Day Five

Today was absolutely awesome. I broke down camp this morning and tried to get a close up of this lady bug with white spots instead of the black I am so used to seeing at home.

Camp Opertje is right on the water, and I took this shot last night right outside the campsite. I was a little confused about how to get to the bikepath that would lead me to my first dijk crossing, but asking around, I found the appropriate bike path started right at the entrance to the campsite. Many of my pictures are of the beautiful Fietspadden, that narrow strip of pavement that leads me through this awesome land.

The Netherlands is pretty flat, but you still have to climb once in a while. I emerged from the wooded section of fietspad that lead me from the campground, and climbed to the top of yonder hill which put me on the road to the first dijk crossing.

There is a museum just before you get to the dijk, and this rugged old vessel is parked outside. I had wanted to cross the dijks because I thought it would be neat to ride for miles with nothing but ocean on both sides. As it turned out, the roadway was usually elevated above the bike path, so you only saw the one side. I grabbed an ice cream cone ( healthy breakfast) from a vending truck at the beginning of the dijk, and headed across. It was kind of boring, actually. Just a long straight road with water on one side.

Here you can see the break in the original dijk where the German's blew it up on their retreat from the land. Halfway across, I enjoyed lunch at Checkpoint Charlie...hot ham and cheese on a toasted sub roll with iced tea. So good. As I neared the end of the dijk, the bikepath climbed to the roadway, and changed from old and weedy to a beautifully new paved red color. It was so incredible to be slogging along for hours and then come upon this beautiful scene.

The concrete stucture off in the distance is a trough full of wter that boats travel through, and the fietspad passes underneath. Then, as I was taking all this in I ran into a cyclist I had met on the way to Apeldoorn the second day. His name was Mike, and we chatted for a while and had a snack together. It was so neat to run into him again, especially in this surreal environment. That is part of what was so incredible about this trip. You will be riding along, and never know where you will suddenly emerge into a totally different environment.

This is Mike, with his BOB trailer writing down his email address. Woefully I took all too few pictures of the people I met there. I took way too few pictures period. I guess I'll just have to go back. Having crossed the dijk I headed into the city of Enkhuizen. I followed the Zuiderzeeroute through the narrow cobblestone streets, following route signs at every intersection.

The zuiderzeeroute took me all through the city, along canals, and over this bridge that only left inches on each side of my Versatile.

You would just never know ( or expect) what was coming. There was a zuiderzeeroute sign with an arrow pointing across the bridge, and here I was. There were places where the street was so narrow I would hve to pull between parked cars to let moving ones pass, canals with narrow shop lined streets, and always the Zuiderzeeroute signs to guide you through the city.

This spot was so steep and sandy that I had to disconnect the trailer, push the Versatile up, and go back and drag the trailer up. I cycled from 9:30 till 6:30 PM today. After traveling through the city, the zuiderzeeroute took me into a wooded section, paved with seashells just wide enough for the Versatile. It was getting dark, the only food I had was some appelbotter cookies from the ladies in the park back in Appeldoorn, and a tube of Pringles sourcream and onion chips. I had no clue where I would sleep that night.

Here is one of my beloved route signs, which proved to be more difficult to find after leaving Enkhuizen.

Now here's a sign that I would hope translates into something to the effect of curb your dog. As the day continued to grow darker, I finally came out of the woods, and while taking one of my many breaks, found a sign for nature camping on the fietspad. There I was, hungry and tired, wondering where I would sleep, and I just turned around and it was there.

I needed a little help filling out the form I needed to use to enclose with my payment in an envelope. A fellow camper spoke English, and was happy to oblige. It was 4.55 Euro for the site, but no showers. (or toilet paper ofcourse) . I started setting up my tent when a nice lady came over and started inquiring about my versatile. I agreed to stop by for a cup of coffee, and finished setting up my tent before it got fully dark. When I went over to their campsite later, I learned that she was disabled, could only walk a short way, and used a scooter for transport. A little three wheel thing which she called skooby. They asked what I had with me to eat, and when I told her about the cookies and potato chips, her husband cooked me up a nice hot dinner.During the course of eating dinner, I learned that she had traveled all over Europe on her little skooby, using the many cycling paths. As it turns out she had been on TV was kind of famous, having inspired many other people with handicaps to get out there and live life to it's fullest with her many skooby journeys. Such a fool am I, that I didn't even get their names, though we spoke well into the night, and I was so very impressed by both her and her husband.Their open friendliness and kind spirits were genuinely uplifting.

I did get their picture, however, and their toilet paper as well. This was taken the following morning as she was preparing for the 75KM skooby ride back home alone while her husband pulled their camper back. I am not what you would call religious, but I had prayed for God's providence that day, and He had come through in spades all day long. ( whole trip actually) It was definitely the most memorable day of my journey, and still brings chills to my spine a year later to think of it in depth as I have today. From the head of the bikepath to the dijk that started right at my campsite that morning to lunch on the middle of the dijk, whizzing through the well signed streets of Enkhuisen to finding camping and an unanticipated hot meal, a day with very sketchy planning had turned into the adventure of a lifetime.