We enjoyed the campsite we have stayed on and would return in the future, access to hot water and showers is via a type of credit card they load with euros for you, we added 5 euros only used 80 cents so they refunded all our money which was a bonus.
We had booked a table for lunch in a restaurant on the mouth of the harbour so we drove into town early and had a walk around in lovely sunshine.
More views.Lighthouse in daylight.This now being used as a restaurant.Cannons to the left of me, cannons to the right.
As we approached the restaurant a sea mist rolled in and it went cold, thankfully it only lasted about 30 minutes and we were quite warm in the restaurant.
We had a great meal with pleasant service.On the hour this bell tower played a tune, we heard “ Blowing in the Wind” and “ Que sera sera“ being two we heard.
After a coffee in Homer we drove to the Europort near Rotterdam where we are waiting for the boarding booths to open, all being well it will be plain sailing and we will be home by tomorrow lunchtime.
When we rose this morning little did we know that the route we worked out would include two ferry crossings and a short toll tunnel under a river.
We had to wait 5 minutes whilst the huge barge went past., thankfully each crossing was less than 5 euros.
All in all, the journey went quite smoothly and we didn’t need to use any motorways for a change. The area we are staying in is below Rotterdam, and is new to us, we have stayed on peninsula’s to the South of us which are very rural.
Hellevoitsluis is located on the Haringvliet ( an estuary to the North Sea) with a beach and dunes close by and is a fortified town with a fortress built in the 17th century. It’s port has a large dry dock and a sea lock to control water levels.
Well you couldn’t visit Holland without having a photo of a windmill, many you see are used to pump water to manage the water levels, this one was used to mill flour.
Adjacent to the dry dock are moored three ships that in the tourist season are open to the public.
Sited around town are old cannons these were lying on the side of the dock, I think one moved “ it must have been a loose cannon.”
We wandered down to the end of the harbour to where it opens out into the estuary, it was beginning to get dark you forget the effects of it being November and the clocks having gone back.
We were up at 7 a.m and after packing up we left the site at 8.00 a.m for the short drive to “ Dierenkliniek Kalverbos” ( the vets) where we had an 8.30 a.m appointment. Thankfully all went well and we were on the road again at 9 a.m heading slightly North to Gouda.
There is a dedicated motorhome stopover in Gouda at Klein America with full services, unfortunately when we arrived they were digging up the surface and you couldn’t enter. There was a large car park adjacent but it was very busy and quite noisy so we looked for an alternative and are stopping on this camperplaats which is on a dairy farm as the odd whiff informs you.
As you can see it is very open and flat, according to my altitude app we are 3 inches above sea level🤔 hopefully no floods.
Before we drove here we did spend an hour or so in Gouda, which is a pleasant easy to walk around city. It’s known for its namesake cheese and the seasonal cheese market regularly held in the Markt Square.
Hard to get lost.The 15th century Town Hall with traditional red and white shutters.Also on the square is the 17th century Goudse Waag, once a cheese weighing station now home to the Gouda Cheese Museum.You can’t get away from cheese.
Just off the square is Grote or St. Jans Kerk, longest church in the Netherlands famous for its stained glass windows which were made between 1530 and 1603. However over the centuries the town buildings have grown up around it and it was difficult to comprehend its size and impossible to take a photo to do justice.
There are numerous pedestrianised ( except for damn bikes) streets with a range of shops and items of interest.
The obligatory stand in clogs photo.A mosaic statue.A mosaic bench.
All in all there was a good vibe to Gouda and we would certainly visit again.
Tonight we are staying at Delftse Hout Campsite on the outskirts of Delft, we stayed here once before approximately 8 years ago, it is quite expensive but we have Layla booked in at the vets at 8.30 am tomorrow morning to have a worming tablet and her pets passport completed, so we hadn’t much choice.
We arrived well before admitting time to the campsite and parked in the popular free parking area next to the site. Our first mission was to find the vets and after a long walk we located it went in and checked all was well for tomorrow.
We walked along the canals into town, there are loads of them and they make Delft a fascinating place. As we got to about 100m from the centre I saw to our left ……..
A giant table lamp.
This in its itself was quite fascinating but suddenly memories crowded into my mind as within metres of the lamp was the boutique hotel we stayed in 10 years ago.
It was a great surprise to see the hotel and it bought back memories of driving through Delft in the car along narrow single lane roads alongside the canals.
When we entered the Markt square which dates back to the 12th century, we were pleased to see a market in full swing, it made taking scenic photos difficult but never mind. We bought from one stall some lovely soft bread rolls and savoury items for our evening meal plus a very nice cake. What we didn’t need was any cheese.
I’ve been eating cheese for 20 years longer than they have been selling it 😊
We found a table at one of the many restaurants around the square and ordered a small cheese omelette with a shared dish of loaded chips.
If these were small I would hate to try a large one, the omelettes were huge and had mushrooms, peppers, tomatoes in them, plus some salad and all sitting on top of two huge thick slices of brown bread. Well you live and learn.The Town Hall.The new church built centuries ago.The Old Church.Michelle as the Girl Without a Pearl Earring.There are lots of shops selling the Delft blue and white ware.
We had spent over 3.5 hours and decided to walk slowly back to Homer along the canals.
Delft is probably our favourite place in Holland, we have now seen it in different seasons and will certainly return again in warmer weather and stay for some days.
It was only a few miles from last nights aire to the castle, there was adequate parking even if I did miss it and had to drive through the towns narrow streets turn round and go back.
In the herb garden, photo taken by a volunteer gardener.Muiderslot Castle.There was a drawbridge at one time.Arms, armoury and a secure chest.Some of the rooms were recreated as they would have been in the past.The kitchen. Above right is a very well decorated wall cabinet, and above right which is hard to make out is a pulley with a trapdoor below where they hauled their buckets of beer up from the cellar.We are still not quite sure what this painting is depicting but the humans are having their heads chopped off and replaced with cabbages.
There was a lot of walking up and down steps/ staircases to reach the upper levels and the top of the towers, some rooms were totally empty.
Roof joists at the top of the tower.
The castle tried to be as self sufficient as possible as it was some distance from the markets of Amsterdam, fish was caught locally and game hunted on the land, they had thriving vegetable and herb gardens.
They did seem to have some problem with giant ants.
It wasn’t a long journey to tonight’s stop at Haarlem which is a clogs throw from Amsterdam. We pulled into the street where the entrance to the aire was situated only to find a 3m hole in the road only 5m from the entrance, a large team of workmen working on a gas main. I had to do a turn around in a car park and drive about 2 miles around the block to the other side of the roadworks.
Haarlem is a lovely historic city on the River Spaarne 20k from Amsterdam. The town centre offers a colourful mix of large chain stores, speciality shops, boutiques and art galleries, there are also plenty of bars and restaurants. In the centre on the Grote Market is the Grote Kerk (Great Church) of St Bavorek.
A typical street.We know the Dutch are bike mad, but a wooden one for €5,995😵💫The fact it is called Splinter made me laugh.
We avoided the shopping streets although we did have a beer next to the Grote Kerk.
We wandered down to the river which is quite active with boats passing through and people living in their boats on the river, we walked along the river to the windmill, “ Molen de Adriaan”, crossed the river and walked back on the opposite side.
A lovely narrow street called Scheepmakersdijk.A general translation is God protect the ship.
We were beginning to feel weary and decided to head back to Homer, any thoughts of catching a bus went out of our heads when we saw this chap at the bus stop.
A little thing I knocked up in the art activity class here at the art museum, it’s in the style of Van Gogh, probably worth millions😊
This morning we drove into the De Hogue Veluwe National Park heading for The Kroller Museum of Art. We had prepaid €13 each to go into the museum and €9.50 for the parking, as we approached the entrance to the park we were stopped by a barrier where a patient young man explained we had to pay a further €13 each just for the pleasure of driving the 2k to the museum, ouch😵💫
The Kroller-Muller Museum is a second home to Vincent Van Gogh, the museum boasts 90 of his paintings and 180 of his drawings and is the second largest collection of his work in the world. Other work on display included paintings by Claude Monet,George’s Seurat, Pablo Picasso and Piet Mondrian. There was also a range of work by other distinguished artists.
Bottom left is a cubist painting by Picasso and bottom right is one of his early paintings.
The Kroller-Muller museum is the life work of Helene Kroller-Muller, between 1907 and 1922 she and her husband bought almost 11,500 works of art one of the largest private collections of the 20th century. She wanted to have a place where she could share her passion for modern art and this was fulfilled in 1938 when the museum opened it’s doors to the public. The museum has been expanded several times since and hosts displays of guest artists.
In it’s considerable grounds it has a sculpture trail with some very different pieces of work.
Very weird.
There is also an area with work by the English sculptor Barbara Hepworth.
After lunch we drove north west to Naarden which is a Dutch fortified town and is the best preserved fortified town in the Netherlands. It is said to be unique in Europe because of its star shape, it boasts double ramparts, gatehouses and bastions, however we have been to two other star shaped fortifications.
I’ve used the two above photos because it was very difficult to take a photo that could show the defensive system.
Entrance gate.The great church/ St Vitus Church.For many years, I, Wolfgang and many others were part of an European Educational programme that gave teachers the opportunity to visit schools in other countries, it was named Comenius I believe after the man above.Michelle has expressed an interest in a 3 wheel bike but wasn’t impressed by this one.
We had a swift journey here today on the motorway through Germany and Holland, we are staying on a campsite “Camping Beek en Hei” in the village of Otterlo in the vicinity of Arnhem.
We are on the edge of the National Park De Hoge Veluwe which we will enter tomorrow., it is a Dutch national park approximately 55 square kilometres in area consisting of heathlands, sand dunes and woodlands.
We have been here before, possibly 2014, pre motorhome and pre Layla days. We were on a car tour of Holland and stayed in the above hotel Wolfgang, Arzu and Bedia who was only 5 at the time, travelled from Germany to meet up with us. Later that day we had a meal in a restaurant in Otterlo and I bought a small wooden clog for Michelle as a keepsake.
Today she found a larger one but I wasn’t tempted to buy it😊
This is a short blog as we are using this site as a one night stopover before doing some touristy things tomorrow.
As always we received a warm welcome when we arrived in Gahlen to visit our good friends Wolfgang, Arzu and Bedia. We try to make a visit here each year and in between Wolfgang has been to stay with us in England. We have an arrangement about the visits,we don’t necessarily need to be do “touristy” things we like to experience every day life.
That can be as simple as a walk along the nearby canal which is used for commercial barges.Or a walk in the local woodland with Layla.Or a walk around the lake and stream in the village.
We visited two branches of a local supermarket on the “special offers” day to take advantage of whiskey and Bordeaux red wines on offer. Then trying for the first time a donner from a food van outside.
We even at our request visited the local Ikea to compare goods on sale and prices, of course we had to buy a few kitchen items.
We had a wonderful meal in a Chinese restaurant we have visited several times before which is self service eat as much as you like where the food is always excellent and as it was Wolfgang’s birthday he excelled himself by consuming 5 courses.
Wolfgang, Bedia and Arzu.Another happy couple.Whilst we were in Gahlen it was Layla’s birthday and Arzu baked her a cake, thankfully it was for human consumption, very tasty too.
Wolfgang did take us to a nearby attraction we hadn’t seen before Schloss Raesfeld, known as a water castle due to its moat.
There has been some form of fortified building on this site for 800 years and it’s fortune has ebbed and flowed as various families owned the properties here. In 1882 the baronet of Landsberg-Welen bought the castle and grounds and turned into a farm.
The buildings had been acquired by the chamber of handicrafts and during the war and afterwards was used for a variety of purposes, a military hospital, temporary shelters for expellees from the East and a school room. In the 1950’s new owners repaired the damage and the castle regained some of its old splendour and is still the centre for training of craftsmen. The castle is used extensively for weddings.
The main castle has now been bought by the municipality of Raesfeld.
Now at the end of a very pleasant break we move on to Holland.
We decided that today we wouldn’t do a site seeing trip to a town and so we broke our journey in a forest region near Bestwig. I had seen that a town nearby was named Wasserfall and it seemed likely there would be one there. There is one but it isn’t quite in Wasserfall and it isn’t something that is feted as a tourist attraction. There is no car park and the path is discovered with some difficulty at the side of a farm house next to a camp site.
The waterfall is called Plaesterlegge which was something to do with the water and rocks but I can’t find the reference. It is situated in a deep ravine reached by a single track through a deciduous forest.
As we were well away from roads Layla was allowed to be off the lead, first time for weeks and she really enjoyed herself, running non stop, chasing sticks sniffing galore, heavenly.
It was a long steep walk down, the path was a little treacherous underfoot as it was wet and the leaves were slippery but eventually we got to the furthest point below the waterfall.
Sadly the waterfall wasn’t awe inspiring, there hasn’t been a lot of rain lately and the autumn trees were a barrier to a full view.
It is there amongst the trees😊This noticeboard depicts what it can look like in the four seasons.
The walk back up,was a killer and we had to stop regularly for a breather, but at least the scenery was great.
By the time we got back to Homer we had walked 2.5 miles and it began to drizzle, we drove on to tonight’s stop and the rain steadily got heavier. This stellplatz isn’t near anywhere of note but is on the side of Mohnesee.
Borrowed from the internet.
The site is terraced with views over the lake, however , although the rain had stopped the greyness and mist didn’t give a great view. The lake is formed by the damming of two rivers Mohne and Heve, the dam is 650m long and 40m high. In May 1943 the RAF destroyed much of the dam in a bombing raid but it was quickly restored.
View from Homer.Looking from the bridge back to the stellplatz.
Tomorrow we move onto the small village of Gahlen for six days , to visit our good friends Wolfgang, Arzu and Bedia, it will give us a chance to recharge our batteries, have a rest from travelling and be thoroughly spoilt. As a result there may not be many blogs for a while.
When we woke up this morning we found this river cruiser moored opposite us, it had arrived overnight.
Today has been one of those frustrating driving days yet again. On three separate occasions we found the road we were on closed for repairs and diversions in place, at least today there were a few diversion signs but if you had no knowledge of the geography of the area they weren’t a great help ( evidenced by the confusion of German drivers in front of us) thankfully for once the sat nav was a great help. We ended up covering an extra 30 miles and adding an hour to our journey as the diversion took us through small villages with 30km speed limits.
We are staying in a stellplatz on the outskirts of Marburg which is a lively student city with a history dating back over 800 years with a quaint medieval core.
Buildings on the street leading into town.
The university here is the oldest protestant university in the world founded in 1527, the brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm studied here and collected many of their fairy tales from around the region.
The old university.
Set high up above the town is Marlburg Castle or Landgrafen Palace built in the 11th century as a fort and developed over the centuries, today the building is used as a museum by the university, most people climb up to it for the view not to enter the museum. Sadly today I failed, today’s long drive and day after day walking on average 3-5 miles has taken its toll and I couldn’t summon up the energy or enthusiasm to walk up the last 100m.
We did reach quite a high level and paused near a church where there were views over the city.
The magnificent Rat Haus.Some more images of the medieval town.
We probably only managed to see about 50% of the town but the afternoon was drawing to an end so we made our way down and back to the river, which we followed back to Homer.
This fountain was in a square beside the river and was used as a meeting area and chilling out space with deck chairs to sit in.
taraabit 