We call the country Holland and its inhabitants Dutch,
however it is known in Europe as the Netherlands, and the region “Holland” is
actually only a small largely reclaimed area around the ports of Rotterdam and
the Hook of Holland. It is such a flat and compact country that we didn’t see
any inclines until we visited Maastricht near the Belgian border and that hill
was such a surprise that we got lost on a bike track trying to navigate to the
top of it to see the view. We had to extract the
car very carefully in reverse with some assistance and much to the wonderment
of the many Dutch people out for a Sunday walk! Everyone we met in the Netherlands had almost flawless spoken
English, were friendly and helpful and we could understand most road signs, apart from the one that said no entry to the cycle path for cars!! We will blame Satnav for that one!
We’re back in Germany now, this time for a couple of weeks
and have so far travelled down the west side visiting Aachen, Cologne, Bonn, Speyer,
Heidelberg, Baden Baden, Ulm and yesterday, Bamberg. We haven’t had to rely on
Sally’s rusty German much yet as most people respond to our hesitant inquiries
in excellent English. The main problem
comes when trying to translate menus and sometimes what we end up with is a
complete surprise – though invariably very delicious!
We had a lovely break staying with old friends from Paris at
their place near Bonn; 38 years since we’d last seen each other. They’ve lived
all over the world from Washington to Buenos Aires to Abu Dhabi and Bangkok so there were plenty of tales to be told and ideas
for our future holidays too!
By concentrating on the 'aldstadts' or old towns which are
usually compact mid-city areas full of history and by having plenty of coffee/tea/lunch
breaks and spending only at the most 4 hours looking around, we are staying
fairly fresh. Picasso and the Impressionists got a battering in the south of
France, whereas here it is the churches more than anything that have amazed us
by in their size and history. Each church seems to be bigger than the last and
they have been renovated to impress with their size and clean lines rather than the
more richly decorated churches in other countries in Europe.
The formal gardens at
Schloss Schwetzingen, near Speyer, made an impression;
everything was geometrically laid out on a huge scale. Three hundred year old
trees that had been espaliered and painstakingly trimmed were works of art and
the various temples and sculptures placed around the gardens often surprised
with their beauty.
There were lots of
great photo opportunities around every corner.
Tonight we are staying in an
apartment
in a converted railway station at Droyssig which has great hosts,
fabulous views from the window and Tony explored the bike path this
afternoon with a 10km ride.
The weather is cooling down now and autumn is showing its
colours in the trees – something we miss in Australia. Hopefully, Copenhagen will not be too icy
this coming weekend though tonight they have forecast the slight possibility of
snow in northern Europe in the next few days! Brrr…
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