Saturday Aug. 31 - Train to Bourg-en-Bresse, France

Deb here. Saturday morning we packed up, said our goodbyes to the crew and then walked our luggage to the ferry back to Central Station. Teri, Ralph, Nancy and Greg were all flying home on the same 2:30 pm flight to Boston, so their plan was to stash their luggage on the boat for a while and walk to a nearby farmers market. We said our goodbyes to the gang at the ferry dock and made our way across the water
to the train station. We quickly found which platform we’d be leaving from, and decided to sit in a coffee shop until closer to our departure time.

Our train left like clockwork at 11:08 am, bound for Paris, where we had to switch train stations to catch our next train to Bourg-en-Bresse. All was going well until the train had a couple of delays, meaning that instead of 1.5 hours to find our next train in Paris we’d only have less than an hour. Our train from Amsterdam made several stops along the way and was packed, with people standing in the aisles, by the time we reached Paris.

We hustled off our train and quickly found the metro we needed to board to transfer from Gare Paris Nord (where we arrived) to Gare de Lyon (where we needed to go). There was quite a queue to buy metro tickets, but thankfully each self-serve ticket station had a helper next to it, taking charge of what we needed.

We jumped on the metro and made it to Gare de Lyon with 15 minutes to spare. This train was much less crowded and had a great cafe car. It was another double decker train and achieved a speed of close to 200 mph. Very comfortable.

By 6:15 we were in Bourg-en-Bresse, where I’d made a hotel reservation to split up our journey to Leysin. It was super hot when we arrived, and with a 20 minute walk to our hotel (Logis de Brou) we were drenched in sweat by the time we checked in! It was a lovely hotel and we enjoyed the AC in our room. We later walked to dinner and had a wonderful meal at Restaurant L’Authentique, with a croque monsieur and salad for me and a burger and salad for John. 

After dinner we walked back to the hotel and crashed for the night.

Sunday Aug. 25 thru Saturday Aug 31, 2024 One week Boat Bike Tour

I’ll try to summarize the entire week since each day had the same schedule of breakfast, riding the bikes all day, evening meeting about the next day's ride, dinner and sleep. And man did we sleep well!

Each evening before dinner, each of the three groups (English, German, Dutch) had a meeting to go over the next day's ride. The first day everything was new. The bikes, the traffic rules, etc. We got to meet the entire crew the first night. They do this week after week and they see a new batch of 50-60 people each week. Olga was our boss and if anything needed attention, Olga could help out. Every day we rode about 50km. Nancy added it all up and we rode the bikes 201 miles over the 6 days we rode, about 33.5 miles per day. The Netherlands treats bike riders with immense respect and bikes usually have the right of way. They have bike specific trails all over the country and most citizens really use their bikes. And year round especially with the climate warming. They all said there really was no snow any more and the canals no longer freeze for skating. So you can bike all year. The bike lanes are wide enough for bikes to whiz by each other and some allow cars and scooters if they are wide enough, with the bikes having priority and a low speed limit. And every age group could be seen riding their bikes. A lot of retired age folks ride their bikes everywhere. And ⅔ of the bikes you see are e-bikes with battery assist.

Each night after the three group meetings we all sit at tables with folks that speak the same language. Most everyone was pretty tired each night so after dinner (6-7pm) we went below and collapsed, except for the nights when we ventured in to explore the towns.

Each morning breakfast was at 7:30 and they left bread and sandwich fixings out so you could pack a lunch. Big buffet layout with several breads, cheeses, meat, eggs, sausage, fruit, yogurt, cereal and pots of coffee and tea water. After breakfast you get on the bikes and turn on the Ride with GPS app and it gives you turn by turn instructions and a map so it is very hard to get lost, although we did get misplaced on a few occasions. While we are biking, the boat gets moved to the next evening's stop where we will meet it.

There are several ferry crossings, many very old small towns where we stop for coffee, tea or the occasional herring. Some museums some days, or windmills or old pumping stations. Fortunately, most people here speak very good English. One fellow told us that their English is so good because “Dutch is not a very popular language”.

And everything is very old. Buildings from the 1600’s are not uncommon to find in the small towns we pedal through. Our cell phones work everywhere, and you use your credit card to pay for almost everything. They are very modern compared to the USA in that regard.

We would get to the boat around 3-4 pm, grab a coffee and a small cake treat of some kind and relax on the deck until the evening meeting. Eat dinner and collapse.

The last day we overlap with the incoming group and we put our bags on deck before breakfast so the crew can clean the rooms.

After breakfast we get our bags, say our goodbyes and then leave the boat.

Saturday Aug 24, 2024 To the boat

Our last breakfast at the Element Amsterdam and headed for Central station. We have gotten pretty good at using Google Maps and the transit system. And the buses, trams and metro all run like clockwork. The boat folks (De Nassau) let us leave our luggage on the boat, then back across the free ferry and found the tulip museum. Tulips actually originated in Turkey and somewhere along the way the Dutch decided they were going to grow all the tulips in the world. It is big ag with lots of big equipment planting and harvesting the tulip bulbs. The bulbs are what it’s all about, not so much the tulips, since they chop the flowers off to ensure bigger stronger bulbs.

We walked through the Saturday farmers market and picked up some food for lunch, and then back to the boat where we got checked in. A woman named Olga is our fearless leader. She is 67 and very athletic. She rides every day on the bikes and is a native of Holland. This is her 6th week in a row doing this and we saw her a few times a day checking in to make sure that nobody gets too lost or has any bike issues. She’s a lot of fun and the perfect person to do this job. 

We had three basic groups. Americans, which was us and a couple from Boulder, Colorado, the Canadians, which was a group of 4 siblings and their partners, and then the Germans and Dutch, which was the largest group. We got to know the Canadians over the weeks but not so much the Germans and Dutch, mostly due to the language thing. There were 60-65 people in all and I counted 56-58 bikes going out every day. A few people brought their own bikes but most of us used the Azor bikes which are good solid Netherland bikes. Ralph and Nancy decided not to get the e-bike version and the rest of us did. They are all identical with Shimano brand gears and electronics. We had no problems with the bikes all week. Nancy, who is fairly short, upgraded to a normal sized bike later in the week from the smaller one they fitted her with. 

Friday Aug 23, 2024 Amsterdam museums part two

Friday morning it was breakfast at the hotel and then off on a long tram and bus trip to a working windmill and museum called the Molten Van Stolen Windmill. It was a real pumping windmill with a screw that augered water from a lower level to a higher level. They used these all over Holland to keep their feet dry. They were eventually replaced by steam powered and then electric pumps, but these windmills were the workhorses for a long long time.

Next stop was to find some herring. Ralph and I bought raw herring samdwiches (hot dog rolls with a fish in it and pickles and onions) which is a local delicacy. The less brave got deep fried codfish bites. Ralph and I had cat breath the rest of the day.

We next bumped into the flower market where you can buy flowers, but mostly you can buy bulbs. They advertise the ones you can ship to Canada and the US so I guess they keep a careful eye on what gets shipped where.

Next stop was the Nemo Science Center which is a 5 story glass and concrete playgound for aspiring scientists. The place was wall to wall with families and children learning about any kind of science you can think of. They are creating the next generation of young scientists for sure. Well done.

After Nemo, we were on to something called “The Holland Experience”. This is another modern iMax kind of building with a “5D” ride across Holland. Kind of a Disney World experience with you strapped in a seat and thrown around a room with 360 degrees movie screens rolling out in front of you. And they spray water in your lap when you dive into the water below and a light mist as you fly though the clouds. Very cool.

Teri had made us dinner reservations in the rotating restaurant called Moon, which steadily rotates to give you a view of Amsterdam while they serve you dinner.

Last stop was our daredevils, Terri and Ralph, who got on the swings on top of the restaurant and swung back and forth over the edge of the building. Yikes.

Then it was back to the hotel and sleep 

Thursday Aug 22, 2024 Amsterdam museums

We had breakfast at the hotel which was very good. The usual adjustment to buying Euro coffee. Flat White or Americano usually get you close to what we drink back home.

First museum was the Rijksmuseum which is huge and covers Dutch history and art. Each section represents a different century and after leaving we had the sense that they are pretty proud of the 17th century and the others were so so.

Next stop was Museum of the Canals which we think was our favorite. It covered the history of the development of the city including all the dikes and pumping to be able to live below sea level. Anybody can build cities on dry ground so the Dutch decided to build below sea level. Hence all the windmills and water pumps and dikes.

Next museum was Our Lord in the Attic. Amsterdam started Catholic and then the government decided it would allow any religion as long as you kept it to yourself. So everyone held church services in private homes. This guy created a good sized Catholic Church on the upper floor of his house complete with pews and alters and even a pipe organ. It was big. Very tolerant folks when religion was concerned.

Next stop was the Botanical Gardens and dinner in the adjacent restaurant. We were all pretty tired by then so it was back to the hotel and bed.

Tuesday (or is it Wednesday), Aug 20, 2024 Bisbee to Amsterdam NL

 Our flight leaves at 9:30 am so we did not have to get up crazy early. It’s 1.5 hrs to Tucson so we left the house about 6 am. We are using a new cheaper parking lot which turned out to be as easy as the one we usually use. And it had shaded parking spots.

Flight to Dallas was on time and only a couple of hours. Flight to Amsterdam was 9 hours or so, which meant about 3 movies worth. We had one meal in flight and a wakeup snack. We did not get much if any sleep.Amsterdam is 9 hours earlier than Bisbee, so we basically lost a whole day. Left on Tuesday morning and arrived Wednesday morning. We met Ralph, Teri, Nancy and Greg at the baggage claim. Teri had arranged a van to pick us all up and we were taken to our hotel to drop off our bags. Our rooms were ready early so we all checked in. Next task was to get to Central Station so we took a tram which accepted our credit cards. Tap your Visa card to get on and tap to get off. How easy can it get?! Teri found these iAmsterdam passes which were fantastic. For 100 euros (111 dollars) you can ride on any bus or tram or metro and get into most every museum and attraction for 72 hours. We picked them up at Central Station and then started our tour not by getting some sleep but by going full bore until the night came.

We did a walking tour of the Jewish quarter with a woman from eastern Europe who walked really fast and for a couple of hours we learned about the 120,000 Jews killed in WW2.

Next was the Houseboat Museum, which was on a houseboat of course. Amsterdam is all about canals and the canals all have houseboats parked everywhere. It used to be a cool cheap way to afford to live in Amsterdam but now it’s an expensive but still cool way to live in Amsterdam.

Next was to find our way back via the trams and buses to the hotel and then have dinner in Papa Hemingway's restaurant, which is attached to the hotel. We were all zombies by then but it was the smart way to avoid jet lag.