Okay, I admit, Holland wasn’t on the agenda at all. But here I am in Cheese town, Gouda.

How did I get here? To recap. The DFDS ferry holed herself at Harwich and is out of service ( by the way, DFDS has a lot to learn about customer service ) so I had to change plans and get the ferry from Hook of Holland or Calais etc. took the night train to Utrecht – sharing a compartment with a talkative and interesting man from Croatia who lives in Norway but was on his way Prague and somewhere else. But I also met Timo who I hope will come to NZ as we need good ICT project managers and enjoyable people.

I couldn’t really decide where to go next – Delft or Haarlem? But finally settled on Haarlem as it allowed me to stretch my legs a bit (poor reason I know, but still a reason). So I spent most of the day following canals and waterways although at times I felt in the middle of a Tour de France training camp as teams in full team kit went roaring by. There were some wonderful transistion s such as this little ‘bike’ ferry.

It’s funny but the last few days of cycling, from Germany to Copenhagen then thru Holland have been wonderful. Very different from Sweden, more crowded but just as enjoyable. Of course sitting in a town square with a beer in hand helps.

Amsterdam was only some 16 ks or so to the east so I thought I’d cycle there for a day of museums, culture etc. on the way there I met a girl, who spoke no english, asking for directions to the Ikea store in Haarlem and with much ado I found it on my GPS and we went on our own merry ways.

After ingesting the crowds, dope smoke and general noise of Amsterdam for all of 15 minutes, I decided – not for me and headed back past Haarlem to the beaches, all be it into a rather vicious headwind. Never having been to an Ikea store before, I stopped by the one in Haarlem. And immediately got lost, in a store that only sells household furniture and goods! Finally I found my way out and had a quick hot dog and, you guess it, met the girl I had given directions to some 3 hours before. Anyway I continued on to the beach.

Any journey has moments of ups and downs, but also ordinary moments. Moments that stay in the mind. Today it was the Policeman on his bike who kindly told me I was cycling in a pedestrian only area. He didn’t rebuke me, issue a ticket but just showed me where I could cycle then asked where I was heading and pointed out the way.