Tuesday April 21st, 2015

Biking - Day Three
Den Haag - Bergambacht

Day Three's Ride.

Saying goodbye to the "Biking by Limo" girls after breakfast.

This morning, surprisingly, we all surfaced for breakfast in preparation for our ride to Gouda, "pronounced "howda" as in howda heck are you?"  

That's it???  The Girl With the Pear Earring.

Stevie decided she would be biking by limo and Ellen and Susie joined her to visit the museum in Leiden to see Johannas Vermeer's  "Girl With the Pearl Earring."  So I set off on my bike with the three other couples en route to Gouda, with plans to meet the girls for lunch.  

Babies everywhere ... lambs and birds.

The ride today took us along several dykes and along water controlled canals where spring is definitely in the air.  The area was like a bird sanctuary with Geese, ducks, swans, pheasant, blue herons and many more, all with babies.  The  sheep had little lambs following them as well.  It was so peaceful and serene.  I'm not going to lie to you, though.  The fragrance of the Hyacinth was far superior to the smell of the fertilizer in the fields.  

Coffee Break at AA Zicht

At coffee break time, we stopped at AA Zicht (means Lake View) for coffee and Dutch Apple Pie.  AA Zicht is a beautiful water side restaurant.  Alice says coffee is very traditional for all Dutch people.   After a relaxing break, we set off again to the town of Gouda.

Gouda Town Hall.

Gouda is a another quaint little Dutch town with a beautiful city center.  Right in the center of the square is an incredible town hall that looked like Cinderella's castle.  The square is surrounded by restaurants and shops.  We had no organized lunch today, so

Lunch at Juuls.

I was waiting for the "biking by limo" girls to arrive to meet them for lunch.  They were nowhere to be found, so I called Stevie.  She told me they came, they saw, they went.  They weren't impressed with Gouda so they left and went to today's destination, The Hotel De Arencshoeve, in Bergambacht.  (Which turned out to be a bad choice, as there was nothing there.  Just a small hotel outside of town.)  I digress.  Anyway, I wandered through the town ... all alone and feeling sorry for myself, having been abandoned ...  looking for a nice lunch spot.  I found a place crowded with people - which tells me the food is good - and the name was Juuls.  

Picnic lunch with the crew, Abby, Alice and Sjoerd.

So I figured it had to be good.  I walked in and asked for a table for one.  As I was trying to decipher the menu written in Dutch, I glanced across the room and saw two familiar faces, two of our guides, Abby and Sjoerd 

(pronounced (Sheward).  What a pleasant surprise.  They asked me to join them, we got our sandwiches to go and had a little picnic in the courtyard near our bikes.  Turned out to be a great lunch.

After lunch, we toured Sint Janskerk, or "St. John's Church."  A beautiful church in the city center, renowned for having the largest stained glass windows in the world.  

Mauritius explained the story of the windows.

Our guide, Maurits, was knowledgeable and humorous!  An historian, Maurits has studied the stained glass windows in the church for years and has written books about the stories they tell.  

Painted Glass Windows at St. Johns.

Mauritz was so 

Copper Floors at St. John's Church.

interesting and held our attention for an hour.  He explained how the windows in the church were removed piece at a time, stored in boxes and hidden away at cheese farms during the 2nd world war to protect them.

Painted Glass Windows hidden in boxes.

The church is being renovated and is proud to be known as the first church with copper floors.  They were just finishing up the floors while we were there.

Polder Willow's roots prevent erosion.

Much of Holland is under sea level, so water control is very important.  One of the ways they keep water from eroding the canals is by planting Polder Willows.  

These trees have shallow roots that spread quickly making for great erosion control.  The trees are cut back every other year because the branches knot up.  When they are cut back, they have huge balls on top where new branches emerge.

After the church tour, we peddled on to our next hotel in Bergambacht, where a cheese factory tour, dinner and wine awaited. Today was the longest ride so far, 35 miles.  But I elected to take the additional ride adding another 11 miles to the trek taking us through the town of Schoonhoven and setting a new personal biking distance record of 48 miles.   I was almost run over by a huge tractor that was pulling an even wider trailer down the tiny road.  I'm glad I didn't know exactly how close this call was, because I may not have gotten back on my bike.  Let's just say, some kind of divine intervention kept me from being crushed by those enormous wheels that brushed my elbow!!  

Quick stop to look around Schoonhoven.

We gave Schoonhoven a cursory glance and set off for our hotel in Bergambacht.  Even though this hotel is simply a stopover place en route to our next destination and certainly nothing special, it sure was a sight for sore butts.  The most special thing about this hotel was the gorgeous windmill standing out front, which we will tour tomorrow morning.  We rolled in just in time for the cheese factory tour and had to go in our biking clothes.  I was beyond tired, but not wanting to miss anything ... I went on the tour.

Inked explains the cheese making process.

Jongenhoeve Farm, is a small but well known cheese maker in the area.  The Farmer's wife and head cheese maker, Ineke de Jong, gave us a tour of the farm and shared the inner workings of a cheese factory.  This is a job that NOBODY should ever fear me applying for.  This poor woman has not had a vacation day in years.  365 days a year with no break!!  Ugh!!

Buying Cheese

She gets up in the morning, the cows are milked, the milk goes into a huge vat and the cheese making process begins.  After working to make cheese all day, she also runs a small shop selling her cheese to the public, but most of it is sold commercially.  We bought lots of cheese.  

Inked receives her first 500 Euro.

Susie was trying to pay with a 500 Euro bill.  Ineke had never even seen a 500 Euro.  She wasn't sure she had enough change for Susie, so we just started buying more cheese.  Finally, we bought enough cheese that Ineke could give us change and we were off for dinner at the hotel.

Dinner was great, we were tired and went to bed shortly thereafter.   

Until then, I'm signing off for the night.