What an achievement!

Wednesday 2nd October 2024. National Complement Day.

Utrecht to Dordrecht – 60km.

Dordrecht was another suggestion of Henk who I met in the Czech Republic. I decided to go there rather than Gouda, which as we know is a fairly rubbery cheese with holes in it. Thank you Henk….my compliments to you and your family.

The weather was just about dry but grey and cool. The good news is that it shouldn’t rain again on my trip and the wind was mainly behind me. I covered the ground quickly.

I stopped around halfway at Schoonhoven which is on the river Lek, which is also a branch of the Rijn, or Rhine.

It was a pretty place with a canal down the centre and a martket in progress.

The remainder of the journey flew past. It didn’t feel like I had done any cycling because it was so easy.

On this section of the ride I passed the 2000km mark.

Surprisingly, I hadn’t seen many windmills so far but that changed all of a sudden. There were several windmills in the fields which I now know are windmills that just manage the water levels. Then when entering Dordrecht I came to this one….

I saw it was open for visits (which is usually at weekends and, luckily, Wednesday afternoons). It is still a working mill too. For 2.5 euros I got a private one hour tour from another Henk. I got the full tour, I think I am a fully qualified Miller now! It was extremely interesting….and I got to the 9th floor too. There were ‘real’ Millers actually working! Packing up as it happens but they had been in full operation. Sadly, I missed the sails going around but I wouldn’t have been allowed on the platform otherwise.

I told Henk, “I saw a mouse”, he said “Where”, I said “There on the stair, a little mouse with clogs on”. He said “Well I declare, going clip-clippetty clop on the stairs”.

Joking aside, Henk was really informative. I gave him glowing compliments….on this day especially.

I moved on into the city and got to my accommodation. It turned out to be another shoebox. It’s OK for sleeping but not so good for eating your own food or socialising.

I went into the city and thought it was wonderful. It is supposedly the oldest city in Holland. We can see Rotterdam skyscrapers in the distance.

The city seemed so quiet after being at Utrecht, maybe it was half-day closing on a Wednesday but that didn’t detract from its beauty.

I went to look for food and then put my feet up after competing my personal marathon of cycling. A short hop into Rotterdam tomorrow for a couple of days before my ferry back.