Day 7 — Elburg to Huizen

30 June 2007 in Netherlands, daily summary, ronde ijsselmeer

We had breakfast courtesy of Mevrouw Greveling at 8 AM, the better to get to the bike store around the corner bright and early — they opened at 8:30, and sure enough we were there by 8:45. Only the hardcore old guys were there, and they leapt to the challenge of the broken trailer hitch. I learned the Dutch word for “hose clamps” (hey, this is valuable information) and when the rest of the crew arrived, our heroes actually sent someone out to get hose clamps before eventually making us a sturdy plate steel approximation of the piece that had broken. Awesome! We bought a spoke wrench out of gratitude and would have bought a spare tire if they’d had one, but 20 by 1.5 and 100 PSI turns out to be a tricky size, or so we learned repeatedly for the rest of the trip, when we stopped at every single bike store we saw just in case they had a spare for us.

Anyway. We returned to Mevrouw Greveling’s house and changed back into our bike gear and hit the road with a quick stop for bread and cheese and apples (yes, I made sure to get the lady’s address because boy oh boy is she ever getting thank-you postcards). Then we wound our way back through Elburg to the route, which took us to our detour through some lovely fields near the water (the Veluwermeer, to be exact). We sheltered under some trees during a brief hailstorm (see picture) and continued on all the way to Harderwijk, where we stopped for bread and cheese on one of many little beaches where windsurfers and kiteboarders were casting off and taking advantage of the strong winds coming over the water. The previous night’s weather reports had predicted gusts between wind force 3 and 5, much milder than Tuesday’s gale-strength 8(!) Anyway. In Harderwijk we called about the night’s lodgings, and found out that most of the places we’d thought to stay past Spakenburg were already full — both Eemnes and Blaricum had no lodgings to offer, so we looked past them to Huizen, where we finally lucked out. Then we double-checked the map and discovered that we had a pretty long day ahead of us — 50 to 60 kilometers left to go, for a grand total distance well over our self-imposed limit of 70-odd kilometers. Eek.

Then, to make matters briefly worse but eventually better, the freaking Germans caught up with us. You know, the ones we’d resolved to dust on Tuesday? Yeah, they hadn’t had a breakdown to slow them down. You can bet that motivated the hell out of me for the next 20-odd kilometers at least, and Peter was kind enough to pedal along. We blasted through Bunschoten and Spakenburg and made the ferry at Eemdijk in record time. Once across, I realized to my delight that our surroundings were really starting to look like Holland again, and took <a href=”a picture to celebrate. We followed the route along the outskirts of Eemnes, and eventually had a late lunch of tea and soup for me, and coffee and apple pie for Peter, followed by a cup of soup when mine proved irresistably delicious. And then we were on our way again.

Despite having told our hosts in Huizen that we had the wind against us and probably would not arrive until 7 or 8 PM, we rang their doorbell at 6:45 PM (probably thanks at least in part to my fanatical need to outrace the Germans). We parked our bike and filthy trailer in their back shed and took much-needed showers, before eventually braving the neighborhood shops to find dinner at an Italian restaurant. Mom, I ate pasta with red sauce, and it was delicious. Please do not disown me. Peter had the house tortellini, and we felt deliciously carb-loaded up for the following day (also I was a little floaty with exhaustion from our exertions). We returned to our lodgings and immediately fell asleep.