For a taste of home headed to Little Collins a very popular Cafe founded by some ex-melbournites trying to bring some of Melbourne's Cafe culture to Amsterdam. Best breakfast in Europe.
Next to the Heineken experience, an impressive big budget affair with a good balance of beer history, beer drinking and beer pulling. Reuben came away suitably soused and Anne-Marie with a new appreciation of the liquid gold.
Finished of a lovely day checking out some Rembrandts, Monets, and Van Gohs for good measure.
Anne-Marie is brainwashed by a Heineken mind-washing video
Reuben admires the stills in the old Heineken brewery
An animated wall of green bottles, more than 99 (but less than 9000). It was quite impressive.
Concentrate, you only get one shot at this (actually 3 if you stuff them up enough)
Anne-Marie, like a professional
Captain Pants certified and all
Reuben's likes a little Van Goh, he always has
Outside the Rijksmuseum all the stoned locals enjoying the sun (I'm sure they aren't all high)
You'd be forgiven for thinking we would be over festivals by now, but they are all different. They all have their own style and atmosphere. Loveland was no exception. Where Tomorrowland is your international big budget blockbuster movie, Nature One is an intense gritty Sci Fi, and loveland is a laid back romantic comedy.
Although Reuben felt quite at home being on the younger side of the audience at a dance music festival for a change (not something he ever expected to see again), it was not quite our normal cup of tea with it's relaxed house style.
Not to say we didn't enjoy the festival with it's free party boat, face painting, origami classes and speech bubble making tent but its numerous bean bag chair areas should have been an early warning.
There was a decent set by Felix da House Cat and then Fedde Le Grand, but we realised at 9pm, when we were considering going back for seconds to sit in the Tee Pee and listen to the Dutch School Madame (with horn rimmed glasses and a tight blonde bun no less) read hard core porn in Dutch, that perhaps it was time to cut our losses and cycle our second hand dope smoking selves back to our fancy futuristic hotel.
Festival parking done right
Banana (phone) for a dollar? I'll take 2
A is for Anne-Marie
And then he Vijixsckled his Mkjrstblickjested in Veronica's Klijmingfalderholdenkaj
I'm on a bean bag, on a boat
Dancin girls, not sure what they where selling
Some music and fun was had
The prettiest of the 8 stages as Fedde pumps out a good set
Amsterdam, of course bikes everywhere and on closer examination it seemed over half had been there for some time. People drinking and smoking pot, the smell was omnipresent. There were shops selling fluro raver clothes, dope seeds and magic mushrooms and women standing in shop windows half or more naked, this city doesn't hold anything back. We did enjoy an excellent coffee made by a kiwi, a cheese tasting with matching wine, a canal ride with a glass of wine and lunch with, you guessed it... There is tons of of art, sculptures and atmosphere, all up an incredible city full ofbicycles, design, history and tons of style.
A view up one of the many canals
One of Anne-Marie's fresh muscles
A helping hand, all the sculptures seem to be adorned with a small infestation of children
Anne-Marie earns her tasting certificate after lying to the examiner, saying her scores where out of seven not ten.
Aboard our comfortable canal cruise
Anne-Marie contemplates the view
Smile you're in Amsterdam
More canal shots
Are you sure you want me in a picture here?
DJ Tiesto lays down some phat beats (almost, he's wax)
With all our clothes either wet or dirty we couldn't head off early for an all day ride, so Instead we opted for a sleep in and then a quick train ride to Utercht where we knew for sure we could wash some clothes*. We stopped at a laundromat and to pass the time decided to ease the load on our bikes by drinking one of our bottles of wine. Of course you can't open a bottle in a laundromat without offering to the other unfortunates without a washing machine at their disposal, plastic cups or no. End result: 2 bottles were consumed as we got to know James from Slovakia, his gay friend and Peter from the Netherlands. Peter gave us tips on where to go and what to eat. So following his advice we changed our direct route and headed off to Amsterdam following a very beautiful old canal, one of the most picturesque places we have seen so far; house and river boats, beautiful buildings, bridges and canals and despite the allegations no prostitutes to be found. We were a little confused at one point and a fellow cyclist, Thomas, offered to guide us 5km down the river as he was headed that way (green jumper in the video). He had just cycled the Danube and was so happy to meet someone touring in his own country and having an opportunity to swap stories. Stopping for an early dinner at a cozy looking restaurant we quickly discovered one of Holland's specialties, pancakes, glorious, savory, sweet, amazing, yummy, pancakes. Despite Anne-Marie's over pancaked stomach threatening to pull us up early we arrived in Amsterdam as the sun set. a healthy 60km under our expanded belts. *Quick side note. Finding a laundromat on the web is hard. In every country we have managed the written word fine, through Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium we have muddled through with lots of apologies, Google translate, familiarity with foreign restaurant menus and common sense. Holland is a different story, these people use too many scrabble high score letters in their everyday language, it's almost Welsh in complexity. Lost we are. And the locals all just laugh, though Reuben did get a complement today on my pronunciation of Stroopwafle from a street vendor, YAY.
Holland does good icecream.
Oh yes they do.
A large canal, it carries half size container ships.
Apparantly the average Dutch person lives in style.
Like complete tasteful old school style.
A typical street view in Utercht.
Our cycle route's biggest hill in our trek from one side of the Netherlands to the other.
The sun sets as we roll in to our most interesting hotel in Amsterdam.
Just a little sped up recap of our roll through Holland. Sorry about the sound, will fix.
Up early at 4:30am we left the town of Rheinberg and headed for Arnhem in Holland. Aware it was going to rain we crossed our fingers and hoped for the best. From the start we had a terrible head wind and at about half way there just before we crossed the border it started to pour. With 50kms still to go we pushed on; strong winds, pouring rain, 2 ferry crossings and absolute confusion with the signs across the border. We made it despite the weather and complicated signage we were both so impressed. Bike lanes everywhere, bikes everywhere, lots of bars, good food and atmosphere. We like Holland (The Netherlands were the Dutch live (so confusing))!
Holland is a little wet. No wait it's a whole lot wet.
We passed a town called Rees (photo damaged by the rain) and a picture of Roos bicycle, kind of Dali if you ask me.
The Cycle the Rhine book we are following has obtuse instructions like turn right at the pink elephant.
We where correct in assuming he meant the soggy brown mammoth.
Enjoying the early start we said goodbye to Cologne and headed north along the Rhine. We passed through the lovely city of Dusseldorf and then as a complete contrast a terrible city, Duisburg, it showed a sobering look at a side of Germany we hadn't seen so far. We had planned to stop there for the night but it seemed run down and unsafe so we continued. Despite strong head winds it had been overcast all day so we were able to finish the 120kms (via the roundabout route) to Rheinberg.
While looking for somewhere to eat we stopped by a house with larger than life-size bottles of wine in the drive way. Busted by the owners who came out for a chat and the next thing we knew we were in their back yard doing an impromptu wine tasting of fabulous German vintages from the region. They owned a bottle shop in town and were such a lovely friendly couple, happy to discuss wine and hear about our crazy travels and adventures. One hour later we said goodbye with two bottles of wine in our hands. Normally we would be thrilled but when you're on your bike any weight is a hindrance particularly as we still had 2 left to drink from our trip in Alsace. Oh well, I can hear your hearts bleeding from here.
Note the labels, that may well be what caught Reuben's eye as we peddled past.
Seriously if you are ever in Rhineberg stop by here and enjoy great wine and great company!
Today we were up at 4:30am to do some serious riding after having been a little slack of late. We left Koblenz and headed for Cologne. It was so nice in the morning, little traffic, cool and quiet. Anne-Marie was having fun comparing the river cruises that we saw heading upstream, trying to convince Reuben that one day we too will join the oldies for an all inclusive cruise of the Rhine. We stopped at Bonn along the way and visited an awesome bike shop for pedal platforms and to fix Reuben's shifters after the crash the other day. We completed the 105km ride just after midday enjoying a yummy 'scampi' spaghetti lunch with of course, a couple of glasses of really good international wine. After Note: the place we had lunch was a pretty amazing restaurant Vintage, we seem to have a knack of choosing exceptional restaurants on a whim (look for white table cloths is Dennis Rewnsley's tip).
Anne Marie in front of the amazing cathedral in Koln.
Beer at the Hard Rock Cafe in Koln. Ozzy and Marilyn say Hi.
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