We managed to take two wonderful bike trips from Leeuwarden during our days there. On the first one we headed due west to the old city of Franeker via a number of tiny old villages. The day was incredibly windy, but promised to be dry, so we took off mid-morning and headed through the small crescent of housing ringing the town and then immediately through wide open fields towards Marssum. The Dutch use an interesting and very practical system of crossroad meeting points—referred to as knooppunten-- as a way of marking the bike routes. Instead of needing to know whether one needs to turn left, right or at all, one simply follows the signs for the next designated number on the map. At each crosspoint there is a map showing one’s location, and with that, one can easily determine the next “number destination”. It is therefore actually possible not to even have a map, although having one with these bicycle points helps from a planning point of view.
We biked straight into a hefty headwind that sometimes left us almost standing still. Along rivers and canals, through endless wide-open(read wind-swept) pastures, and through a handful of delightful tiny towns. The few homes and buildings gather around the often very old church—we ran into several that were 13th and 14th century—although granted many have been restored to at least some degree. Horses, cows and sheep speckle the wide open landscape. We came to another small bicycle/pedestrian ferry and finally reached Franeker, where we were fortunate to enjoy out and out sunshine while we ate outside. Home to the world’s oldest working planetarium, which alas we were unable to visit, it also has a stunning town hall as well as a host of other older buildings. We walked around to get a sense of the place, but then had to jump back on our bikes and hope the wind hadn’t changed, charting a slightly different route back to Leeuwarden. A worthwhile and enjoyable outing.
Our second trip, at the recommendation of our hosts, took us north of Leeuwarden along the Dokkumer Ee, a canal cum river with quite substantial boat traffic, that connects with other waterways and eventually to the North Sea. The path skirts the river for the majority of the trip that we took. From time to time the way takes a small detour through a town, many of which are just as lovely as yesterday's crop. Here, too, there is the possibility of ferrying across the river—as there are few bridges north of Leeuwarden—, but when we arrived at the ferry, we discovered it only crossed in the afternoon, so we continued on until we arrived at the town of Birdaard, which lies at a point where a bridge does cross the river, and where we also discovered a working wind mill. A fair line of boats was waiting at each of the two drawbridges. We watched the first bridge open, while boats moved into the next stretch of river, where they then pay the drawbridge master the small toll for passing. Meanwhile lots of bicyclists—predominantly locals just crossing from one side of town to the other--, waited on both sides of the river. For the tiny town that it is, a major traffic jam, although not a single car to be seen!
We were able to visit the mill, which burnt down about one third of the waydown a while back, but was rebuilt under the guidance of the local miller and volunteers in about 1987. It was a saw mill and a flour mill, and continues to be both. We were basically given a private tour of the building, with very detailed explanations on everything from loading the logs into the mill, to the fact that the gear wheels within the mill are still completely made of a very hard local wood, and we were able to climb up to the fifth (of seven)floor within the mill along with our guide, up incredibly steep stairs, and out onto the “balcony” where one is at the level of the bottom of the windmill’s arms. As the wind is often not strong enough, there is also an electrical mill within the same building. Today’s millstone continues to be stone, however. The complexity of breaking down the grain, separating it into all its components—all done through inner passages in the mill—is actually quite fascinating. The flour milled today is made from locally farmed grains, and is all for private farms, not for any large corporation. Some farmers bring in quite small quantities of grain, and have their own “label”. It did make for an unusual tour, and our guide (a volunteer who grew up on a farm in the area) was really knowledgeable.
From Birdaard we wove our way through still more tiny towns until we stopped for a snack in Oenkerk. Again it was nice enough for us to enjoy the outside patio of the café, and as we were chatting with the waitress about all the horse-drawn carriages that were clip-clopping by, she asked whether we were planning to stop at the Tegeltjesbrug (little tiles bridge), which is the last bridge that the skaters pass under before reaching Leeuwarden during the Elfstedentocht. This 11 towns of Friesland tour—done on speed/ice skates when the canals freeze sufficiently solidly, last occurred in 1997. It's a huge and often last minute all-out operation to put together and brings close to 2 million peoplefrom around the country to watch the approximately 290 km race. The tile bridge shows a picture of the skaters speeding by on the canal, and is made with individual portrait/photo tiles of past participants in the race. Naturally we made the slight detour to catch that little bit of local color and then gradually rode back down the Dokkumer Ee back into Leeuwarden. Another excellent ride.
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