It’s been two days of solid travel, finally enacting the logistics that we carefully planned months ago.  Rather than fly, we decided to take an overnight ferry from Newcastle to Amsterdam, then a train to Antwerp. It all sounded simple on paper, but the proof would be in the execution.

Luckily the traffic was light driving to Newcastle from Berwick, although we saw plenty of congestion in the other direction.  Ian dropped me at the ferry terminal in North Shields at 11am, and I took the suitcases into a lounge full of people waiting to board a small Fred Olsen cruise ship.  Ian’s mission was to return the rental car to the airport, then take the metro back to the ferry, in time for boarding at 2pm. All was achieved with no problems, and we checked in and showed our passports before walking the gangway onto the Princess Seaways.  This was the closest thing to a cruise we were going to get on this trip, and we were determined to maximise our time on board.

We sailed away from the Tyne, admiring some of the more striking buildings on the northern side.  Ian was able to show me where he’d walked on the last day of his Hadrian’s Wall hike, including his official finish point near the red buoy.  Quickly we passed Tynemouth, slipping through the twin harbour walls of the Shields, and out into the North Sea.  It was smooth sailing.

Cabin 7038 was, well, cosy.  Captain K took up residence on the top bunk, happy to be at sea even if it was only for a short time.  We managed to find places for the things we needed, and stowed the rest.  The bunk beds were actually pretty comfortable.

When I booked the buffet dinner for 6.30pm, I was unaware that ship’s time was an hour forward, and hence we’d be eating at 5.30pm.  Not quite enough time to work up a big appetite, but we are experienced cruise buffet eaters, and we ploughed in.  The food was all delicious and plentiful.  We waddled back to our cabin for an early night.

This morning we were woken by the dulcet tones of the lady on the PA, reminding us to get up and spend our money in the duty free shop.  We sailed into Ijmuiden right on time, and duly disembarked.  A bus was waiting to drive us to central Amsterdam, about 20 km away. 

We saw wind turbines instead of the traditional Dutch windmills, and plenty of canals and dykes.  Everything looked neat and tidy, and people were riding bikes everywhere.

Today was the final day of Sail Amsterdam, a 5 day festival with hundreds of ships and boats of all sizes ready to sail out.  We could see some of them from the A’Dam tower, where we’d been dropped off – right next to the building which helpfully told us where we were, just in case we’d forgotten. 

We were on our own now, needing to navigate our way by various transport means. It began with a free 5 minute ferry ride across the canal to Central station, swept up in a multitude of vessels and people.  Next was the metro, for a 5-stop ride to Zuid stationd, in the much quieter commercial district.  Here we had some time to fill before our train to Antwerp.  Ian spied a sign “Dutch Pancakes – Gluten Vrij”.   For two people who’d skipped breakfast, this seemed like an excellent way to pass the next hour.  And so it proved.  Dutch pancakes are pretty much the same as French galettes, and just as delicious.  They even gave us a tiny clog on a keyring. There seem to be plenty of reasons to return to Amsterdam and have a proper look.

Sated again, we settled in on the train to Antwerp.  These red seats are pretty nice, we thought. Wonder why so many of them are empty?  At this point we realised they were the first class seats, and we were meant to be in the blue seats, so we slunk discreetly down the corridor to our proper place.  The blue seats were pretty nice as well, and we spent a pleasant 90 minutes watching Dutch countryside give way to Belgian countryside.

Arriving into Antwerp’s main station, we oohed and aahed at the elaborate interior, before beginning the search for metro line 2.  Let’s just say it quite some time, and some orienteering skills to find it (OK I fess up, we eventually turned to Google to figure out it was underground rather than at street level).  Once located, it carried us efficiently to our apartment in Merksem, north of the city.  Ted and Margi will join us here tomorrow.  We’ve stayed in entire apartments smaller than our bedroom! It’s a great base for the next week, with serious orienteering to get underway in two days’ time. There is plenty of room to swing an entire herd of cats simultaneously.