Madurodam - little Netherlands, an into Belgium

21/6 a day at Madurodam

Awoke to a fine, warm morning in Delft and headed out for a family exercise with mum running ahead around the lake, dad walking (nursing sore rib) with the kids on their bikes conjuring stories of the Beany Kid vs Dutch Fairy running relay around the lake.

After breakfast al fresco style we headed off to Madurodam near the centre of The Hague, along swirling superhighways that fully disorientate you as they spin and dip and incline - the IPhone Tom Tom screen looks like a kiddy drawing with intersecting circles everywhere.

Madurodam in Scheveningen (that’s a tough one to pronounce for Aussies) is an   entertaining interactive small scale model depiction of Netherland’s highlights focussing on man’s contribution esp in engineering innovations to keep the water out.

Maeslant Dam

Schipol Airport

Wouda Germaal!  world's biggest functioning steam engine

Amster Dam

Some things we learnt:

Dutch invented so much - telescope, microscope, the cassette tape and the compact disc (Phillips), they export expertise in engineering, design and architecture, in fact their biggest export product.

They are the biggest exporters of vegetables in the world, and sell 45 million flowers/day!

Of the iconically Dutchie foods tourists love the choc sprinkles on bread most and raw herring with onion the least, the opposite of Jen!

They are a real cycling nation - the 1st fietspad (cycle path) was built in 1882 in Utrecht.  There are more bikes than people and the vast majority of trips < 4km are done on bikes - c’mon Aussies!

Kel relished all the little things, Wil loved the doing things and overall it was an apt way to spend our last day in this very fine country that has surprised us in so many ways - we love it!

From Madurodam the plan was to head south to the Oosterscheldedam’s haringvlietslius which is a daring engineering feat that has largely locked out the furious sea but allows the gentle ocean in to maintain the ecosystem.  9km long, a dam in the ocean, 3km of which retracts upwards to allow the tidal movement, except when it gets angry, then they just shut it out by lowering the walls.  Drove over it, noticed a beach to our right on the North Sea which was crowded with people despite the heavily over cast sky and near gale force winds - those Dutchies do get out! 

Just kept on driving through a tunnel under the sea where on the other side, TomTom directed down a bunch of small country lanes. Wil noticed that all the number plates had a B on them - we were in Belgium!

Noticed 2 more things - the roads are rubbish (spoiled in Holland) and the skies opened up - the rain hammered down for our last 45 min into Brugge where we stopped in a council ‘aire’ for the night, Jen cooked a Tandoori fish (fantastic) and we planned our walking (Wil dissents and wants to ride) tour of Brugge tomorrow, the centre of which is only 2km away.  Nice community motorhome stop amongst trees and on banks of large canal full of expensive boats.  Oh and how long will we stay in Belgium??  A few days?  Maybe a few weeks.