2003-06-18 - 4:42 p.m.

Original Date: 2003.05.30 :: Jesus Day and the River Rhine

Yesterday was Ascension Day. It is a religious holiday that is not celebrated in the U.S., but is in the Netherlands. On Mondays and holidays most Dutch shops are closed, so Redwood planned for us to first travel to this small village which is some sort of national forest, and then rent bicycles.

A Dutch national forest is not the same thing as an American one. Basically the forest was one of the few bog / marsh lands that had not been drained in the past millennium. However, much of the forest / marsh is farmed, so the park is most just a series of trails.

Some of these trails are small roads, others are dirt foot paths, and the rest fall in between. The land is largely flat, so riding the rental bikes through the forest and meadow was a snap.

Amazingly I've been afraid to ride a bike for the past year, but by the end of our bike riding day, I was totally goof-balling it, i.e. horsing around.

Now I'm considering buying a bike for riding in the U.S. We'll see, as bikes require helmets and other things.

Note to travelers in the Netherlands: round trip tickets are always recommended. We almost got stuck in this village since the regular ticket counter was closed and the automated ticket machine only would take coins, which I had few) and the Dutch have an aversion to change machines. Redwood did find enough money so we could at least go to the next station, and fortunately we did so before the regular ticket counter closed.

Our next stop was to visit Redwood's uncle (a water engineer) and aunt. Their English was excellent and they both were awesome hosts. It was nice to see a more normal Dutch community and family. Hanging around with Goths sometimes you get sick of pot and constant talk about how superior Europe is and how EVIL America is. It would be bearable if it came from people who get out and do more than just party. Plenty of the same types of rants can be found in any San Francisco club. [And it bugs me here too.] Fortunately there are so many cool people it all washes out.

So when Redwood's uncle dropped us off at the train station, he suspected something was wrong. Naturally, being an engineer, he was right � something was wrong: only every other train was running. Instead of just leaving us at the station to wait a second half hour, he drove us back to the River Rhine (the German name) and gave us a quick water tour.

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