Week 13 - Campervan Adventures

---

Day 85 – 14^th November 2013

Brecon (South Wales) – Dover (England) – Dunkerque (France) – Gent (Belgium)

With mixed feelings today after two and a bit weeks in Wales we started our travel journey again. The mixed feelings are sadness; of leaving the convenience and luxuries of a lovely home, worry; of freezing to death while being in a campervan in freezing temperatures and snow and excitement of the adventure we are planning.

So the big winter adventure started with a big driving day from Brecon in South Wales, across to England to get the ferry from Dover. This took us 5 and a half hours, it should have been a 5 hour journey but we had a little delay due to some silly young boy having an accident, just 4 miles outside of Dover. It looked like the young boy had rolled his car which caused a standstill of traffic, we were sat there for about 20 minutes before the police allowed traffic to pass, which is when we saw the silly boy walking around with a neck brace on. The rest of the drive was fine and we had no issues boarding our ferry, passport control (French and English) did not even look at our passports. I would like to say that our ferry journey was smooth also but it wasn’t, even though the weather was fine, I became very sea sick and had to visit the bathroom a number of times due to being very ill. I was thankful when we got off the ferry, lucky Steve knows the roads around France and Belgium very well and I was excused from map reading. After a few hours of driving we pulled up at a service station where we spent the night. Due to it being late (for us about 9pm) the plan was to have an easy dinner, which we did have (Chip sandwiches for me and tuna sandwiches for Steve) as when I put the gas on to make noodles we found out the man that serviced our van had left our gas on and our gas bottle was empty meaning we could not use the cooker. After our dinner it was time for bed, it was also a way to get warm as we were feeling the cold. Let’s hope that I can get used to this winter campervan living.

Day 86 15^th November 2013

Gent (Belgium) – Amsterdam via Rotterdam (Netherlands)

As our plan is to get to Scandinavia we hadn’t really discussed visiting places on the way but today we decided we would visit Rotterdam and Amsterdam. So after a cold start we hit the road, due to their being no toil charges across Belgium and Netherlands we used the motorways which meant that we arrived in Rotterdam around lunch time, which was a good thing, but we hit a parking issues as we do in all big cities in Stan the Van, however this time it was not a space issue, it was a price issue they charged 50cent per 9 minutes all around the city. This just seemed ludicrous and a price that we sadly where not willing to pay. Before leaving the city we sat in Stan next to the river and eat chip(crisp) and vegemite sandwiches. As we still needed to buy gas and shop for fresh produce, we made this priority before heading into Amsterdam. We stopped at a petrol station and one lady told us that we would only be able to get a gas bottle at a camping store and gave me directions how to get there, due to me not being great with directions, we did not make it to the camping store but made it to a mega store, where the lady then directed us to the camping store, where we got the gas bottle that we were desperate for. The people in the Netherlands are so friendly and there English is fantastic, I think it’s a place I could easily live, not just become of the people but also because of the beautiful scenery. Anyways after we got our gas bottle sorted we thought it would be best to find a supermarket before heading into another big city. We searched out an Aldi, our second favourite supermarket and got some fresh supplies and bought a nice steak for dinner. We then hit the road heading for Amsterdam, but by this time it was getting late in the day and light was limited, so we had a bit of a dilemma, do we drive into the city and explore it by night or do we find some place to park up and explore tomorrow. We decided to park up at a servo and used the free wifi, where we researched parking places, which was a good idea as when researching we found out that ‘The Dam’ is the most expensive place in the world for parking, but there is a park and rides. After some time on the internet we decided to go and explore the parking options/campervan sites, we found the campervan site that I had researched but it seemed overpriced €18 for parking with no facilities. We decided that we would spend the night in the service station we had been in earlier in the day, which was a great idea for parking but meant we were driving around the Amsterdam ring road at peak hour on a Friday, not great, my husband who hates traffic was not impressed, but he soon forgot about this experience when we got to the servo and I cooked him a lovely dinner with sweet potato chips, steak and mushroom sauce. This dinner was thoroughly enjoyed by all (the two of us) after all the chip sandwiches. After dinner we got into bed and snuggled up to keep warm as jack frost is out tonight.



Day 87 16^th November 2013

Amsterdam (Netherlands) - Bad Zwischenahn (Germany)

Amsterdam this morning we woke to a white out of fog, it was extremely cold and I started questioning myself if I am going to survive the winter as we are yet to hit the freezing temperatures and I’m already finding it a struggle. The heater was put on in Stan which made it toasty for dressing and eating breakfast, once the heater was off Stan soon got cold though, but that was okay as we hit the road to ‘The Dam’, thinking it was going to be easy, we rocked up to the Park and Ride(P&R), the one that was advertised as this was the closet to town and also to the servo we had stayed at, but the P&R was a multi-story car park with a height of 1.9m with Stan being 2.8m we were not going to fit in there. So we went looking for the next P&R, before going there we check out the price of the street parking, again ludicrous (50cents per 9 minutes). The next P&R was again a multi-story but we were in luck there was a larger parking area next to it which charged for the day €14.40 so we parked here and got out our bikes. Since my stack on L’Alpe d-Huez three weeks ago I had not been on a bike and it did feel a little strange, but also great. The Netherlands have over 20,000k of bike lanes in the country and bikes are given right of way over cars and pedestrians so I felt safe and loved riding around. Once we got into the main part of the city we had to park up, as bikes are not allowed in the tourist epicentre. Finding a parking spot for a bike in Amsterdam is almost as hard as parking a campervan in a major city. We ended up parking Vic and the Beast in the multi-story bike park. Which on my previous visit to Amsterdam I had laughed at but today I could see the benefit of. Steve and I walked around the city for hours it was freezing and super busy, but if you put aside the sex and drug culture of the city it is a very beautiful place. We had our packed lunch but did not want to sit outside to eat it due to it being so cold. I suggested we sit in a foyer of a museum and eat lunch, so this is what we did. We sat in the science museum (neither of us care for science and would never pay the €13 they wanted for entry) with a table and free wifi we enjoyed our salad and salami sandwiches. After lunch we wandered around the city some more and then got on our bikes and rode to Stan. We then spent a few hours driving and are now spending the night in a rest platz just over the boarder by a place called Bad Zwischenahn in Germany.

Day 88 17^th November

Bad Zwischenahn (Germany) - Kiel (Germany)

Today was a boring drive day – we drove about 350k. It was a good driving day though as it was wet and drizzly the kind of weather I hate. When we arrived at Kiel we had a nice walk around, I thought I had come across my first lot of winter markets and got very excited, but it was just some food stalls by an ice rink. We walked along the water front, this was a very popular area, as there was lots of people walking, cycling and running around. Steve was keen to try and find the yacht club he had been to in 2004 when in the army, sadly he could not find it. I suggested we should have been looking for the bridge his grandfather designed (he was an architect) but we had no idea where it was so we did not think we would have much luck finding that. This evening we have spent relaxing, reading (Steve is up to his 6th book) and planning our adventures in Scandinavia as we will be arriving in Denmark tomorrow, after doing some final preparation (buying snow chains for Stan) in the morning. Tonight we are also doing an acclimatization exercise, (we have been working on it all week) we don’t put the heaters on unless we need to in preparation for the colder countries and freezing temperatures.

Day 89 18^th November

Kiel – Flensburg (20k South from Flensburg)

As I said yesterday today we had to do some final preparations. We started by hitting the supermarket to stock up on supplies. Food shopping is something I hate going to do in my normal no traveller life, but as a traveller I love going into large foreign supermarkets and looking at all there food and buying it, if budget allows, which today it did allow for some treats. Me in a foreign supermarket is like a kid in a candy store. I walk around with a smile on my face looking at things in amazement, today I stood looked at smoke fish, this is something I love to eat, but also reminds me of my Dad and a great childhood memory of mine. Him coming back from a fishing trip with hundreds of herring, sitting in his shed with his fishing buddy (our neighbour Steve or my Uncle Mick) clearing the fish and then the next night he would get his smoker out, big large metal drums and sit outside for hours in the cold smoking them, if his fishing buddies were not there with him, he would draw on the drums with me with chalk, the next morning the house would smell of yummy smoked fish. Mum hated the smell but it’s a smell I love. Sadly we did not buy any smoked fish today, I was worried they would not taste as good as my Dads. I think in total our food shopping stop took about two hours. While in their we also looked at boots as Steve and I both needed to get snow boots. Next stop was to get snow chains, we went to one tyre place, he didn’t have any but told us to go to another place, we are unsure if we went to the right place, but shop two didn’t have any, he sent us to a third place. At lucky number three shop we got some which was probably where shop number one tried to send us as it was just round the corner. Next it was time to go and do what I normally love, boots and clothes shopping (salopetts) but it was not that fun, as I was finding it hard to decide on a pair of boots that were practical and also nice looking, in the end after a number of shoe shops we both splashed out and got ‘THE NORTH FACE’ snow/walking boots. But the day was not over, we had to find some salopetts – we wanted these for when we are in the snowy places to walk around in ect, but nothing over the top, the only shops we found selling them where snow board shops which were to cool for us. In the end when we were just about to give up we came across C&A (British Chain Store) and found what we wanted for a reasonable price. By the time we had finished our final preparation it was dark, we really did not think it would take all day or be so exhausting. We decided that we would not drive into Denmark tonight so spent a little time driving and have parked up about 20k from the boarder ready for a good night sleep so we are fresh for Denmark tomorrow.



Day 90 19^th November

Flensburg (Germany) – Lake District (Denmark – Jutland Island) via Ribe

Yes we made it, this morning we got up early and hit the road. We were both rather excited that we would be making it to Demark today. When we crossed the board – as always I tried to take a photo and failed, I need to work on a steady hand when taking photos while driving. At first the roads looked a bit like Germany, but then we soon changed our minds, the roads are so straight, without a turn for miles and along nearly 90%!o(MISSING)f the roads are cycle paths. When in the county you can tell its farming land, and this is not because you can see the farm animals but because of the smell. After an hour or so of driving we arrived at the first Danish town we were going to explore: Ribe is said to be one of Scandinavia’s oldest towns dating back to AD 869, and one of Denmark’s most attractive towns. It was raining when we parked up, for anyone that knows me well you will know I hate rain, today due to my excitement I put on my layers and rain jacket and went to explore. The travel guide was right Ribe is very attractive, will let you know once I have explored more towns in Denmark if it’s high on my list of pretty towns. It has nice little cobbled streets and little boutique shops, with canals running through it. I am going to love Denmark if everywhere is like this. While in Ribe Steve and I brought our first Christmas tree, it’s not real and its small enough to sit on Stans dash Board, yes this will be mine and Steve’s 6th Christmas together but due to always being away we have never bothered with a tree, which is a rather ironic that we buy one now while we are travelling. We had looked at a few around but when we saw this one in the shop window we knew it was the one for us. We have not put it up yet, I am super excited for when we do. After exploring RIbe we hit the road to the Lake District, our big map did not have road numbers on for this area and we ended up getting a little disorientated trying to find the lakes. We wanted to find the lakes before dark and go for a run, but we got there just as the sun was setting, we have parked up not far from the lake and the plan is to go for a run tomorrow morning. The plan for tonight is to get snug in our bed and watch a movie. With the heater on for a bit – but not too long as we are still working on acclimatization.

Day 91 20^th November

Lake District – Arhus via Skangeborg and Silkerborg

This morning when we woke there was a little frost and ice on Stans side window. Way too cold for me to get up and go running, but Steve was good and went out, after about 10 minutes he came back for the camera and he said the views of the lakes where breath taking, I really wanted to go look but it was just too cold for me at that time. When later driving passed they were breath taking. Once he returned we had breakfast and hit the road to go and check out two of the towns that had be recommended in my travel guide. They had not been recommended for any reason other than they were in the area and I would agree and say that they were nothing towns, with nice views due to being able to see the lakes. After exploring both towns, we drove towards Arhus – and just outside the town have parked up in a service stop. This evening I have spent baking biscuits, baking is not something I normally do, and it came about due to Steve and I joking the other day that we would keep warm by me cooking cakes, as we would use the oven as an extra heater, so tonight due to it being so cold and me not having all the ingredients for a cake or a cake tin, I made plain biscuits, I really didn’t think they would work out but we have just had some with coffee and they really are not that bad. I think next time I go food shopping I will buy some choc chips so the next batch of biscuits can be a little more exciting, as having the oven as a heater really keeps Stan warm and if tonight is as cold as last night we needed all the extra heat we can get.

---