The Mad Red Motherf**ker World Tour.
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Here's the next installment - finished the Christmas celebrations and straight off to the Netherlands we went! Yesterday we were at the in-laws, today at my Mother's. We drove straight to Den Helder from there. This is where the ferry to Texel leaves, to the first and largest of the West Frisian Islands.
It's the place we go on vacation, sort of our safe space and sanctuary.
I first went there with my parents at the age of 12, and have spent at least a few days every year there ever since. It was the perfect vacation spot when I was a kid, and my parents bought a house there early on - thus we went on every occasion we could. I was the only one from our family who kept on going there regularly, but still my parents decided to sell the house some years ago. Still, we kept going, renting a place in the same holiday park.
I had been trying to get my own place there ever since my parents sold theirs, but when there's a waiting list three pages long at the reception in that park alone, it's not an easy undertaking. We had incredible luck two years ago, when an opportunity arose, a once-in-a-lifetime thing. We jumped on it, and now go there as often as possible.
It's an 370km drive to the ferry, that is anything between 3 and 6 hours (mostly 3, but it can be bad on a Friday afternoon). That's a little too far for 'just' a weekend, but everything that is longer - public holidays leading to longer weekends, and every school holidays there are we go there.
It is beautiful to see the island changing throughout the year, things you wont see if you're a 'regular' tourist. I'll show you some spots during the course of the next two weeks.Here's the Mad Red at and on the ferry:
We had a full moon tonight:
Our place is the one with the lit windows:
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Forgot one thing to add: it was right at that ferry terminal where I heard 'Bullet in the head' by Rage against the Machine for the first time, see my music related post above. Must have been the spring of '93. Blasting from a VW bus driven by a couple of surfer type guys. Looks like it had a lasting impression on me.
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Well, by the end of this post you're going to ask me how cold it was - around 1-1.5" I'd say...
So they've got this tradition in the Netherlands - a 'Nieuwjaarsduik'. And yes, this translates to New Year's Dive. First time for me.
Despite the beautiful looks, it was windy as fuck today, with outside temperatures of 8°C (46.4°F) and water temperatures of 6°C (42.8°F).
Here's me checking in. You get a lovely orange bobble hat for free:
The MRMF ready for action:
The view from the starting line:
Still smiling:
Waiting patiently for the start:
Too crowded to take picture of the action, so here's me afterwards:
Finally warmer clothing, the N1 is a better piece for the beach... Sign translates to 'fat seal'.
No MRMF was harmed during the making of this post!
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holy crab
that’s tough 
frohes Neues
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Legend
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I have warmed up a little... The weather is pretty bleak, though. Lots of rain, and very windy - up to 10 Bft tonight.
As the island is mainly below sea level, it is difficult to pump out all the water after longer periods of rain. A lot of paths are flooded.
One area is left flooded on purpose - where the sea broke trough the dunes centuries ago, and left a giant salt marsh:
We went to one of the museums today, a seal shelter and natural history museum.
Also on display - whales, which are washed up to the shore fairly regularly. New on display is the skeleton of a fin whale:
Bones of a blue whale:
Oh, and @Alex - that wouldn't have fit in the pot for the Three Penis Soup, right?
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@WhiskeySandwich thanks, man! Looking forward what you will do on your leg of the tour. Am I safe to assume some Easy Rider style action?
And is there anything I can try to sneak through customs for you? A small bottle of booze possibly? -
@tody LOL nope thanks though! haha idk it'll be cold but I'll try and get out on the bike and have my son or somebody snap some pics. Otherwise, I'll probably just be going about my daily biz. I don't want to disappoint, but I don't have any travel planned in the next few months. I'll try to capture some shenanigans though!
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@WhiskeySandwich @tody I can second the Josh Homme reference!! Rock star status big time!!
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Hell yeah. UHF ballad:
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Thanks guys - TBH, I had to look up Josh Homme as neither Kyuss nor QOTSA are my cup of tea.
(The guy I'm familiar with from these two bands would have been Nick Olivieri, now playing for the Dwarves and the Svetlanas.)Tomorrow will be our last day on the island, so we visited some landmarks today.
As I posted before, most of the island is below sea level. Nowadays they are using electric pumps, dumping the water out the other side of the dike:
In 1878, that was a completely different deal. They used a windmill to drive the pumps:
More landmarks - shipwrecks (probably a tiny bit more on this tomorrow) occurred regularly.
The 'Iron Cape' is a structure used for navigation in daylight:
During nighttime, you obviously need light. In a perfectly red lighthouse:
At this time of year, the lighthouse is open at nighttime, too.
That is not the distance to Gosport, more like Great Yarmouth:
