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May 25 Thursday rain all day Bicycle touring Holland Inside bicycle touring Holland day. Poured throughout the night. Extremely overcast this morning. At 5 AM it started to thunder and soon the storm drummed down. Lightning flashed brightly inside our little bicycle touring tent. Things forgotten and then remembered: One precocious little brown bird would fly to my face and try to hover. I held out some bread in my fingers and the little bird would fly up and take it. She couldn't hover and take it at the same time though, so I would feel her tiny feet as she momentarily perched on my fingertips. It kind of tickled my fingers -- and my soul. Just one of the wonders of bicycle touring when one is out there takes the time to interact with nature. Lovely. I saw a small girl carrying a good-natured cat by its armpits. The cat had all four paws stuck straight out -- obviously enjoying itself immensely -- just like the cat and the monstrous little girl in the Saturday morning Tiny Tunes cartoons. Yesterday, we waited out the worst of the rainstorm in a bus shelter. Near the end of the storm it rained so hard the pumps they have in the sewers (since we are below sea level, as you can probably imagine, things don't drain too quickly) couldn't keep up. Muddy water accumulated along the curb. We had waited 45 minutes in the bus shelter without being splashed by passing vehicles. Then, just before we get set to cycle off on our touring bicycles, two cars in a row hit the standing curb water and totally soaked us. An all-out drenching. I may not have been any drier if I had ridden in the rainstorm, but I certainly would have been cleaner. Have you ever noticed black and white cows look like modern art if you look at them real close-up. Met a couple out cycling on the bike path (strange, that, eh?). He was 62; she said she was 60. He asked Sharon and I if we were students. "No," I replied. "We're teachers." (Sharon is actually a Chartered Accountant, but she has her Education Degree as well, although she's only done student teaching for her practicum.) "How old are you?" he asks with a perplexed expression on his face. "Sixteen or 17?" My goodness, all this fresh air from bicycle touring must be making us look very youthful. I ask him if he is 26. Last night, a girl cycling past stopped to assist us with directions on our Dutch bicycle tour. We wanted the road through the forest where we planned to wild camp. A youth hostel was on the map for the same road. We pointed to the Youth Hostel and said we wanted to go there. (We rarely tell people we camp in the woods as it usually doesn't compute well and we receive several admonishments about "bad people" running amok through the forest.) Not to mention the fact that we've been told it's illegal to free camp in Holland. But this girl said, "The Youth Hostel? That's stupid. Oh, well. You'll have fun." Sharon thinks she meant it was stupid for us to stay at a Dutch youth hostel when there are so many woods around. I think maybe she thought youth hostels were bad places to stay since so many bad people run amok through them. Pentecost is today. It's a holiday and everything is closed. Good thing we stocked up on food yesterday. Saw a bunch of Canada flags outside a hardware store with a sale sign reading "We've gone Canadian!" Bicycle touring in Holland sure does bring some surprises for us Canadian cycle tourists! |
