Hotel Dordrecht

So this is an incomplete version of events with no pictures while I am using up time in an internet café - I will update it when I can.

Revellers coming into the dorm at 3.30am made for another disturbed nights sleep so I decided not to rush myself out in the morning. Had breakfast and prepared stuff for check out at 10.30...

Not quite well enough as it turned out - it was 11.20 by the time I finally handed back the key cards - this was primarily due to trying ...

... hours with my host Nai and the italian guy he's also hosting (which I'm not a fan of). Nai is super nice but the Italian guy is a bit weird. It's all good, just not a fan..

Tomorrow afternoon I should be heading into Amsterdam.. Hopefully it won't be raining quite so much there.

... next bus wasn't for another half an hour. The lady in the bus station was really helpful, and gave me timetables - in which I annoyingly discovered I could have got the number 90 bus from Rotterdam, straight to Kinderdijk! Ah well, live & learn.

I decided to have a wander around Dordrecht since I was there, and I found it quite a dismal wee place to be honest! I took some photos ...

... a few songs at night when they put their shoes out ! On his actual birthday 5th December if the children are luck enough - as we were , some black petes will come & hand deliver the presents that St Nicholas has been making ( in the toy shop you can go & visit in town) and each child will also get a poem, about what hes been doing during the past year ! We suppose that this is where our santa claus came from ? After Sinterklaas , everyone ...

... everywhere and ryan is absolutly mental for the raw Herring and the cheap beer ! Ryan has joined the local rugby union team , although he'll miss the first few games as we'll be at the world cup ! We also bought a little red rover which we are hoping will take us away to the rugby and on weekends to germany, belgium and beyond ! I did tell someone that we wont be going home until weve totally masted ...

... the eye could see, beautiful blue sky, hardly any clouds at all, just the lovely North Sea stretching into the distance. After lunch, it was time for the big adventure - Maggie had arranged for surfing lessons for three (fool?)hardy souls, so we started walking down the beach towards the "school." Two of the three victims - my 57-year-old father and Alex - started looking distinctly nervous about the prospect of hurling themselves into the frigid North ...

... beautiful) gardens. We have also been to Gouda a lovely quaint town where Gouda cheese originated from - of course we came back with a good stash of cheese . Last weekend we went for a 25km bike ride through the National Park near our home over numerous dykes and rivers. It will be no surprise to tell you that there is a lot of water in Holland. Sitting here on the computer i am looking out onto a lovely big square pond complete with ducks, water hen and fish ...

On Easter we set out on another of our marathon bike rides (marathon for us at least!) - we had hoped to complete a 30 mile (roundtrip) expedition to Haarlem where we had planned on going to the Frans Hals Museum. We had also wanted to bike south of Haarlem through some of the bulb fields that we had seen before. We were using our GPS system to guide us and also following the red bike path to Haarlem (red paths are the fastest bike ...

... body, and the last meal you ate sheepishly assessing its options inside your tossed-about gut. Good times. With excited anticipation, i awaited the return to good old fashioned roller coastery fun and the chance to act like a complete child once again. Truth be told, i failed to rise at the designated hour of 8am this morning, getting shaken awake by Sanna who sternly informed me that i needed to get my bum out of bed quick smart for a day of wild action. At this ...

... een beetje in de stemmming te komen, dachten we: gooi je haar los en doe eens gek. Daarom hebben we nog één geinig tussendoortje nu al vastgelegd. Op 18 december -we zijn dan toch in de buurt - stappen wij in het Argentijnse Ushuaia aan boord van het gelijknamige expeditieschip, dat ons naar een heel bijzondere plek op aarde brengt: Antarctica. Veel lees- en kijkplezier! Hasta luego