Gouda and the Kinderdijk Ride

On Monday - the last day of a wonderful four day holiday weekend - our four travelers (Pam, Tony, Laura, and I) woke up bright and early to catch the train from Utrecht to Gouda. The bike rental shop in the Gouda train station served as our starting and ending location for a 62 km (38 mi), one day bike ride into the Dutch countryside and through the village of Kinderdijk. Pam and Tony, who had been training for this day, are seen below negotiating one of the many bridges on the ride.

As an aside, because I know you're wondering: yes, Gouda is indeed the home of the famous cheese. Just don't pronounce it Goo-da in front of a Dutch person or they will laugh at you - it's actually pronounced How-da.

The ride featured much of the usual Dutch scenery: long green grass as far as the eye can see, canals everywhere, islands of farmland filled with animals, and trees cut in bizarre ways. The lambs were a treat for Laura yet again, and we also saw many nesting coots and swans.

During our ride, we took two ferries across the Lek River, which were fun (and surprisingly efficient). Here I am with my bike on one of the ferry rides.

Throughout the ride we were treated to the sight of windmills - I believe more than 30 overall - but the main event was the 19 of them situated in a 2 km stretch near the Dutch village of Kinderdijk. This area contains more windmills than any other place in the world, was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997, and is absolutely magnificent. The windmills - or molen - are from the 18th century and were used for keeping water out of the polders until as recently as 1950. Although not in use today, they're well-maintained and can still be operated.

The end of our ride took us through another extended area of farm land, where we saw a farmer shearing an entire flock of sheep (and the resulting enormous pile of wool). Laura was particularly excited when we came upon a herd of Highland cows because she saw a lot of them last week in their home country of Scotland (Scotland stories coming next week). These are the only ones we have seen here in The Netherlands.

A bike ride in the Kinderdijk area is a must do activity in The Netherlands and we thoroughly enjoyed it. After riding 61 km, though, we were all beat, sore in the rear, and glad to trade our bikes for a train ride from Gouda back to Delft.

Posted by Matt

Bike Ride to Keukenhof

Last Friday - the start of a four day Easter holiday weekend (wohoo!) - Laura and I planned to revisit the Keukenhof Gardens. As you may recall, Keukenhof is the Dutch flower "amusement park" and according to them, the most photographed place in the world. We had originally intended to visit the park and bike around its immediate vicinity with the hope of seeing the tulip fields in bloom. However, when we saw the weather report (70°F and sunny!) we decided we had to really maximize our time outdoors.

And so it was that at about 10 am on Friday morning, we set off on a 45 km (27 mi) bike ride from Delft to Keukenhof. The journey took us up a main canal out of town ("Delftse Vliet"), through Leiden, and on to Lisse, the home of Keukenhof.

The entire ride from Delft to Leiden was full of really great scenery. We rode through Leidschendam, a very picturesque Dutch city (as almost all of them are) situated at a particularly wide part of the canal we followed from Delft. Here you see a picture of a traditional Dutch windmill overlooking the canal - here I believe called "Trekvliet" or "Zuidvliet" - and the city of Leidschendam.


We also had the pleasure of riding past many farms and seeing all of the newborn animals. Laura's favorites are the lambs, whose bleeting instantaneously turns her into baby-talking mush. At one stop, a baby lamb chewed on Laura's fingers through a fence while the amused farmer watched - unbeknownst to us at the time - from a higher vantage point while working on his boat.


When we did arrive at Keukenhof, we were not disappointed! The blooms have really started popping since we first visited 3 weeks ago. Below Laura is standing in a field of daffodils, which are everywhere in the Netherlands right now.



On our ride to Keukenhof, we saw many fields of blooming daffodils and hyacinths. The tulip fields in the Dutch countryside are - for the most part - not yet blooming (though they are getting close). Somehow, though, Keukenhof has a field of tulips blooming already; we took the picture below from a windmill platform on the Keukenhof grounds. Soon, the Dutch countryside will look like this all over.



We thoroughly enjoyed our return visit to Keukenhof and were there almost until the park closed. Unfortunately, we had to get back on the saddle for the 45 km ride back to Delft, but we were pleased to have exhausted all of the sunlight the day had to offer.

You can see Laura's pictures from this visit to Keukenhof or look at the ones from the previous visit if you like.

Posted by Matt