Houten Update

The back extension is well underway. The wall separating the extension from the living room comes down tomorrow. The round shapes on the roof are domed light wells. The Rond looking less stark, now that the leaves are out on the trees.

Raphy walking and checking out the game on the telephone at the same time. He is quite a techno boy! Mia and Abi having fun down at the Rond, where a marbles competition is taking place.

A typical canal view.

A field of white daisies. There is actually a children's adventure playground here too.

A path behind the house, in all its late Spring glory.Mia and Abi dressed up for the hot day, which rose to 25 degrees! Even I managed to take my jumper off! Looking towards the back of the house, where Kylie is working in her study upstairs. The view from her study is very distracting.There is a family of black ducks in the branches. We spent some time watching the parents reinforce their nest with sticks and feeding their babies. Raphy really loved them.

Off back home tomorrow!

Vier Daagse

In Holland at this time of year there is a four day walk, for all people who are interested in taking up this challenge. And lots do so.
In Houten, the schools organise walks for the children, starting at 6 p.m. each day, for four days. The children in each school put on their school T Shirts, and off they go, together with their parents. The children in Groups 1 to 4 walk for 5 km, and the children in Groups 5 to 8, walk for 10 km, each day. Today we walked around Houten, and tomorrow we will walk out in the countryside.
At the end of the four days, the children and parents will meet in the town centre, where the mayor will give a speech and present the children with small medals.
Off we go!
A welcome rest, with a drink and some crisps. Mia (on the right hand side) with her friends.
So ever onwards tomorrow!

Bremen

I agree with Karen Stirk, when she stated that my description of Bremen sounded like a good setting for a thriller. What with the very old buildings, intense feeling in the air, the drunks and the out of work sitting around the edges of the buildings plus an anti Nazi demonstration in the square and a few more people waiting on their turn to demonstrate. And there were a lot of dodgy looking people (in my eyes anyway). Add to this, the noiseless trams running on the pedestrianised streets and the cyclists who seemed to be everywhere.
I am not impressed with Bremen but then we only had a quick look at the old city, as there are also beautiful parks and an interesting area with moats where the old wall stood.

The town hall, in all its splendour! The statue of Roland, who symbolises Bremen's freedom, has stood in the square since 1404.

The Town Musicians of Bremen. If you rub the front legs of the donkey, and make a wish, it will come true. I did not test this theory!

The stellplatz was in the middle of an island. We were surrounded by hundreds of small gardens with tiny houses on them. People who live in flats own these little plots of land, build a small house (one or two rooms) and use them as their summer house with garden. They are really beautiful

Sunday in Waren

We have just finished dinner which was very substantial! Freshly made bratwurst (as against the packet variety we bought last time)with fried potatoes and ham and sauerkraut. Delicious!

This morning we attended Mass in the new looking church in Waren. All the old churches in northern Germany are Protestant, and often Evangelical, although they still have the Catholic icons around the church. When we arrived (not late) everyone was sitting very quietly and seriously, and the place was packed. I thought 'What a dour looking lot' but during the 'Our Father' everyone held hands while saying the prayer and the whole atmosphere changed. One needs to get to know the formalities of a culture before judgements are made! The reason why the church was packed was due to a bus tour which had pulled up outside and everyone on the bus attended Mass.

After lunch we went on a bike ride (about 16 kms) around a small lake. We only took one photo due to the fact that the mosquitos swarmed in on us when we stopped. However the woodland was beautiful, although the track was very bumpy. Our bikes will need a good service when we get back to the UK. Tomorrow we start our trip back to Holland and will break our journey with one night in Bremmen.

Altogether we have really enjoyed our trip to North East Germany and will certainly come back again. People are really friendly, food prices, as long as you do not eat fresh meat, are very low and scenery spectacular. The only downside have been the mosquitos which have been out in full force during the past few days.

A day in Waren

After the thunderstorm and heavy rain last night, we woke up to brilliant sunshine. The world had been washed clean, not that it wasn't clean here before the rain. We are in Germany, after all!

After a prolonged breakfast, with the sun streaming through the window, I hung out the clothes that I had been soaking all night, making sure that I hung all the 'smalls' in the middle of the clothes line so that they could not be seen. German motorhomers generally do not hang out washing outside their motorhomes. But the sun was shining and I knew that it was a good drying day. In my new role as retiree I try not to waste money on laundromats!

Then it was time to get the bikes out and join all the other retirees on the bike paths. I am amazed at how many of us there are in the camping grounds, all with our motorhomes or caravans and of course our bikes, which are attached to our vehicles whilst moving from one place to another. Of course everyone else is either working or in school!

Waren is a delightful place, full of character, colourful houses and atmosphere. We arrived first at the marina, which reminded me a bit of St Tropez but not such huge boats of course and no one posing.

Then we went to the square. As you can see from the photo the buildings are very picturesque. I was impressed with the shape of the fountain which is made of wrought iron.This is the main shopping street. As it was Saturday, it was fairly busy.Lunch was quite a tame affair, as we decided on the special of the day, which turned out to be schnitzel and potato croquettes with a vegetable sauce on top. Not very original but still tasty. The beer was great. My face is red, due to the reflection of the orange umbrella rather than from drinking too much beer! Honestly!The horses and carriage are waiting on the bride and groom to appear from the town hall. The bride looked much older than the groom, and was nearly twice his size but they looked happy which is the main thing. Tomorrow we intend to go for a very long bike ride around one of the arms of the lake. We hope the day will be as sunny as today.

Waren, Lake Muritz

We drove down from the island of Rugen to Waren, which is a resort town on the edge of Lake Muritz. We are only about 40 kms west from Neubrandenburg. We stayed off the motorway, not that there was one handy, and kept to minor roads. So we travelled through lots of small villages and towns, which were interesting, with many pre WW2 houses in ruins and many blocks of featureless flats.

A number of roads were lined with trees, very picturesque except if you run off the road into a tree. A fair proportion of the roads we travelled on were well patched, done with the usual Germany efficiency. The patched roads were very smooth, with no bumps or ridges. Not like the patched roads in the UK!

We are staying in the stellplatz which is outside a camping ground. Of course it is cheaper than being in the camping ground, but then the spaces are not as spacious. One has to compromise! Still over 3 nights we will save €24 which is more than enough for lunch out for the two of us. Included in our €12 per night is water, electricity, internet and the use of the showers and toilets. This is about the best stellplatz so far. Of course we went for our usual bike ride, through the forest this time. We could not stop too often due to the high number of mosquitos which zoomed in on us. We had an ice cream to celebrate the end of an hours ride.

Dinner was white asparagus with fried ham and eggs and left over spagetti which had pesto sauce in it. Pesto goes very well with asparagus. I changed my drink to wine for the occasion.
Then it rained - Walter sheltering from the rain, yet again!

So tomorrow it is off into town to explore what is to offer.

Rugen

We are in a stellplatz on the island of Rugen, which is at the top east end of Germany. The stellplatz is by a marina and near a small town called Putbus.

On the way to the stellplatz we stopped at a restaurant/giftshop where we first drank weak coffee and ate some cake, which was pretty good, although we are not sure what it was.
Then we saw that they were selling smoked fish, which we realised later is a speciality of the island. Of course we decided we were still hungry and needed to try out the local delicacy. We chose smoked deep sea salmon, which was served in a breadroll with a dressing of dill and mustard. The smoked fish was as good as the smoked fish in Coromandel Peninsular, NZ. I had trouble pausing to get my picture taken as the fish was so delicious. The plastic bag on the table contains a local cumin cheese, also very tasty.The van parked in the stellplatz. There is now another van parked beside ours, space is often tight in these parking areas. There are many white swans on the water in front of the van. The view as I write this blog is spectacular - water as smooth as glass, swans floating on it, and the lights illumating the pillars of a smart hotel across the water. These are new holiday homes which are built over the top of the water. No threat of tsunamis here!A picture of me, holding my stomach in so that I look thin, after we had lunch here! I had more fish, this time smoked mackerel with fried potatoes. Walter went for the more substantial dish, pork and mushrooms in a cream sauce, with a potato cake and lots of salad. He decided against getting his photo taken! Yet another bike ride! It is really great travelling around northern Germany as you never have to take the motorhome out, once you have parked it. There are bike paths everywhere and the countryside is mostly flat. We are getting lazy and will even ride the bikes short distances, such as to the ablution block or take the rubbish to the rubbish point. Today we took the longest way possible to get into Putbus, which is at the top of a small hill. We even had to drop down a gear to two at times! There were masses of white flowers amongst the trees. They looked stunning but there was a strong smell of onions in the air. False onions? I can't remember their botanical name. One small village we went through contained picturesque thatched roofed houses.This house managed to fall on its roof! It is part of a museum.
There was once a castle in Putbus but it was pulled down in 1982. As our German is not very good we could not work out the reason. There is a very large park there now, an orangerie and a statue surrounded by eight segments of parkland and a road 'circus' around this. The houses look very prosperous but that could be misleading. There were no English translations so we used the little German we knew and lots of imagination to translate the signs and brochures.

Neubrandenburg

We are in a stellplatz in Neubrandenburg, which is north of Berlin. There is a little collection of lakes between Berlin and the Baltic Sea and Neubrandenburg is on the tip of one of the lakes. We are not far from the Polish border. We are on the way to the island of Rugen which is in the Baltic Sea.

The lake is directly behind the trees below. On the other side of the stellplatz are huge buildings which date back to before WW2 and behind them are more buildings which were part of a military establishment. The German Military Force used this area to make torpedos and then test them in the lake. Now the buildings are used as sports complexes. Times have changed!
Neubrandenburg is a well laid out town, easy to travel around in, and of course surrounded by heavily wooded areas, water, canals and lovely gardens. The old centre of the town is no more, as it was flattened in 1945. No doubt bombed to bits, which then caused devasting fires. The centre of the town has been rebuilt, with many faceless and bland buildings. The hotel in this picture is an example of unimaginative East German builders!
It would appear that one or two buildings survived. One of these is the Konzertkirche, which of course is now a concert hall, not a church.

During the 1990s money was spent on rebuilding the wall which surrounds the town. Inserted into the wall are many old houses, all recently restored, with a little bit of financial help from the European Union.

These are boatsheds, not flooded houses. They form part of a marina.

More cycling!

Walter sheltering from the rain - yet again. The thunderstorms in Berlin have brought much colder and showery weather. Hopefully the weather will improve again soon

This stellplatz has very good internet facilities, very cheap too as it cost only €2 for 24 hours. And I can access it from the motorhome, which is just as well as the computer is still attached to the front passenger seat. The security chain is just long enough to reach the table. No sign of the key yet!

Potsdam

Most of Potsdam and its surrounding area is definitely one of outstanding beauty. Potsdam is about 50 kms from Berlin and was once held the summer residences of the Prussian Kings, starting with King Frederick 11 (1712-1786) who built, first a very intimate and homely palace called Schloss Sanssouci, and then a grander palace called Neues Palais. They were used by the royal kings until the end of 1918 when the Kaiser William 11 was sent to exile in Holland. The style of the grounds and palaces were similar to Versailles but the Prussian Kings were more modest in the amount of money they spent on themselves.

Sanssouci with the terraces in front of it. The doors between the climbers are made of glass and inside were fruit bushes, not ones that we recognised though.

Neues Palais

We stayed in a camping ground called Sanssouci (not the palace unfortunately) for four nights. The facilities were immaculate, beautifully tiled and heated and with plenty of luxurious extras added, such as private bathrooms, family rooms, hairdresser. Each site had its own grey water outlet, unfortunately our motor home does not have the fittings to hook up to it. Each day I watched the staff rake the leaves off the pitches and brush down the walls of the ablution blocks. If only they had WiFi throughout the campsite than I would have been really happy! The camping ground is on the edge of the lake and is surrounded by woodland. In fact most of the land around Potsdam and the lakes is heavily wooded and flat. Cycling here is a pleasure, with excellent cycling paths, often through woodland and considerate motorists. When in towns the cycle paths are incorporated in the footpaths, often they are paved in a different colour but sometimes cyclists share the footpath with pedestrians. So far we have cycled to the Park Sanscouci, went on a tour to the small towns of Caputh (where Einstein lived for a while), Geltow and Werder and finally we cycled around one of the lakes and spent a few hours in the old town of Potsdam.

Time for coffee!

A very picturesque view of one of the villages beside the lake. We took a short ferry ride to travel to one town - a rest from cycling!People are very friendly, both the tourists and the residents. They also look happy, but then who wouldn’t be, in such lovely countryside.

I still have not found the keys to my computer security lock. I think I have thrown it out as it was last seen on the table amongst the maps and papers. So we have rung the camping ground in Manjestre, South of France and they are going to send the spare key to Aaron. Hopefully it will be there when we arrive.

Berlin

We spent two and a half days in Berlin. At first I was not sure of the place, especially as I could not orientate myself. I know it does not matter anymore but I still wanted to know which part was ‘west’ and which part was ‘east’. But after two and a half days here, I think it is a fantastic place to visit, lots of interesting buildings and places and plenty of action. The people are much friendlier here, except if you bump into them or get in their way when they are cycling. They really know how to glower at you!
We stayed in a stellplatz, which is an area where motorhomes can park, as well as fill up with water and empty the grey water and toilet. Often they are free but as this one is in the centre of Berlin there is a charge of €17 per night but this includes electrical hook-ups, toilets and showers. The stellplatz is in the suburb of Wedding, and the old Berlin wall would have run right beside us, if it was still up. Although the stellplatz is technically in the old west part of Berlin, Wedding is a relatively poor area. We found out that the first tenement building for poor families was built in Wedding in 1870. And I think they still exist!

The stellplatz is on the Chaussee Strasse, which runs into Fredrichstrasse and then into the main part of the old East Berlin, which is now an exclusive shopping street. Chaussee Strasse still has some old post war tenement buildings, so characteristic of the old East Berlin. However, I don’t think they will last much longer, as many of them are derelict.

The first afternoon we bought two Berlin Cards which enabled us to travel by public transport, anywhere in Berlin. A lot of money but good value we thought at the time. However, one afternoon of using public transport (four short trips on the U Bahn) and doing a lot of walking convinced us that we would be better off on our bikes. Financially, the Berlin Cards were not a good investment for us!

Berlin is a marvellous city for cycling around, although you have to watch out for fast cyclists, especially during peak hour. One elderly lady told Walter to get out of her way, so that she could take off immediately the lights changed! Anyway we have seen so much more, while cycling around and enjoyed it as well. And we did not suffer from sore feet! There are many, many museums here but we chose The Story of Berlin Museum, which provided a marvellous display of historical events, and it gave you an understanding of the circumstances leading up to the WW2 and the wall being erected to keep in the East Berliners. People did not have an easy time here. So it is no wonder that many older people look a bit grim. We also went to the Willy Brandt exhibition; he was definitely a man with a vision and lots of determination. We visited the STASI (Old East German Secret Police) Documentation Centre where they have stored all the old files. People can look at their old files as everyone in the old East Berlin has a file. There is also a display area where they showed some of the tactics they used to spy on people as well as pictures and information on some people who were obviously agitators. Not very friendly!

We rode along the main shopping street (Kurfurstendamm) without being tempted to have a big spending spree. We then walked back along the street as the traffic was a bit daunting by late afternoon.
We visited the Brandenburg Gate (pictured above) which of course is a must and gazed in wonder at the impressive new buildings inside the gate, which turned out to the American and French Embassies. We could not fail to notice the high level of security surrounding the British Embassy. Paranoia or what?
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe is a field of stelae near the Brandenburg Gate with over 2700 concrete stelae. There is also an exhibition under the stelae which tells the stories of the extermination of Jewish people and other minority groups. It was very chilling experience and I felt relieved to go outside again into the sunshine. The field of stelae is very impressive

At Checkpoint Charlie there is a substitute sentry stop and €2 will allow you to have your picture taken with the ‘soldiers’. There is piece of wall still standing, with yet another excellent display of photographs and information relating to the era between 1934 and 1945. The wall is beside the site of the SS and Gestapo buildings, (the buildings were pulled down after 1945). There is now a very modern building which houses an exhibition on ‘Nazi terror and crimes of the Third Reich’. Not for the faint hearted! We have had two great budget lunches in Berlin, the first was pizza bread with toppings and the second was roasted pork knuckle with finely sliced white cabbage which had a dressing on it. The crackling and sauce were superb. I have decided to change to beer because it is so much cheaper and is the most popular German drink! At the moment I drink the beer with lemonade. I not ready for the strong stuff yet!
It rained today so we had to take shelter. No raincoats of course! Walter looks happy and dry under the large umbrella. This is the first rain we have seen since the beginning of March!