Tuesday 28th September.
Only a few more days until we fly home, three months now seem to have gone quite quickly. All that is needed to be done is to pack up the camper, a few small jobs that Ewout has taken on himself to do to make it better again and to pack our bags so that they are not over the allotted weight.
We spent the weekend with Gaby & Renko at Weringerwerf in North Holland, we arrived Friday about 5pm after negotiating the busy traffic around Amsterdam. Greeted warmly by Gaby & Renko we felt immediately at home and spent an enjoyable weekend with them again, renewing the acquaintance and exchanging news.
Saturday we went for a drive to the beach, and although it was very windy it was good to be out and about walking along on the sand and seeing many people doing the same. After the beach we drove down to Alkmar, a very nice old town which we had visited about 31 yrs ago to see the Cheese market. A tourist spectacle in the summer season, but being out of season we were content to walk through the busy shopping streets and then to visit the Cheese museum.
Sunday we took the traditional mode of transport (pushbikes) and rode about 17kms to the village of Winkle to see their flower festival where they decorate floats with Dahlia and the community get involved from the school children to big groups who go all out to make very large and elaborate displays. With market stalls, bands, motorbikes being displayed and food and drink stalls it was a very busy place and a chance to experience more dutch culture.
After a good ride and a simple dinner of soup and bread ( homemade by Renko each night) we had to say our good byes. We enjoyed the time with them and it was such a nice thing to be able to be so comfortable with them in their home.
Damn goodbyes…..again.
We hoped that leaving late on the Sunday evening we would have a good run on the motorways back to Martins. But even the best plans can be put to the test with the traffic delays, and we had a good run until Utrecht and came to an abrupt halt with the motorway closed and all the traffic directed into 2 lanes. We sat for about 1/2 and hour watching the outside lanes moving when we decided to move over and try to make a better move.. it worked and so we got going, although slowly and we arrived back at s’Gravendeel a lot later than we planned.
We were hoping to get back earlier to visit Ria for her birthday and so after parking the camper we went straight to Ewout & Ria’s to join the birthday celebration. It ended up being ok and we had a chance to socialize with some family for a couple of hours.
Now it is a waiting time.. time to get some last minute things done, say goodbyes and looking forward to getting on the plane for the return trip to Australia.
