On the Road Again!

Day 4 is not quite over. We have just boarded the ferry for home after a palavver over changing our ticket. On P&O coming back a day early costs a ticket change cost plus additional fare amounting to £60. I kid you not. In the end we got it down to £29 but even that is a disgrace when the website return is £19! Maybe when I next travel I will remember this rip off? The problem was that Claire's hip wasn't causing the expected problems so we cancelled the night stay in Breda and had the run to Calais. We left the hotel around 9.45am and wasted a bit of time getting to the Motorway. We had Steve in tow until the motorway when he shot off. We stopped for petrol pretty quickly as I wanted to make sure that when we arrived at the badlands of the N49 between Antwerp and Brugge that we has loads. We made good time until I followed the overhead signs for Brugge. We had a tour of the Antwerp ring including three tunnels. The middle one carried a toll... So once you arri...

Race day. A short ride after breakfast to the circuit. Within 45 minutes we were parked and looking for our seats. The Winterdijk stand was full to busting. We sat for over six hours in the burning sun to watch the main races. Hopefully when we download the pix from the camera we will have a few decent ones. On the way back we got separated but arrived in Diever for an ice cream about the same time. Tomorrow James and Steve ride home and we head for an overnight near Breda.  Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

We were up early enough to nosh through a large breakfast and it was about 930am when we finally left Zonnemaire. The plan was to go back to the N57 and continue island hopping towards Rotterdam and then head north. Once we were in Maasland we seemed to be heading east before a 180deg turn brought us to a ferry. It made a change and €5.05 later we were aboard and soon whizzing across the Maas. My Garmin interprets routes created in Mapsource and Tyre with Google Maps as it sees fit. So after the ferry we had a tour of some housing estate before we emerged on a road roughly north and roughly towards Amsterdam. Eventually we joined the A4 to the east of Den Haag and headed north at a greater speed, under the runway at Schiphol and onto the A10 ring. Eventually onto the A6 running along the eastern side of the Ijselmeer. We made one stop for petrol and a snack, otherwise it was non stop to Wapse and the hotel. Once checked in we had a walk into the village to see...

We were up early and away by 0715 for the short run to Dover. The checking in was pretty simple and quick and we were loaded straight on the ferry. We were at the back of a large group and the rings in the deck were rusted tight so we were moved to the other side. The sailing was relatively painless and we were soon on the way out of the port. The other group were all over the place in the road out and we slid past. The idea of island hopping seemed a good one. I topped the tank up on the outskirts of Bruges and then we seemed to get in a tizzy as the GPS mapping is out of date. The roundabout trip to the tunnel underneath the West Schelde eventually came up in sight. Just not from the direction I had expected. The day has been warm and sunny and we are both glad we are wearing our vented jackets. I've ridden all day with just a T-shirt and mesh Joe Rocket Phantom jacket. Only cold in the 6.6 kms long tunnel. We had a Coke break in a small place called...

 Two days to go until we set off for the TT, or I should say the Dutch TT. Official TT Website in English

The trip has been on the cards from way back in 2009 when we had to pre-order the ticket.  Then my brother decided to go on a trip along Route 66 ( http://ndr66.blogspot.com/ ) so we made a team change and old mate Steve Hazlehurst stepped up to the plate. Now with just two weeks to go we have had a small change to our part of the trip. To save Claire's hip we have already broken the outward journey into two days with an island hopping first day Zeeland and a second day to Wapse and the hotel. On the way home we are going to break the trip again to keep the riding and subsequent pain down a bit. To keep the costs down I have booked a Premiere Classe hotel in Breda. It's not quite half way but will be okay I hope to save Claire's hip from hurting to much. It should make for a more relaxed holiday!

I have finalised my route with Tyre and then opened it in Garmin Mapsource. The plan is to go Thursday morning and take a more relaxed ride up island hopping across Zeeland, and staying in a B&B on the island to the south of Rotterdam. Steve H will join us there in the evening. I just hope we have weather like last year.