May | 2017 | European Adventures

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Have you ever heard someone speak English and thought to yourself,”I have no idea what on earth they just said. Not a clue!”? Maybe you had a cold and your ears were blocked, maybe the TV was on and you didn’t quite catch the words. Or maybe it wasn’t what you expected to hear or the speaker wasn’t a native English speaker. Whatever the case, particularly if you are married, I’m sure you can relate!
My cousins Sue and Andrew (Aussies) live in Ilkley, an idyllic village in the north of England. It is famous for the broad hills and winding valleys of the Ilkley Moors, part of the larger area of the Yorkshire Dales. And there lies our language problem. Yorkshire. The nicest people, in the nicest part of England, speak the worst of the Queens language. Having just come through the middle of Europe, we had better sign language exchanges than some of the efforts in Yorkshire!
For instance, we happened across a lovely gentleman in York, once the seat of English royalty. We were struggling to find our bearings and he hobbled across to us and mumbled what we thought was a friendly greeting. We smiled and responded with a bright hello. He then repeated what he said before. I knew this because the pattern and tune of his sentence were the same. That’s right, the tune. It wasn’t a greeting, he was asking where we were trying to get to! It took some effort to detach the ‘music’ from the ‘lyrics’ but we got there in the end. What a remarkably nice man, but I was wishing for subtitles!
We love Yorkshire, having been to Sue and Andrew’s previously on our first European adventure in 2013. In a tangible sense it’s like stopping off home for a bit of a recharge, not that it’s at all like Perth or Freo. Apart from being with family, somewhere in the depths of our being our heritage calls and we relax in the company of the similar, both relational and cultural. For those of you who have visited countries of distant family origin, I’m sure you understand.

There is so much history, triumphant, humourous and disturbing, in Yorkshire. We explored York on Easter Sunday, finishing with the Evensong at York Minster. The grandeur, choir, pipe organ, and religious pomp and ceremony made it an unforgettable Easter. And the message too! Revelation 1, John’s vision of the glorified Christ, delivered by the Venerable David Butterfield, Canon Residentiary, who spoke not just from the Book, but also the heart. A fellow brother indeed.

York Train Station

Standing on the York City wall with Sue. Built in Roman times, 3.4km of it still stands.

The Shambles, an area of medieval streets in York with overhanging half-timbered houses.

York Minster

Choir practice before the Evensong Service.

We also spent some time in Skipton, a very scenic historic market town, and drove out to Windemere in the Lakes District. What a treat! The scenery of dense forest surrounding Victorian villages, perched around sparkling expansive lakes was surprisingly English! I expected bare hills and pastie-skinned locals both ensconced around a muddy ‘ole in ground. I found the aforementioned locals but the wooded hills were radiant in the new shoots of Spring, and the clear, deep lakes were inviting for all manner of water sports. It would be a great place for a summer holiday, something we would love to try when we come back again….

Canal in Skipton. Our European boat ride next time!

Next to St Oswald’s Church Ambleside, where William Wordsworth is buried.

Lunch at The Flying Pig in Bowness-on-Windemere.

Now that got your attention, didn’t it!! Sorry to disappoint, but this is a blog entry about Holland, or more correctly these days, The Netherlands. The Dutch name translates to “The Low Lands”, which is how you can then get to The Nether Regions. Jokes a-plenty!!

Day break saw us leave the Rhine and make our way towards Amsterdam on a broad canal. This is the shipping equivalent of the autobahns, with river ships racing past each other at, well, speed in a sense. It’s not what you call break neck speed though. The difficulties arise from the sheer size of a lot of them, and the narrowness of the canal.

I was riding in the wheelhouse with Captain Janos, and he was radioed by the captain of the following ship that we were going to be overtaken by him. Capt Janos dropped a few kms/hr and told me that a lot of these captains have been born on the ships, lived their whole life on them, and are now young men captaining their own ship. They sit in their seat watching TV, drinking vodka, and powering along at 25km/hr (we were doing 18 in a 20 zone) with scant regard for anyone else. So we watched in slow motion as the barge pulled out from behind to overtake us. The AmaReina is 135m long with the wheelhouse positioned about 25m from the bow. The barge was about 60m long with the wheelhouse at the back. That means that the barge captain must decide to pass us when he is more than 200m behind the bow of our ship. 200m at 7km/hr faster will take nearly 2mins to overtake us! And while he’s doing this, another barge comes round the corner in the opposite direction, in the middle of the canal, with his feet up, watching TV, drinking vodka! Now I’m concerned, so I get out my phone to record the carnage!! At the last moment, the oncoming ship veers right and we pass 3 abreast with less than 5m between each ship. Even Marion, conducting an excursion briefing in the lounge expressed her alarm! Capt Janos just shook his head. “F%&@$ idyots!”, he muttered. I wholeheartedly agreed!

Don’t let anyone tell you different. Amsterdam is beautiful. The canals, the architecture, the bikes… the bikes!! Those people on their bikes are pedestrian killers. Seriously, the last thing you would hear before entering through the Pearly Gates would be a bike bell sounding an ever-so-sweet alert… of your immediate demise! Beware the Dutch bike!! Sorry, I was saying how beautiful the city was and was momentarily sidetracked by fearful memories!

Beware the bike!

We docked at lunchtime and then took a canal boat tour. The city is criss-crossed by an enormous network of canals. Tree-lined streets front Victorian era apartments that often used to be stately homes (now subdivided), or shipping warehouses complete with winch and hook still hanging seemingly disused over the top of the houses. However, they have a modern day use. How better to move furniture and large household items in and out of a narrow 3-4 floor apartment!

Old barges have also been converted into houseboats and line many of the canals. Just as you own the land that your house sits on, so Dutch law states that these houseboat owners own the water that their craft occupies. With so many houseboats now on the canals, they’ve stopped approving any more as there is already congestion problems with private, tourist and taxi boats.

Disembarkation. Such a thought had remained suppressed throughout our cruise but was now a looming reality. The final night on board for most was a passive, somewhat sombre time of reflective sitting, packing, sleeping, and coughing up a lung! There was nothing left for wild partying. We were done!

APT supplied us with a luxury car to the airport where the driver also kindly escorted us through the unknown of Schipol to the luggage storage lockers. Our flight to Manchester was late afternoon so we had purchased tickets to a Dutch spring time must see. The tulip gardens of Keurkenhof.

I never knew there were so many colours in flowers, let alone one type! Tulips are so varied, and what we saw blew our minds! Every way we looked was another photo opportunity, and that’s how we started. However, it quickly became clear that we needed to simply enjoy the exquisitely manicured visual feast and snap the highlights.