On the move...

My goodness, a busy few days...

I left Tavistock just after 7.00am Saturday on the bus to Plymouth. From there a whole day on the train, changing at Birmingham, to arrive in Glasgow late afternoon. Up to Margaret McDonald House (Glasgow School of Art student accommodation) in Bucleugh St where I had a room for two nights. Not the most welcoming accommodation but there we are, it was 'cheap' (comparatively).

Sunday I caught the train to Dalmuir station to spend the day with Aunt Christine and Marjorie at Ramsay St. Also ANGUS. 

The man in charge...

Aunt Christine and Marjorie

Cups of tea, chat, lunch out, walks for Angus and late afternoon train back to Glasgow before leaving the following morning to train down to London then underground helter-skelter to catch a train from Liverpool St to Harwich in order to get the overnight ferry to Hoek van Holland. All a bit rushed, this leg, but its purpose was to see Christine and Marjorie and it was lovely to do that.

I loved my compact little cabin on the Stena Hollandica and being up on deck early to watch our entry on a calm, fine morning into the Hoek van Holland. From there train to Rotterdam (chatting to a young Canadian lass) another train to Den Haag, tram to Rijswijk and who should I see, coming towards me on bikes along Bilderdijklaan, but Lauren and Merel. Like coming 'home'. After lunch L & M left to catch the day ferry to Harwich (!) and I went into the village to do some food shopping and get my hair cut (the relief!!). Nina and Lasse have become Nina, Lasse and Benjamin (for at least part of the time).

Nice to be back :-)

'My' house...

Rijswijk has, at some time, been a village quite separate from Den Haag. Now it is a part of the city. Bilderdijklaan (the street name) runs off the main route from Den Haag to Delft. I can get off the tram from the central city and walk two minutes to the house. It's not an affluent part of the city but I like it. 

The church around which the nearby shops are clustered

Bilderdijklaan is a tree-lined street of three-story apartment blocks. 'My' house is on levels two and three. So you come in through a tiny entrance garden, through the front door and up the steepest, curved flight of stairs imaginable. On the first floor are the kitchen (tiny), a toilet (even tinier) and a huge, airy living, dining and study area which was once three separate rooms but now runs the entire length of the house. I love this room. Through one window you look out onto Bilderdijklaan, the apartments across the road and all the activity below. Through the back window you glimpse lots of greenery in the back gardens of further adjacent apartments. 

No 35 on the second and third levels

Up another similarly steep flight of stairs are a bedroom, bathroom, another toilet, a study (for Merel) and Lauren's music room where she teaches piano and practices her singing. I am sleeping in this room - a mattress on the floor (there is only one bed in the house). I don't have to be on the floor - it is my choice to stay here; the mattress is very comfortable and I am very happy.

'The stairs' - impossible to capture their steepness and narrowness but you get the idea...

Getting there - the Kiwi flew too...

Phew! PHEW!! The non-flying kiwi is a sensible bird...

It's now very early Tuesday morning (Netherlands time) and the timeline since very early Sunday morning (NZ time) goes something like this...

Up 3.00am. Final preparations. Feed chooks (in dark), feed cats, feed Possum (cat) up the road. Leave Governors Bay at 7.00am to pick up Claire in Opawa and out to airport. At airport, as requested, THREE hours before departure. Flight late leaving. Ten+ hours flight to Singapore on Singapore Airlines. Five hours wait in Changi airport. Twelve+ hours to Frankfurt on Lufthansa. Two hour wait at Frankfurt after lengthy, snaking queue through immigration. One hour flight to Amsterdam, also Lufthansa. Find train station below airport. Try and pay for train ticket to Den Haag - machine won't accept my carefully pre-loaded with Euros ANZ Travecard. Top of a LONG queue of busy people with functioning cards. Lovely, patient Dutch lady who coped cheerfully with my post-flight miasma and incipient distress. Mastercard to the temporary rescue. Train to Den Haag Central, them tram from the centre to Rijswijk where Lauren and Merel met me at the tram stop and we walked a short distance  Bilderdijklaan 35. My 'travel light' policy pays dividends.

Random flight observations: the food on Singapore Airlines (for airline food) was delicious; the food on Lufthansa was crap. ChCh-Singapore leg sat next to an Indian couple, from New Delhi, who had just spent three months with their son and daughter-in-law and 2 1/2 month old grandson in Christchurch. The son teaches at the University of Canterbury. Small world. On the Frankfurt-Amsterdam leg sat next to a little (maybe Turkish?) girl of about six or seven, who was separated from her father up ahead. Such a lovely, self-contained, serious little lass who gently but firmly demonstrated that she didn't need any help to do the airplane stuff and who rewarded me with a beautiful smile as we disembarked. This is one of the reasons I love to travel - to experience the rich variety of the world, be reminded of how diverse and yet connected we are.

And back to Den Haag. Such a warm welcome from Lauren and Merel who leave this morning for Germany, Switzerland and Italy. Met Merel's parents and several friends who dropped in, met much loved cats Nina and Lasse, had a short walk to the local shops, tried to deal with my email - grrrrrr, server won't recognise my webmail account, meaning I can receive but can't send email messages. Working on that. All this in a haze of serious flight fatigue...  But I am here. Intact.

To those of you who might be reading this and who have sent emails, I'm sorry I can't reply right now. I have read your messages :-)  I may be able to find a location where I can access webmail. And/or I am working on setting up a Gmail account...

Photos haven't been a priority so far, but a couple to finish with...

'Upright' bikes outside local shops. I was taken by the pink plastic carry-box!

Lasse commandeers my bed-in-the-making