Europe Revisited: Amsterdam. Getting Started

We flew from Redmond to Seattle, Seattle to Amsterdam yesterday. It was a long day of sitting on planes but compared to the hassles that we are all-too-familiar with these days with planes and airports, yesterday's travels were a piece of cake.

Ready to go in Redmond

The Redmond airport is always the easiest because everyone is very helpful and they never balk at the size of the boxes.

Unlike last year in Nova Scotia, the bike arrived with us and we were unloading the parts and reassembling everything in no time at all.

We cleared customs at the Schiphol airport within a few minutes of landing and our big bike boxes were waiting at the oversized container baggage area before we even got there. Efficient!

Getting our bike boxes to where ever we happen to be staying the first night has always been an adventure. This year we're staying in a generic business-type hotel near the airport. These places are easy and provide lots of space to assemble the bike and get equipment sorted out. The hotel we chose advertised a shuttle capable of carrying sporting equipment from the airport, so we loaded the boxes onto a trolley and headed to the shuttle pickup zone. Alas, the hotel shuttle was far too small to accommodate our big boxes. I'm not sure that they'd even carry a set of golf clubs. But no matter, the shuttle driver had a plan B and she found some guy who said he had a van and would deliver us. We were a little skeptical but played along for a minute or two. It turned out that his van was too small. An entrepreneurial guy, he said that we could put the box in sideways and while it stuck about 6 inches out the sliding door, that was no problem. I told him that it was a problem. He insisted that it was fine, and he said that he'd have us to the hotel in no time for just 100 euro. The hotel is only 5 km from the airport. I said no way and that we'd find some other solution. He was kind of put off but I didn't really care. What a plan B!

So we went to plan C and rolled the trolley back the short walk back to the pickup zone. Fortunately, it was sunny and nice. Along the way, walking by the Sheraton Hotel, Lorie saw a big Mercedes taxi and went into the lobby to find the driver. He said that he could fold his seats down and have everything loaded easily. And so it went. We were at the hotel in about 10 minutes and he charged us 25 euro. Good plan C!

We often try to head off jet lag by forcing ourselves to stay awake. Putting the bike together helps. And that's what we did.

Lots of padding for a kind-of-new bike.

We've done this so many times that putting it together doesn't take much time.

Ready to go.

We stayed awake until about 2000 and then slept through the night. No puppy to wake us up at 0530! Later this morning we will do a trial ride to see if Lorie can manage to ride somewhat comfortably with her arm in a brace. She's still really sore and swollen at times, but the brace locks in variable angles. We'll see how it goes. Maybe ride to a local coffee shop or to the outskirts of Amsterdam. And if we can't pull it off, we'll visit the Sixt booth at the airport and rent a minivan for a week. That wouldn't be our desired outcome but it could be worse. We're just very pleased to be here at all after the past couple of weeks.

More to follow!

Update:

We had a nice, chilly ride of about 35 km today. The primary purpose was to see if Lorie's arm was working well enough to consider riding a full day. So far, so good. It was a bit awkward and uncomfortable, but we are going to try it tomorrow to ride to den Bosch, about 105 km away. The weather looks fairly decent. About 17 degrees and some wind (of course, it is Netherlands), but no rain in the forecast.

Our friend and neighbor, Linda, was very kind and sewed what I call an "arm condom" for Lorie. It is a waterproof sleeve that fits over her brace and can be used in the shower. Lorie figured out that it makes a nifty cover for riding on a chilly day. And it looks very nice. Thanks Linda!