to work out which direction to look before crossing the roads, and eventually found a tourist information place. We had a coffee at the attached cafe, Liz bravely being the one to go and order, while I talked to the info people about how to get to a bank to get money out. Also, we grabbed a map from the map machine, despite being a little sceptical since the machine back in Chester ate our money and gave nothing in exchange. But everything in Europe works better!
We located our hotel, which turned out to be very handy to the Centraal station - wonderful since we used it quite a bit on the subsequent days. The land-lady seemed to have been indulging in some of the local past-times a little too much, and her cat wasn't much better.
After dumping our bags in the great modern room, we wandered in search of money exchange, which we found in Amsterdam Square (Liz in a clog!). We had our first of what turned out to be many relaxing sits in the sun, soaking up the atmosphere and generally not doing much at all, before wandering back in search of our friends.
Arriving on the stroke of 7pm, we stood outside Centraal station, looking for anyone who looked vaguely like they might be the person I had last seen in Year 11 at Sydney Tech and his girlfriend Jessi who we had never seen. Luckily, they had been looking at this website and seen recent photos of us, so they walked straight up and said hello!
That night, Sebastian showed us his local knowledge by directing us fairly well through to some of the interesting little areas further out from the city centre. We had Italian for dinner, and continued exploring the Dutch culture.

(customised)