we made it.

 Yep we are here. 

Despite threats of delays through the Dartford Tunnel and roadworks on the Essex stretch of the M25 we reached Harwich for the ferry with over an hour to spare.  This meant I had to get on the ferry.  The Met Office had been forcasting gale force winds in the North Sea and I don't really like being on boats even in calm waters.  I had been manging to keep the panic to a minimum during the day at work with the possibility that I may have to stay late and not leave in time to get to the port.  Turns out I needn't have worried. After an excellent supper we stood on deck and watched England slip away  into the night.  We then retired to our cabin and slept the few hours until the rather loud wake up call.  If it was rough I didn't notice at all.  Ed must have slipped something into my lasagne.

Navigating across Holland to our first stop proved interesting.  We hadn't been able to find a road map before we left, but didn't worry too much as we had printed off some google directions and there was bound to be a map to buy on the boat.  There were plenty of maps, but not one of them was a road map of Holland, one of the only two places the ferry goes too.  So braving it with google directions was our only option which worked admirably enough to get us to the first petrol station where we stopped and bought a map.  All would be fine now, or it would be if I could work out how to open the map up and how each page unfolded and then had to be refolded before turning over to the next page.  It was quite a work of origami by the time I had finished with it.  Once that was all sorted it turned into a pleasant drive through the Rotterdam rush hour and on into flat expanses of countryside punctuated not with traditional windmills but with enormous windfarms.  Just to make us feel at home every time we came across a lifting bridge it was up just like the level crossing at St Dunstans.