Day 7 - Venlo - Deurne (Leiden -> Venlo trip)

Bicycle: 39 km

Train: 180 km

Riding time: 2:24 h
Total ascent: 78 m
Avg speed: 16.3 km/h
Route: Venlo - Deurne
Weather: Cloudy, headwind and drizzle (sometimes), 18 C

Yesterday I had reached my official and unofficial goal of this one week ride through the Netherlands. But today is Sunday. So one more day off before returning to work. 

My initial plan was to cycle towards Eindhoven and to take the train there. But already today in the morning it was clear that the wind would be against me and that potentially some rain could be coming my way too. So instead I followed a route back to Deurne, but on different paths than yesterday when I make the Deurne -> Venlo trip in the opposite direction. 

Out of Venlo I came through this strange park or maybe some kind of university campus. Not sure. 

After about 20 km, as usual, I had my first break. I found this bench alongside the way. As in the past days, I had brought some sandwiches from my breakfast. 

I have found that my ideal break schedule is to have a break approximately every 20 km. Sometimes it can be a rather short break. Other times longer. On this 7 day trip I actually always had sandwiches with me so didn't need to go to restaurants for lunch. Just for dinner. And unfortunately Dutch cuisine really isn't very good. I would say that apart from the breakfast in the B&B in Middelburg, I did never really have great, good food. Not even in the 4star hotel in Deurne. Probably yesterday evening in Venlo I could have had a chance, but I was tired and didn't want to go out for dinner. So just went to a Döner place close to the station (and the B&B) and ate in my room. Which was exactly what I wanted. 

But really I am missing the onsen. It is such a great invention to go off to an onsen after a day of riding. Relax in the waters and then have a hearty meal with a cold beer, before making the last few km to this nights accommodation. Pity onsen are not more widespread. 

After my lunch break today unfortunately it started to drizzle. Not strong enough to really call it rain. But still strong enough to get quiet wet. Shortly before crossing America... 

... I had briefly considered to go to the next railway station, which would have been only about 4 km away. But decided to continue in the rain/drizzle. Sometimes it stopped, sometimes it started again. Luckily on the last kilometers to Deurne station it had stopped and surprisingly although I had not donned my rain cape, my jersey and cycling shorts dried in time for my arrival at the train station, so I am not sitting in damp clothes here, but rather in smelly, sweaty ones. 

As a summary of 1 week cycling through the Netherlands, I can say: 

• Landscape is a bit boring, even though I noticed some differences. 
• Heavy headwind (as again today), isn't good fun 
• I should have made shorter daily trips to be able to do also some sightseeing. Yes, I like cycling, but 7 days nothing else but cycling and eating is a bit boring. Maybe a better idea is to look for 1 or 2 bases and ride around, including some sightseeing. 
• Even July can be cold. I hadn't brought my bicycle cap or cycling scarf, and both would have been nice (and are really lightweight) 
• Cycle touring with the brompton is also in the Netherlands comfortable. Due to Corona, bicycles were not allowed on trains. But folding bicycles were. As of 1st of July they changed the rules again, and now you can again bring a normal bicycle on the train, but need to reserve first. 

Day 6 - Deurne - Venlo (Leiden -> Venlo trip)

Bicycle: 62 km

Riding time: 3:41 h
Total ascent: 123 m
Avg speed: 17.3 km/h
Route: Deurne - Venlo
Weather: Cloudy, but no rain, 18 C

Today, after nearly 400 km of cycling, I reached Venlo, the official goal of this one week ride through the Netherlands. The unofficial goal however was a supermarket in Germany to get sweet mustard! 

The ride today was shorter than the other days, only about 50 km, plus an other 10 over into Germany and to the source of sweet mustard. 

The countryside had less forests, more farmland, but with fields. A lot of corn fields, some asparagus fields, but very little dairy pasture. It seems to be a part of the country with a lot of pig farms, but they are never allowed outside. 

Although it continuous to be mainly flat, it is not totally flat. But going over the boarder to Germany means climbing a hill with 3 - 4 % gradient. Something unseen in the Netherlands (with the exception of probably the Southern parts of Limburg). 

Although the wind is no longer blowing at force 6, it was still pretty windy, so finding a small hut for lunch, was nice. 

When cycling over to Germany, I expected some kind of indication on the boarder that one crosses into a different country. But there was absolutely nothing. Only the language on the signs changed. But yet, I managed to take a picture of poor brompton, yet again divided between 2 countries: 

 

Day 5 - Baarle-Nassau - Deurne (Leiden -> Venlo trip)

Bicycle: 72.9 km

Riding time: 4:18 h
Total ascent: 83 m
Avg speed: 16.9 km/h
Route: Baarle-Nassau - Deurne
Weather: Cloudy, a bit sun and no rain, 18 C

Today was a relatively eventeless ride from Baarle-Nassau to my second convent hotel in this trip. 

Less forests than yesterday, a few more fields and a long ride along a channel. 

The channel is quite similar to the Vliet channel that links Leiden with Den Haag and Delft. But with much less boat traffic. Obviously today was a weekday (Friday) so not many recreational boat riders but also not a single transport ship. So maybe this channel is now outdated for transport. 

Following the entire time the LF route would have resulted in a 84 km ride. But after so many km in my legs from the previous days, I had planned also a somewhat shorter version. Unfortunately that went right through Helmond and from there along a rather major road to Deurne. So the last 10/15 km weren't the nicest to ride. We are talking the Netherlands, so obviously there was ALWAYS a cycle path but even cycle paths alongside busy roads aren't really nice. But it brought me to my hotel a bit earlier so I had some rest time. But not enough time on catching up with the blog. This here I am writing while waiting for my dinner. But the blog post for Day 3 is still waiting to be even drafted. At least I got cleaned up the one for Day 4 in the afternoon. 

The shortcut through Helmond however brought me to these cube houses, by the same architect as the more famous ones in Rotterdam. 

Good thing tomorrow is a quite short ride. 55 km along hopefully scenic paths to Venlo. Actually if I would just take the shortest path, Venlo is only 36 km away. But no reason to cut things short tomorrow. 

Day 4 Ossendrecht - Baarle-Nassau (Leiden -> Venlo trip)

Bicycle: 85 km

Riding time: 6:15 h
Total ascent: 110 m
Avg speed: 16.7 km/h
Route: Ossendrecht - Baarle-Nassau
Weather: Cloudy, a bit sun and one rain, 17 C

Today I mainly pedaled through forests. Which is surprising in a country like the Netherlands where there aren't many forests. Maybe the LF path was especially going through forests, or simply here in the South there are more forests. 

For being the Netherlands there were also some non totally flat areas. I know that in Limburg there are real (small) mountains, but it was more surprising that in a region so close to the sea not everything was totally flat. Actually in the village where I started (Woensdrecht), there was even a street announced on cycling signs as having a 5% ascent. Not that I tried it out though. 

Somehow Komoot or Garmin initially sent me in the wrong direction, back on the path I had come yesterday, but after a while I got suspicious of the route as it just didn't correlate to my expectancy. So retraced my pedal strokes and cycled back to the convent to take the correct route. 

From there onwards it was mainly through forests. Later on also through Belgium, There were still some remains of recent boarder controls (due to Covid-19 boarders between Belgium and Netherlands (and other countries) had been closed.) but now everything was open again. 

I stopped at a ice-parlor-farm (something that exists also close to Leiden, but maybe is a Dutch thing), loaded up my water supplies and had an ice cream, while I could see the rain coming closer and closer. This ice parlor was located in a farm house that was designed by one of the Amsterdam school architects. 

After some rest there, I continued on, although the sky looked darker and darker. Luckily shortly before it started raining I found this public rest place, which was located right besides the medieval gallows hill. But for me it meant a safe place to hide from the rain and eat my sandwiches. 

After crossing more forests I finally made it to Baarle-Nassau and Baarle-Hertog, one being Dutch and the second being Belgian, and together being really just one village, as one can see nicely from my evening ride to dinner, where in 3 km of riding I managed to cross the boarder 6 times! But it was worthwhile for an authentic Belgian beer:

While my black brompton made it in February this year to 3 prefectures in Japan at the same time, the green one made it to two different countries today:

 

 

Day 3 - Middelburg - Ossendrecht (Leiden -> Venlo trip)

Bicycle: 85 km

Riding time: 4:45 h
Total ascent: 186 m
Avg speed: 18 km/h
Route: Middelburg - Ossendrecht
Weather: Clouds and sun and a strong tailwind,  20 C

Finally tailwind! And sun! 

After two days struggling against a fierce onslaught of headwind, today was time to sail in front of a (slightly less strong) tailwind over land from Middelburg to a village in the South of Bergen op Zoom. 

My plan was to follow the coastal LF route down to Middelburg and then the LF 13 route to Venlo. And while in the first two days I hardly used the coastal route (wind would have been even worse and the ferry from Hoek van Holland was very infrequent) from today I started following LF 13. It is a well indicated route, although I followed my garmin. 

Clearly strong winds are often expected here as there were many streets protected by alleys: 

Not for the only time in this trip, I came by some remains or memorials of the 2nd World War: 

Although today was the longest ride in this 1 week ride from Leiden to Venlo (I am writing this post actually sitting already on Day 6 in Venlo in my B&B), it was also the fastest average speed. Surely this was helped by the strong tailwind which blew me over land and along the sea away from Middelburg and right into Ossendrecht. 

The route was following for a long while the coast on the outer side of the damm. 

But there were also two channels crossing what must have been a peninsula but were severed by these channels. 

I also came by some white poppy fields, poppy seeds for cakes??? 

And these sheeps who had to cohabitate with a lot of abandoned onions that were apparently dumped on their pasture. The sheep very clearly had not interest in eating the onions. 

And finally I arrived at my first convent-hotel of this trip. Although this was the longest day in the saddle, I would say it was not the day I was most fatigued. Probably it helped that the day before I essentially had a rest day and that the wind was a reliable tailwind for nearly the entire ride.