Travelicious Times

  That's what I had for lunch in the local town.  And Mike's now famous "old cheese roll" is hidden there at the back.  We have had hours of fun and laughter about Mike's lunch.  It was shit. And so was mine.  Cody's was ok.  And there was no food for Roses.  But never fear - a visit to the supermarket (that included lollies, chocolate, chips, Fanta, and pancake mix - both gf and normal) made everything better! Let me go back a step.   We woke up to pouring rain this morning, and then our we-plan-as-we-go fell a bit to pieces today.  We tried to find a trekking hut or cabin for the tonight about 25km south, but it's the long weekend here, and nothing was available.  Luckily, the nice people here in our palace let us stay here again tonight - so we had a day of washing clothes, shopping, watching movies, laughing, eating - and I made another spag bol for dinner.  YUM YUM.   We have a new plan for tomorrow and a trekkin...

  Our cabin in Leiden Hello there race fans.  I'm knackered.  Tough day. We are currently holed up in the most salubrious accommodation so far - there were no trekking cabins available where we are tonight (7km out of Gouda), so we got upgraded to a "chalet" - where we actually have our own bathroom and a sink, and for the first time ever...A TV!!  We are currently sitting on a SOFA (OMG the luxury), and watching Dante's Peak, after some home made spag bol and salad for dinner.   We are all tired.  Today was a tough 33km  - we left our cabin in Leiden (cutest cabin and campsite) this morning in 2C coldness, though the sun was shining for the first time, around 9am headed for Gouda, and then a bit beyond to this campsite.  We set off after an easy day yesterday of only around 12km and a really good night's sleep, so thought we'd be in power mode...but alas, the cold, the headwind that was with us the whole way, had us pretty knackered by the t...

50km of riding.   Head wind, rain, snow, sun, a Formula 1 track and billions of tulips. Two dreams realised. A big day for the Hamster Jams. We headed off from our little hut (after taking 2 hours to pack up and get on the bikes), and followed bike paths through the old town of Harlem (unbelievably cute)... And then to to Zandvoort.  Cody had a dream.  To see the Formula 1 track at Zandvoort.  So off we went - we'd done a weather check before leaving, and were informed that there would be patches of cloud and sun all day, so though it was 7 degrees and we were all rugged up, we were feeling pretty confident of a pretty comfy ride. It started after Harlem on the way to the beach (Zandvoort is a beach side town)...the head wind.  OMG, "bracing is an understatement".  Poor Roses, this was her first headwind.  We must have been doing about 4km/hr at one point as we're heading up hill with the wind almost blowing us over...and then the rain hit.  For s...