Holland by Bike

Much to our surprise and the approval of many Dutch locals, we must be the only travellers visiting the Netherlands who didn't go to Amsterdam! Instead we decided to base ourselves in Utrecht, which is a beautiful city with plenty of canals located pretty much in the centre of the Netherlands. We made a decision to get more involved in couchsurfing and figured our 10 day stay in the Netherlands was a perfect opportunity. We found a host (Lars) in Utrecht with whom we stayed initially and left most our gear with when we embarked on 3 main trips within Holland:

Trip 1: Riding to Deventer

After everyone told us how flat Holland was, the logical thing to do was hire some bikes to get around. We weren't sure how far was a reasonable distance to ride each day given we are bludgers, but we decided about 100km a day was suitable. 100km/day wasn't suitable....it nearly killed us. Well to be fair, what people hadn't told us was that riding from Utrecht to Deventer through the national park was actually one of the only hilly parts of Holland, and with a strong headwind for about 90km (in EVERY direction we turned) we struggled. We eventually did make it to Deventer (it was looking shakey at one point) and met our next host (Mathieu) who looked after us really well and his spaghetti bolognaise was most appreciated. The next day we were planning to cycle around the area but couldn't bear the sight of our bikes so we just stayed local, and Mathieu showed us around the beautiful little city of Deventer and introduced us to some of the traditional snacks eaten in Holland, most notably the Kroket. We spent that night with another host (Alex) who is a sound engineer and a generally all round interesting guy with a love of tea, well...and beer too which we did have first at the Witches Hex bar. The next day we headed back to Utrecht and met up again with Lars.

Trip 2: Sailing in Freisland

As it tured out, Lars actually was co-owner of a little sailing boat which he kept up in Freisland (home to the Freisian horse). He'd lined it up so we could all go up sailing for the weekend. We drove up there through the reclaimed land which is an amazing project really....in a nutshell they built huge walls to retain the sea and then pumped out all the water to leave a huge amount of farming land that is actually below sea level. The saying God created the world but the Dutch created the Netherlands seems to have a litertal meaning! We sailed around for the weekend, with beautiful weather and beer in hand while Lars and his friend Marc did most of the "work" although both Anita and I had a go at sailing which was pretty cool. On the Sunday we sailed to another town, tied up the boat and had lunch. We had a very relaxing weekend and still managed to see a lot of Holland.

Trip 3: Utrecht to Leiden, Haarlem, Zaanstad

The nicest ride in my opinion was between Utrecht and Leiden....along waterfronts, back roads, fields and small towns. Now this was flat...we rode 50km and barely broke a sweat, which was most welcome after our near death experience of the last ride. This was the kind of riding I had in mind...easy, pancake and Amstel filled, and beautiful. We spend that night in Leiden with our next host (Ellen) who showed us around the town on bike which is a great way to sightsee...its really quick and easy and you can see more in a short space of time.

The next day we rode north to Haarlem along the Tulip trail stopping at the Keukenhof along the way. This is the most amazing flower show I have ever seen and although Canberra's Floriade is also nice, it makes it look like an amateur's copy of a masterpiece. There were so many people there and we were at least 40 years younger than 97% of the visitors.

The next day we rode to Zaanstad and visited the Zaanse Schans...a village recreated in traditional Dutch style, including a mustard mill, saw mill, oil mill (literally windmills!), wooden shoe craft shop, cheese shop and heaps of other things. Although we were a bit worried that we were going to be paying through the nose for such an obvious tourist activity, we were surprised that everything was pretty reasonably priced and really relaxing. We ended up staying longer than expected and this is why we never made it to Amsterdam, and had to view it from the train as it sped back to Utrecht.

All in all we got to see a lot of the Netherlands and got to experience many 'typical dutch' foods, activities and sights. We couchsurfed with 4 different hosts and had great experiences....it's really good knowing someone in each place who can show you around a bit, point you in the right direction, and speak the language if you need help. It really takes some of the cognitively demanding aspects out of travelling. Also, there is the chance to do something that you otherwise wouldn't have been able to - such as sailing - and helps you get a genuine experience, otherwise you just wouldn't know where to start! As an added benefit we paid for accommodation on 2 of 9 nights in the Netherlands. I think we will be doing a lot more couchsurfing through Europe.

Easter in Brussels

After Luxembourg, we were somewhat stumped as to where to go next. Europe is fantastic in that everything is so close, but when you have no real restrictions guiding you, you could end up anywhere. In the end, we chose Brussels, Belgium - mainly because we got cheap open-return tickets for less than the price of a one-way. Ha ha. Turned out Brussels was a pretty popular choice of Easter destination though - we got about the last 2 beds in our hostel for the first night, but it was fully booked out for the Sat/Sun nights (same with every other hostel within walking distance of the city center!). The city center was absolutely chockers, with thousands of tourists packing the Grand Place (main square) and cobbled street surrounds.


The Brusseleirs are called the 'Kiekefretters' - chicken eaters - because, according to legend, they preferred eating to fighting during the middle ages! This is pretty much on par - there are so many restaurants, cafes, bars and other food outlets that it's impossible to walk a dozen steps without getting a whiff of some fantastic new smells. Plus the waffles and chocolates are beyond contestation! Hopefully on our way back to London we'll get a chance to drop in and stock up...


In the meantime, we're off to the Netherlands to work off some of the waffles, beer and chocolates by cycling around the north of the country...

Luxembourg Hiking: Part 2

Day 3: Larochette to Hollenfels

The start of this section was again easy going and very pretty – the trail wandering alongside a mossy, tree-lined stream and coming to a junction at the base of a private castle almost hidden by trees. After lunching in Mersch, we headed up the hill at the back of the town and discovered that this section of the trail probably hadn’t been walked in a while. Parts of the trail felt a bit creepy – big open forests of bare trees carpeted with remnant autumn leaves that turned out to be full of tiny ticks and spiders (the spiders had us constantly on the lookout for some giant creature like Aragog in Harry Potter). After some frustration at having to constantly flick the ticks off our pants and also the lack of anything resembling a marked trail, we did another scramble down the hill and walked along the roadside for a few k’s until we found the home trail.

On entering Hollenfels we were greeted by a huge fairytale castle perched on a hillside, and overlooking a green field that in its day was probably perfect for jousting, archery and all the rest of the medieval sports. Except whoever designed this trail had a sick sense of humour because we had to ascend about 120m elevation in the space of about 500m. Not fun. After exploring the entire town (and there wasn’t much of it), we failed to find anywhere that looked like it would serve food. It was looking like we might have to use some Survivor skills and make a meal out of one of the backyard chickens… but thankfully, it turned out we could buy dinner at the hostel, so the chickens were spared.

Day 4: Hollenfels to Luxembourg City

By this stage, our legs and feet were pretty stuffed, and we’d decided that if it looked like rain in the morning, we were catching a bus. However it was clear and almost sunny by the time we’d scoffed breakfast, so once again we set off on foot. This leg turned out to be the longest of the trip – 25km. One section of the trail was confusing to follow (due to poor markings and other trails crossing and overlapping with ours), but once we got going we had an easy trek along the ridge of the mountains. We even saw some wild deer and rabbits. Annoyingly, a lot of the towns (especially the smaller ones) didn’t seem to have anywhere open where you could get food. This is especially frustrating when you’ve just walked about 15km, and then have to walk another 2km straight uphill to the next town which may or may not have any food either. To add to this, the temperature seemed to drop about 5 degrees, the sun disappeared and the wind picked up. It was a very good feeling hitting the outskirts of Luxembourg City, even with the added disappointment of still having to walk another 2 km to the youth hostel to get our bags, up a heartbreakingly steep hill to catch a bus, and then walking again to the flash hotel we’d booked into for a couple of days. In the end, it was all worth it – it was hard work and tiring, but the countryside was picturesque and pretty spectacular in places, and now we’ve got two days of full buffet breakfast to enjoy before we say goodbye to Luxembourg.

Luxembourg Hiking: Part 1

Hiking often conjures up a lot of romantic notions – getting back to nature, immersing yourself in the outdoors, blah blah blah – but if you look up the term in a dictionary, it should really describe hiking as “walking a freaking long way carrying a pile of stuff on your back, which encourages old injuries/ailments to resurface to accompany your newly sore feet, legs and shoulders”. In spite of knowing this, we decided it would still be a good idea to see Luxembourg, since the country is small, the landscape supposedly spectacular, and there are well-defined trails linking a network of excellent youth hostels. So after leaving the majority of our luggage at the Luxembourg City youth hostel (finally, a hostel with free lockers large enough to actually fit a backpack!), we hopped on a bus to Echternach where we planned to start our 4 day hike through the Mullerthal region.

Day 1: Echternach to Beaufort

Echternach is small historical city very close to the German border – in fact, we’re pretty sure the land across the river on the edge of town was Germany! The hostel was located on the edge of a lake area bordered by pine forested-hills – a kick-ass location even if it was just a bit far from the rest of town (about 3km walk). Our first days’ hike started by heading straight up a hill overlooking the town, and then headed down (and then up, and down again… you get the idea) through forest and some spectacular rock formations. This section seemed to be a popular section for day hikers – we crossed paths with a lot of people on circuit trails heading to/from nearby car parks.

Everything was going along smoothly… until the trail markings stopped matching up with anything we had on our map – you know you’re up the creek when you get to a 5-way trail intersection, and not one of the signs points to anywhere you’re expecting. Anyway, so we followed what we thought was the right trail according to our map, but about an hour after we’d expected to hit the bridge (and most importantly, stop for lunch), we were still on a trail that seemed never-ending. At this point we were about ready to chuck the map on the ground, stamp on it a few times for good measure, and flag down the next bus we saw. Eventually we stopped, figured out where we probably were, and after spotting a section of road below that we could pinpoint on the map, we did a bit of scrambling straight down a hill, walked along the road for a bit, and finally, there was the bridge (and the home trail to Beaufort shortly after).

Day 2: Beaufort to Larochette

We were the only people staying in the Beaufort youth hostel, so we absolutely destroyed the breakfast buffet. After the previous days’ unplanned detour, we were careful to double check our trail map against the hostel’s before heading out on the trail. This trail section is dubbed “Little Switzerland”, and very quickly the terrain changed to rolling green fields and meadows (though strangely devoid of livestock), interspersed with pine and open forest. The trail was relatively easy going, and we ended up rolling into Larochette around lunchtime. Larochette was another small town nestled in a valley with a creek flowing through the centre, and a grand castle perched atop a rocky hillside over the town. Check-in at the hostel wasn’t until 5pm, so we grabbed some beer and chips from the supermarket (4 Euro for 6 beers, thanks very much!) and sat in the shade by the creek watching the cars drive by and loving Europe’s lack of public drinking laws.

Germany Mach 1

After leaving Hamburg we jumped a train to a small town an hour south of Hanover called Goslar. We were a little unsure about this place as 2 German guys in our dorm responded with "Why Goslar?" when we told them! We were glad we did though as it turned out to be one of the highlights of this trip so far. Basically Goslar is a fairytale town, cobbled streets, almost all traditional houses, located at the base of the Harz mountains (they provide a dark green backdrop to the town), churches with stained glass windows and tall towers, a Glockenspiel that put on a show at 6pm and the best Schnitzel either of us have ever eaten in our lives!


I also think the Harz mountains are the home of some fairytale witches, so there was plenty of witch brews and stews going on too. I can confirm that goulash from















the witches cauldron was sensational. Our accommodation was the Schmidt Guesthouse, where we ended up with a little self-contained apartment about 40 meters from the main market square. Here we set up for a few days complete with bacon and eggs for breakfast (for the first time since January), and the cheapest beer I think we will have this trip. A 6-pack cost 1.79 Euros...not bad considering there is a recycling machine at the store and by recycling all 6 bottles you get 1.50 Euros back!!! That's right....0.19 cents for 6 German beers! Admittedly they probably weren't the best beer money could buy, but they were easily as good, if not better than most Aussie beers, after all they are German (although I should add, Astra is easily the worst beer I've ever had in my life)!


We were sad to leave Goslar, and contemplated staying forever. Maybe at a later date...I dont think that will be our last trip there. We spent most of a day travelling on 4 different trains through Göttingen and Frankfurt until we reached Mainz. We were both glad we only spent one night there as we found it disappointing.maybe we both missed Goslar. Despite our plan to catch a cruise up the Rhein to Koblenz, we had to settle for a train as the boat wasnt yet operating for the season. This has been a very common theme in Europe so far...it mostly shuts down through Winter so if you want to sightsee here, best brave the crowds during summer! Anyway, we trained along the Rhein to Koblenz, and then again up through the vineyards of the Mosel valley (on the Mosel river) to the town of Trier, which is Germanys oldest town.


There are a few remaining ruins from Roman occupation with the most celebrated being the Porta Nigra (the black gates), which is a huge entry gate into what would have been the old town surrounded by walls. Trier is also the birthplace of Karl Marx. Trier is bustling right now, partly because the sun has finally come out to play, topping out at a very welcome 24 degrees today. The old town alleyways are packed with people sipping beers and coffees in sidewalk cafes and restaurants, and theres plenty of people-watching to be done sitting on the steps of the many monuments and fountains. Our hostel (also home to the fattest cat in Germany) is about a 5-10 minute amble to the old town, so its been perfect for us to wander around the city and then duck back for a quick siesta in the arvo. We depart in the morning for Luxembourg City. We hope to spend the night, leave the majority of our gear somewhere and then undertake a 5 day hike around the country (literally!). Weve even gone all out and booked our hostels ahead of time for a change, so were both looking forward to just walking, seeing the sights, and organising lunch and dinner. Hopefully the weather holds!

A little piece of Meldgaard Heste

So this is a little bit out of order but anyway...
I found this little video clip of the horses at Meldgaard Heste (Denmark) being let out of their paddock to be fed in the barn. It was like a racetrack out there as they all tried to get pole position for the feeding...