day 13

I thought I booked a cycling holiday.  My buttocks seem to concur with this.  Ed thinks it is in fact an eating holiday, which we have done plenty of (for those who want a little more information before they vote), but I seem to have spent an inordinate amount of time on boats today.

So the day starts as usual with a continental breakfast, though a little sparse compared to those that we've had recently. What was odd was that it was at 7.15, and served in the very same posh Chinese restaurant that a few hours before had provided us with a very good chinese meal. We even sat at the same table...

The ferry trip from Enkhuizen to Stavoren took about an hour and twenty and left the harbour at 08:30.



The townsfolk of Enkhuizen turned out in force to give us a good send off in spite of the weather.

Yep, we had to be stood on the quay breakfasted, checked out and ready to leave by 08:15.  That is in the morning, and we're an hour ahead of you lot too, remember...  Fortunately it was calm enough for me to nap on the way over so I missed most of it but I was awake to see this



We're told that the total flock numbered well into the thousands.  They apparently live on an island locally and are the bain of the fishermans lives as between them they eat 10,000 kilos of fish a day!  Although not an uncommon sight for the regular ferry users I had never seen anything like it before.
It took 15 minutes or more for the whole flock to go by, flying much faster than a boat that was itself doing nearly 20mph in a column several birds wide they stretched from horizon to horizon for the whole quarter hour.

Also on the ferry were a party of school children off on a cycling trip.  Surprisingly this improved Ed's experience as one of the parents is a baker and provided cake, so much cake they were giving it free to anyone on the ferry.

The second boat was a trip of a couple of minutes across a canal that they didn't want to build a bridge over.  You pressed a bell and shortly the pilot got his shoes on, came out of his house, drove the boat over, picked us up and took us back across.  All for the princely sum of 1 euro. Marvelous.  I might be exagerating to  call it a boat, more sort of a motorised raft with railings.



Today's route took us along the edge of the lake, but the wrong side of a dyke so we couldn't see it, and then across country to Oudemirdum.  Longest route so far and we are begign to feel it.  Usually the fidgeting in the saddle doesn't start till about 35 miles but this week it is nearer 25 necessitating some extra stops along the way.  One of these stops included lunch.  As breakfast had been very early and somewhat shorter than our usual hour due to the unseemly time it had been taken we stopped at a riverside cafe.  There was a busy lifting bridge which we sat and watched till we fell asleep pretending to do crosswords.



The maps and notes seem to have been a bit better so far this week, but maybe I'm just getting used to them. We have been suffering again at the hands of road works though as we keep coming across bits where they are relaying the path or a bridge is broken and they don't always put up diversion signs leading us at one point to be crossing a field and ending up the wrong side of a canal.

Still we made it, and that meant that I got to eat my favourite dessert of the holiday so far, a pina colada sorbet  with ginger marmalade and sugared cashew nuts.  So who's up for dessert at mine when we get back?  One just for Lara, the bread served with our salad (the first and only time both Ed and I ordered salad as a main!!) came on a board with a herb butter, rock salt and a shot glass of olive oil to be served with 2ml pipettes, just like in chemistry at school.  We were too busy eating to get a photo, but will try and remember tomorrow.

And finally, wotd.
An unusual one this. We've been here for nearly two weeks now and have seen more windmills than you could possibly imagine, and that's ignoring the vast windfarms that have appeared all over the North Sea coastal regions. At several points during the last few days riding we've been able to see four traditional 'mills in the view, and one on the horizon was actually going round. Thus far they have all been of one type, where the cap goes round with the sails to face into the wind and the rest of the structure is fixed. Todays wotd is our first post mill, where much of the mill is sat on a central post and so most of the building turns to face the wind. It was also comparitively small.



Sorry this one has taken a while to post, we're having internet trouble again...