Beach, hot chips and cheese!

Being childish (how unusual!) at an outdoor art expo

Crazy buildings in Rotterdam - people live in these

The beach

Tristan trying to beat a man on a mobility scooter who was in the bike lane!

Before - no seats, flat tyres and wonky handlebars

After outside the Queens residence!

Dear Diary ...

We thought it was about time we checked in and filled you in on our last couple of weeks based between Rotterdam and Den Haag.

We last left you while actively on the job hunt. This has proved a little harder than anticipated since the Netherlands thinks that it is still in the recession and it is summer holidays so half of the country is at the beach!! We have been through the registration process which required our Dutch family connections to help us and now we are in a 4 week queue for our tax and identification numbers to make us legal!! Yet with our current house sitting job, bikes, a foo market, plenty of sunshine and most importantly the beach only 4km from our door we are not to concerned about being available for work yet anyway!

We spent our initial 5 days in Rotterdam staying with family in the spare caravan - you beauty. Whilst we were there we got to see the sights of Rotterdam and a few neighbouring towns as Emilie played the friendly tour guide. We saw windmills, churches, boats, ate patot fritz wit mayonaise (hot chips with buckets of mayo) and lots of salty liquorice.

Now we are half way through our month long stay in Den Haag, house sitting and looking after the cat (Lisa) while her family are away on summer vacation. It is a fantastic spot and really nice to have a base after being on the go for so long. While we are here we are checking out as many neighbouring towns as possible, visiting museums, galleries, eating cheese and relaxing at the beach.

Our most important news though is to report on our latest purchase ... a matching pair of city bikes!!! We managed to negotiate the Dutch version of 'trade me'- still not sure how it works as was all in Dutch but we managed to send an email about a funky looking womens bike! Low and behold the response came back saying they had a mens one to match. We did a bit of bargaining, and after a short train ride to get them, we were dropped back to our house by the previous owner of the delightful pair as well being given some handy advice on where to look for work. After spending a hard day in the sun, drinking coffee, working spanners, and a trip to the market for a few more parts (new tubes to fix the flatties) - thunderbirds are go! We took them for a spin in the bos (forest) to visit the Queens residence to celebrate.

Last night we were invited to the neighbours for dinner as they are off to visit NZ and wanted some advice. So as you can see... we are loving this place.

x McDuff

Michele and Tristan

More photos!!

Old building and blue sky in Belgium

Tristan and Matt buying cheese at the markets in Bruchsal

Having all our delicous food and beer on the deck in the sun

Michele practicing her skills on her town bike! (note the hambag in the basket on the back!)

photos

Tris and old mate fixing the wobbly wheel.

Michele in FRANCE!!

Michele in Triberg

The Schloss (Castle) Bruchsal

Tour De France early in the morning in Brussel (No one told us it didnt start untill 12pm)

The Tour Brussels

Belgium Chocolate

Around Europe and the Tour De France!!

Dear Diary,

It would seem another few weeks have past and we have now made it to our destination of The Netherlands where we plan to find a job for a month or 3. We have been up to our usual tricks and after travelling through Germany we've managed to pay our respects to France, Switzerland and Belgium on the way here. Needless to say it is nice to be in a country that we can learn alot more about the language and set up for a little while.

Germany was a great place - after arriving at Hotel De Jarvis we set up camp and our fine host had scheduled days for different German food, beer, and coffee. Amoungst the eating we used our South Western German base to trip about by bike, train, and foot. Daily activities included markets, bike rides to a nearby lake for swims, raiding cherry trees from the local golf course, more bike rides, and actually being able to cook ourselves something to eat in a kitchen (something you take for granted until you dont do it for 3 months!).

From here our favourite trip was a bike ride to France for Lunch. We caught a train with our bikes to a town closer to the boarder and biked the last 20km across to a small town called Wissembourg. With only one slight mechanical issue where we almost lost a wheel we managed to use our map and pedal along very happily - Michele only had one gear but I had a wiggly wheel to make up for having 21! We did note the customs lacked duty free, officers, or come to think of it any real notification we were leaving Germany! Aside from a sign telling us to report to the town hall in France if we thought we needed too, and then a second sign announcing we were in France, we just meerily biked across the border unnoticed - brilliant!! After riding around the town and sampling the best chocolates, cakes, and croissants of our lives we cycled home with a few Belgium beers that cant be bought in Germany - very cool.

The next little trip we planned took us a few days but we took off nice and early one morning and made it to Basel in Switzerland for lunch. This city is built around the Rhine river and was everything we had imagined about the Swiss, very slick, very beautiful, and nothing under 10 bucks. Here we spent the day sampling chocolates, wandering around the city and watching people float down the Rhine River next to the ships to cool off. The next couple of days we returned to the very southern part of Germany - The Schwartswald or Black Forest, and with a hop on hop off type of trian ticket we got to see the cities of Freiburg, Baden Baden and we had a night in a little place with the highest waterfalls in Germany called Triberg.

Triberg is built within a valley so theres are lots of surrounding hills. A very picturisc little town. We had booked our accomodation on line so when we arrived we set out from the train in the hot afternoon sun reading a map provided by the hostel to try and find it. One of the things we find frustrating is that photos that dont quite capture the size / height of things, but without a word of a lie the hostel was situated on the highest hill in Triberg! After walking/crawling up the hill we found our hostel completely disterted. That was expect for the owner sitting in an office directly behind a sign that read 'we are busy working, next check in two hours'. Although we have mentioned sun it is probably notable to mention that for the entire time we have been in Europe its been over 25 degrees. So two hours in a waiting room dripping with sweat, and looking at a charming little German fellow sipping on his water that we could not yet buy as he was too busy got our tempers slightly inflamed!! However we stayed calm and eventually he gave us our linen, water, keys etc. We excitedly skipped to the third floor and found our room, a 10 bunk dorm on the backside of the hostel with one tiny window and no view. So we had 5 bunks each for the night and aside from it feeling about 100 degrees we got some sleep. We had enjoyed a great italian meal at a little place were the women cooked everything in front of us (back down the hill I might add) the waterfalls and loads of paths through the forest so was a great spot to see regardless of the accomodation challenge!

After returning for a night and a selection of beer from around the world we left Hotel De Jarvis for Belgium to catch the Tour De France. We had a few nights in Brussels and caught two days of the tour, one leaving Brussels and one 65km south in a town called Namur as they whistled past. We will let the photos tell the story of that one, but very very amazing to see and another real trip highlight. Belgium itself was pictursic, good beer, old buildings, brilliant chocolate and a real mix of people.

We have now had been in Rotterdam, The Netherlands for a few days with family getting shown around and starting to get a feel for the place. Tomorrow we are off to The Hague (Den Hagg) for 3 weeks on a house sitting job.

McDuff
Tristan and Michele