Wednesday August 21, Steenderen

Country roads

Such a beautiful morning, clear sky and the river was very calm, although there was a never ending passing of boats. Our neighbour put me onto an app “Marine traffic” where you can follow all the boats that are going past and find out where they are coming from and going to and other information. Guess it’s a bit like “train spotting”, but rather fascinating.

Before Ian packed the bikes away I very happily popped up to the store on my bike for some bread,  a good start to the day as riding my bike always puts a smile on my face.

We needed to empty our toilet cassette this morning which wasn’t on the site but near by, and we made several failed attempts to find the spot and after several drives around Tolkamer we eventually got there. Dutch villages can have quite narrow roads and we have been caught before so are always wary as to where we drive.

Today we first headed to the town of Winterswijk where Hitten told us about Obelink, a huge store devoted to camping and camping supplies. What a place, just huge and crowds everywhere, and the parking area is also huge with many, many motorhomes. They stock everything you could possibly want for life on the road, and plenty of things you never thought about! Ended up with a few things in our basket!

By the time we left it was mid afternoon and had spotted a place on a river about 40 minutes drive, but arrived to find it was full. Continued onto another one, but it was a campground that was full of caravans and tents and crowds of people, not at all our scene. Third time lucky with this rather lovely spot in the middle of a farm and big grassy sites to camp on. Perfect.

We have driven through some wonderful farm land today, this is dairy country with huge barns and many of the cows are grazing outside. As always in Holland everything is so neat and tidy, the houses have a distinctive look with dark mottled bricks and black shutters. And always wonderful gardens.

When I looked at my photos tonight realised I must be nearing the end of my holiday as very few, popped out as the sun was setting to the neighbours field of mown hay.

Rural views tonight