Saturday, November 7, 2009

Day 4: Dreams, Deventer and Planning

Frans wrote:

7 Nov '09: We all had somewhat of a lay in this morning, we're obviously getting used to the time difference and as we had not planned to travel far today all of us woke up quite relaxed, I think.

After some breakfast and Tai Chi (by Karen only) we headed off to Deventer where we were going to visit the local market http://www.deventer-markten.nl/ that is held there on Saturdays.
We seem to develop some sort of a routine as soon as we get into the car and on our way because for a second morning in a row Karen enquired about each others dreams: 'Did anyone dream last night?', 'Can't remember', says Maxine, 'Me neither' says Evonka and I'm saying nothing but am thinking 'I know where this is leading and noone is going to psycho-analyze this little Dutchman'... 'Frans?' the question is asked again... 'no way it ain't happening...' .. 'No I can't remember either', I reply.....'some things will remain firmly locked away between my ears.... Evonne then started to tell about a dream where she dreamt she was abducted by Aliens but she came back! ....I just couldn't resist that one:..... 'So even the bloody aliens wouldn't have you Evonne?'

... I better be careful with my smart remarks, for some reason she 's always sitting right behind me and a clout around the ears might not be too far away.....


After squeezing the Merc in a tight spot on a parking place in Deventer we wondered towards the markets but yet again this dreaded shopping monster raised its ugly head. The Ladies discovered this leather shoe/handbag/etc. shop and managed to dissapear into it for at least an hour. After wondering into the shop myself to kindly enquire if we were going to have lunch there I came upon the remnants of what looked like a complete Battle of the Boot War strewn over the shop's floor. After some more haggling and arbitrating between the Shop assistants and my fellow travellers over the concept on how to apply a discount we finally left the shop with each of my travelling partners a pair of leather boots richer.....


The market stalls were a great experience for Evonne and Karen, besides sampling plenty of the fresh wares on offer like 'Kibbeling', Cheeses, 'Stroopwafels' and Sausages they engaged in a conversation with a Dutch Lady who was letting them sample some of the special cakes and quiches she had baked to celebrate one of the stall holder's anniversary of 10 years on the job.

After completing our tour of the markets and around the center of Deventer we got back to the car only to find that our tight spot had become really tight and the slimmest of all of us had to drive the car out of it as I certainly could not get into the car... thanks Karen!


After retrieving our car we visited another working windmill nearby. At least this one was open to the public to view and although it wasn't actually being used as a sawmill because there was no timber to saw, the visit was a lot better then yesterday's effort at Kinderdijk.

From the sawmill we drove on the dyke alongside the river Ijssel and we stopped at a local garden center to view the rich assortment of Christmas articles that have already appeared in the shops here in Holland. We had a snack and Evonne in particular has acquired a tatse for Dutch croquetten which is a typical local fast food delicacy. You just wait until I get you to try a fricandel Evonka, they're irresistable....

We arrived home early for a change which was just as well as everybody was becoming a bit tired. I guess the jetlag and time difference has to catch up sooner or later. We spend some time behind the laptop looking for some decent and affordable accommodation in and around Bruge, Belgium for tomorrow as that will be our first stop on our Europe trip. After some consideration where everyone voiced their personal preferences to the style of accommodation we finally settled on staying one night at 'Het Pannenhuis' in Bruge. http://www.pannenhuis.be/

After seeing that it probably would be beneficial to plan a little more ahead to ensure we will be able to get accommodation in the places we want to stop and stay I put a bit more effort into our planning for the coming days and produced a bit of a route we'll be following. My intention is to update this route each evening and post it on the blog so the homefront can closely follow where we intend to travel to. The yellow markers indicate our planned route for the next few days, the purple line shows our planned route for tomorrow.....


2 comments:

  1. Women and shoes... I know...
    Are you already tired of shopping, Frans?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I hope you have left some shoes and boots for me when I go to Holland in December...

    ReplyDelete