Bergen op Zoom to Eindhoven

Today (the date on the posting will be Sunday but I'm talking about Saturday. I hope you've caught on to that by now.) was a relaxing day. Our room is the best room we've had yet. It's just beautiful and the hotel is amazing. We had a lovely breakfast and then headed out to explore the town. We were able to keep our car in the hotel car park - again a gift due to parking challenges here. As I noted yesterday, our hotel is on the market square. There were already many people sitting at tables in the square in the morning. The square is very large, made with cobblestones, and surrounded by buildings from the 1500s.

With map in hand we headed for the one remaining city gate. Right away we got lost (we're good at it) and was helped by a teacher who just began her holidays the day before. (It turns out that the entire workforce doesn't take holidays for 6 weeks. The kids are out of school and so many parents take some holidays during the 6 weeks.) The city gates were very impressive. There once was a wall around the city - which had a castle inside it. The castle was our next stop.

It was built in the late 1400s and is the oldest "city castle" in  Europe - at least I think that's what they said. So many facts in day causes things to run together. It's a wonderful castle that's still mostly in use  - for meetings, weddings etc. We were only in a very small part of it and most of that was a museum. Only 2 rooms showed what the castle rooms would have looked like. All the displays are "open" - meaning that people can touch everything. This was concerning, to me, as many items were 600 - 700 years old. All of the plaques were in Dutch only so we didn't get a clear sense of what we were looking at. Frustrating but I guess that's our problem.

When we arrived at the castle, we had to put our backpack (that we take everywhere) in a locker. It wasn't until we were ready to leave town that we realized that we didn't have it. So, in Wales is our umbrella, a bag of gifts from Buckingham Palace is somewhere in England, and our backpack could have been left in Holland. Luckily we remembered it before we left town. We're hoping that's the end of loosing things. Between getting lost and losing things, we're starting to wonder about our mental capacity!

We sat in the market square and had some apple tart and juice. A wonderful  expereince. Europeans know how to enjoy the summer weather with lots of biking and sitting in cafes.

Dave had a list of 3 things we could do. We decided to go to Ouwerkerk in Zeeland to see the Flood Museum. It told the story of the flooding that took place in 1953 when the dike broke. I'm sure Dad remembers that well. The musuem was inside the caissons (huge cement blocks) used to fix the break. Quite a story. It reminded me of Hurricane Katrina and the storm Sandy the east coast recently went through however the number of dead in 1953 was much higher.  After the museum, we walked along a dike for a bit. It was quite hot - 25 degrees - the hottest day yet. There were lots of people out biking - most of them with grey hair.

It was about 4 pm by this time and we decided that instead of going to Rotterdam for a river boat ride, we'd head to Eindhoven where we were spending the night. Hopefully we'll get a river boat ride in somewhere before we leave.  It was about a 90 minute drive to Eindhoven. We're both getting weary of driving  so much each day. Less driving in the days ahead.

We had booked another B&B online for our 2 night stay in Eindhoven. It's always a little tricky doing that since you really don't know what you're going to get. We try to stick to 2 star places - which generally have been really good. As we drove down Parklaan St. (Dad may know this street) we were in awe of the houses. They're like the huge homes on Plymouth St (for the MI readers) or like the very largest homes on Bond St (for the Canadian readers). The house, our room is, in is massive. I think the people on this street have a LOT of money. Jos runs the B&B. He and Dave drank wine and chatted in the back garden and I rested and read.

Only a few blocks from downtown, Dave and I walked to the city center for supper. Loads of places to eat - all with tables outside. We chose an Italian place and had a traditional meal - antipasta (melon and ham), side dish (salmon lasanga - amazing!), main dish (I had the steak and Dave had pork tenderlion - with vegys and potoates) and then dessert (something with white chocolate that was super good). The meal took over 3 hours and was too much food - even though we shared everything but the main course.

We walked back to the B&B and got there about 9:45 - it was still broad daylight. Tomorrow we'll spend the day with my cousin, Kees, who lives only 10 minutes from here.

One thing I learned today: Jos, the owner of the B&B, really doesn't want people to smoke. There's a notice on the door written in 31 languages!

One new thing I experienced today: While we were eating supper there was a man playing an accordian. When he was done, he came over to us with a money pouch open "asking" for a tip. Never seen that before.

Most powerful moment of the day: Reading the list of things that many countries donated to the people of Zeeland after the flood. It was great to see both Canada and the US listed.
 
One pleasurable experience: Sitting in an outdoor cafe twice today.