Beside the Seaside

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In Which I Get A Brief Attack Of The Willies

December 16, 2006 by Mike

Bergen aan Zee

Route: Oosteiende - Bergen aan Zee

After a shaky start last night I fell in love with Holland today:

The People
Filling up at a petrol station in a tiny village on the coast, the attendant and three passing teens were all fascinated to see, hear and ask about the trip. (I'm a sucker for anyone who likes to hear the sound of my own voice.) And in a big room with a large window, facing the petrol pumps, a group of kids stopped what appeared to be a birthday party to line up at the window and stare as I filled the tank. They seemed to think I was fascinating despite (or perhaps because of) not being able to hear me.

The Place
There aren't as many modern, spindly, metallic windmills as there are in Denmark, say, or northern Germany. But everywhere I looked today I could see good old-fashioned windmills. Squat wooden windmills, the kind with mice in, there on the stair.

It's a busy little country, packed with people, but I've seen plenty of landscapes just crying out to be painted in heavy oils, with bright sunlight breaking through leaden skies over distant fields, a small copse of trees here, a flock of sheep grazing there, a walled town in the distance. And a windmill or two.

The Water
Everywhere. Not just the occasional light shower, and not just the sea looming the other side of the dyke, but canals and rivers and ponds and lakes. If this trip is about finding somewhere to live near water, then Holland goes in to the charts very close to the top. I *really* liked some of the houses.. but not quite enough to stop and put in an offer. Maybe if it was summertime and I could see the sun.

--

To the port of Harlingen.

In fact, I approached by riding the road under the seaside dyke. Not sure at any stage quite how legal this is. It may just be a cycle path.. a thought reinforced when the 'road' emeged beyond a shipyard onto a huge concrete bluff built to protect the port from the sea. To tell you the truth I got an attack of the willies -- the bluff is about 30 metres high, built of rough, knobbly grey concrete with a rounded top. It was like riding the motorbike up the back of a beached whale. I suddenly had one of those moments -- "How the hell do you expect to get off this thing, Mike?" -- when the unconscious feels strong enough to take over the veer you hurtling off the side into the sea, just for laughs. Luckily, I intervened and, step by trembling step, negotiated the bike round until I was facing in the right direction.

Harlingen itself, when I eventually got to the town centre, was charming, with scores of old sailboats bobbing on the canals and portside. Very special.

--

Another milestone reached today: riding along/ across the Zuider Zee - a 20 mile causeway across the mouth of the IJsselmeer Lake.. it was the IJsselmeer Bay until the causeway was completed, cutting off this large body of water from the sea. It's somewhere I first remember seeing on Blue Peter, of all things. Thst was back when I thought I was going to grow up to be a Blue Peter presenter, of course, like every middle-class kid in Britain. As Biddy Baxter mysteriously overlooked me, I've had to come here under my own steam.

Riding the Zuider Zee, I was hugely grateful for the high, protective dyke on my righthand side, the seaward side, cutting off not only the chilly waters of the North Sea but from a cutting sidewind. But that dyke also cuts off half the view. It's only on stopping at the monument to the construction of the whole thing, close to the south side, that I had a chance to gain my bearings. It's an extraordinary sight - the road diaappearing straight as an arrow off into the sea.

The Zuider Zee becomes my second favourite ZZ: below erudite professional Texans ZZ Top but far in advance of surly headbutt champeen Zinedine Zidane.

One thing about this ZZ, though: since its completion in the 1930s, Amsterdam has been cut off from the sea. 70 years ago I'd have had no choice but to ride round Flevoland to the capital. Now, having decided that the Rules Of The Trip include manmade land such as this causeway, I can cut that bit of the Netherlands off my itinerary. Coming so soon after I bypassed Hamburg, this comes as a shock. Aren't I going to see any of the fleshpots of northern Europe? (Purely for the purposes of the blo-- I mean diary, naturally...)

Not today, anyway. I have a destination in mind. Way back in Norway in August, I rode straight past Bergen in a snit because it was raining. Holland has a Bergen of its own, and better still Bergen aan Zee, which my rapidly-improving Dutch suggests is 'Bergen-on-Sea'.

In the hope that this is not the Continental equivalent of Walmington-on-Sea -- all Dads' Army, blue rinses and zimmer frame-bedecked bowling greens, I steer my way there.

It's not Walmington-on-Sea. It's quieter than that. But for one night only, a room in a B&B that last had a paying guest at the end of September suits me fine. Once the owner's jaw has been picked up off the floor, and the smell of rising damp has been dispelled by an open window, and the resulting freezing air has been turned out by a large and powerful radiator, I settle in for a quiet night of BBC2 and my book.

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