Day 17 – Problems usually come in three’s so we are waiting for the third

Journey: Kinderdijk – Delft – The Hague – Zaandvoort – Haarlem

Our natural contraception is working well and we woke up to Ernest’s balls near our faces 😂🙈 It was a wet and windy morning so I lazed about with Mabel in bed until I spotted a chap in the park setting up a fitness class. Typical me toodles over and asks to join in…rookie mistake always ask what the class is before you sign up! 10 exercise sets of tabata and a countdown 9-1 of two exercises later and I was knackered. Still it’s his new business, I really enjoyed it, and I got to listen to a friendly group chatting in dutch. Meanwhile Mark walked the pups then watched me from the comfort of the van.

It was Ascension Day so a sort of bank holiday and the fitness group had warned me everything in Delft would likely be closed. We decided to drive on over anyway for a quiet potter – turns out it was race day! Three race events were taking place throughout the day, it was heaving and lots of the roads blocked off for runners. I really wanted to join in and asked the HQ but all spots were taken. It’s made me Google races in other town we are visiting just in case as that would be a great way of exploring a new place.

Delft itself was gorgeous, just a maze of canals and little streets, cafes and boutiques. Definitely a nice place to while away the day. With it being race day though it was difficult to get about especially with the doggies so we drove on to The Hague. Apart from a small area of historical architecture, The Hague is dull, just a clone shopping town. You really wouldn’t have noticed if you’d been teleported to Oxford Street.

Markles fancied going to the beach so after a quick scan of the map we plumped for Zaandvoort…there are some huge houses that put Newmarket to shame! To save money we have been wild camping unless we need services, I’m afraid in this case my inner cheap skate got the better of me as they don’t allow parking except for in a designated area which was €22 (with no services provided), and thus we only looked at the sea as we drove past, and are yet again hiding in a carpark. 

It was here we discovered our side door won’t unlock. Fortunately we could escape through the driver/passenger door but it’s not convenient with the pups. After googling I discover it’s a common fault with swift moterhomes and annoyingly expensive to fix, so I spend the best part of two hours, trying to prize various bits of the door panel off, unscrew and rescrew bits all to no avail (we have three screwdrivers and the butter knife was the only thing that fitted). So tomorrow it’s off to a dealership to see if they can fix…and while they are at it we have lost the tap off our waste water tank 🙈

Ah well it all adds to the adventure 😊