The Last Haul: Germany to England Via Netherlands

 

Heemskerk Castle

  A very quick summary: From there, Johanna and I traveled the next day to Heemskerk, in the Netherlands (after making a quick stop in Cologne--or Koln--to see the cathedral), which was an exciting trip as we could no longer understand the language, headed in the wrong direction from our train station, and got caught in a downpour while lost and trying to find our hostel, oh, and did I mention it was getting dark?   Johanna tried communicating with a mixture of German, English and Afrikaans, which was basically a failure, but eventually we were guided to a bus which took us to our hostel (after we promptly walked the wrong direction, away from the castle instead of towards it. Don't ask.).


Anneliese grows tired of writing postcards.

       The next day it was back on the train for us as we traveled to Delft, where we only hopped off the train because I saw some graffiti which said "Delft". Thankfully, I was right, and after a long hike in warm weather (we were wearing our heaviest clothes) we entered into the beautiful city, full of pretty canals and Hollanders happy to stare at the strange sight of Johanna and I trudging through with all our 70 lbs of luggage. Not only that, but we were also lost, which meant that we trudged by several times. At the hostel I was thrilled (as I am sure you can imagine) to find that our 14 bed dual-gender room was only to be occupied that night by us! Yay! After walking about some, we ate our Cliff Bar dinner with sides of pretzels and carrots which Johanna'd de-molded in the bathroom sink, split an Eis, and got lost while discussing a rather deep philosopical thought.


Johanna grows tired of hauling the suitcase everywhere
 

     
   
 On our last day in the Netherlands we walked some more, boycotted the churchs, since you had to pay to enter, and instead wrote some postcards and did schoolwork right at the base of one of those magnificent churches.
        After Johanna finished up some posting/emailing while I watched the Olympic swimmers on tv, we hoisted up our luggage, and hit the road. We took a train to the Hoek van Holland, a shipping district on a canal to the North Sea, where after getting dinner and ice cream at a seafood place (which was actually quite nice) and spending all but 5 cents of our euros, we returned to the docks, where we boarded the good ship Stena Britannica, which would take us overnight to Great Britain.  The sunset and view from the deck was absolutely magnificent.

  











           At 6 a.m., which to us was actually 5 a.m. body-clock time, our ship arrived in Harwich, England. From the ship we entered dark, overcast, rainy Britain in the middle of a rather gloomy and uncheery industrial port. We managed to drag ourselves and our luggage onto a train bound for London before Johanna crashed, only to wake up just in time to see the London Olympic Stadium zip by. Dismounting at Charing Cross Station, we and our luggage trudged out onto the streets of London. Determined to make good use of our train travel-card days by seeing some of London before we headed back out to Cantebury, we managed, thanks to mini maps and our own knowledge of London, to find our way to the Tower of London! There we ate a very early lunch before we taking a rather wild hike over to St. Paul's Cathedral.

 

       "O my gosh..." was all that came to mind as a mixture of fear and awe crept over me as I turned the corner and saw the great Cathedral of St. Paul's, London. Then the next thought was complete awe that we had somehow, by the grace of God, managed to obtain a choir residency here! After sitting outside the Cathedral for a little while, unable to enter due to the ridiculous fact that one has to pay to enter, we left for the the train station. Upon arrival we learned that unlike the wonderful train systems in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and just about every other country, the train system in Britian is different, not to mention absolutely ridiculous. London has seven train stations ringed about it, and each of these stations goes to a different part of the country with almost no overlap or even connections to other districts. So, if you are going to Cantebury, it is not possible to go from Charing Cross; instead, you have to take the underground to Victoria Station, which will then take you to Cantebury. After paying 4 pounds each to take the underground (a ridiculous sum for those who have spent weeks spending no more than 4-5 euros each per day on food only), and after a rather nerve racking experience where Johanna got caught inside a metro, and I (and Johanna's wrist) was stuck outside, we finally managed to make it to Victoria Station, and from there we took a train to Cantebury.


      



      After hiking to the most incredibly hospitable and homey hostel ever (Kipp's Hostel at Nunnery Fields), we spent a lovely two days wandering about Cantebury, and even going to a service in Cantebury Cathedral, which was the first service we had been to in weeks that was not in German or Latin (Yay!), and also had communion!
          
      





         Unfortunately we had to leave Cantebury all too soon, and after a hectic trip through London which involved us speed-walking and lugging all our luggage from Charing Cross Station to Paddington Station, which is technically no longer in London, but in a different city, through the crazy busy streets of the Olympics (we even saw an Olympian from Russia; we're pretty sure he was a pommel horse competitor), just to get on a train to Bath, which, when we did finally manage to get on, was so full that we ended up standing most of the time. We arrived in Bath at about 9 p.m., and started the long, long hike up to our hostel, which was way (way) up on a very steep hill called Bathwick Hill. Arriving at the YHA hostel at 9:40 p.m., we promptly crashed. Having spent weeks on the road, it was really nice just to rest over the next few days. Both of us were on the verge of being sick, it was cold and rainy out, and the thought of climbing down the hill, only to have to hike right back up soon after, was a very discouraging thought (the thought of catching a bus, which, as it turned out, is what all the strapping young men did to get to the hostel, never crossed our minds). We did manage however to visit Gay Street, where Jane Austen resided once, and visit the very charming Jane Austen Center, followed by a stop in at Bath Abbey (the first free church we had seen, not to mention would see!), one of the oldest Abbeys still standing, and home to the first crowning of a united England's King, King Edgar. We also strolled over to the Royal Cresent, hung out in the Circle, and walked past the Roman Baths.

The lovely ladies of Bath

          On August 10th we left Bath and stopped in Salisbury for lunch and a look at the Cathedral (had to pay, too bad...) before heading over to Surrey outside of London, to stay with a family we found through Candle in the Window (a really cool hospitality network--check out their website at http://www.acandleinthewindow.com/ and join--it'll make your life more interesting!). Picture a family with eleven kids, six of whom still live at home, which is dedicated to God, but never stops laughing (or at least making Johanna and I laugh), and you have the our host family. Johanna and I loved watching movies with the family, then just sitting back and laughing as the brothers provided us with a bantering aftershow.

       The next day Johanna and I traveled into London to wander about, visiting the British Museum, and attempting to watch the Olympics at Hyde Park, which was a bad idea, as the walk was very, very long, the wait almost as long, and we ran out of time. Running through the streets of London to get back to the station in time, (around Buckingham Palace, across the Wobbling Bridge, nearly lost each other while dashing through a festival, etc...) we ran into Waterloo Station only to watch our train pull out. We hopped onto another one, which actually got us there earlier than the other one would have!

Last morning on our own

        On August 12th, Johanna and I got up at 5:45, said goodbye to the family, and left to meet our choir at Gatwick Airport by 8 a.m., which included our two younger siblings.

If you want to read more about what happened after we met up our choir (and it was a pretty awesome tour, if we may say so ourselves), then go to our choir's blog: http://www.deanerychoirtour.org



Johanna, our siblings, and I back together

We hope you have enjoyed this blog, and forgive us for not updating it in such a long time!  Thanks for reading and for your comments!

Sincerely,

Anneliese and Johanna