Well, we were expecting a short trip up north from Arnhem to Gronningen - just about fifty miles. The train station in Arnhem was torn up, but only for those trains that were going south. We were told that we could hop the train with only one train switch north to Gronningen. We got to the train station fairly early, about 10:30, bought our tickets and trudged up the stairs to the platform.
After a few minutes, all of the train information blanked out and we were standing there, wondering if anything happened, or was it just a momentary glitch. Jack said, oh, nothing is wrong. I, the pessimist, decided to ask the conductor. He told me that the electricity went out about five kilometers from the station and there was no way to get to Gronningen from Arnhem that day. All these trains run by electricity, of course. I said, please come and tell my husband, because he will not believe me if I tell him the trains are not running.
The nice trainman explained it all to the two of us: the trains could not run from this station, period. We would have to take the bus to a neighboring town, board that train, go to Utrecht, and then change again in Utrecht. We had a good idea of the geography of Holland by now, and we realized we were not headed north but just zig-zagging from west to east and back again. Eventually we would be someday heading north. The trainman even helped us drag my suitcase up the stairs and around the station to the bus.
We took a half hour bus ride to the little town of Ede, hopped on that train and headed to Utrecht. We had been in the Utrecht train station many times, so we knew our way around. I wasn't sure of the next leg of the trip. I asked at the information desk; he directed me to track 11. We headed down there. I asked another train - woman this time - about this train. She said, yes, get on this train and get off at some town, but be sure to get on the last cars of the train. The front cars would be going to Belgium, but the last cars would be going north to Gronningen. I followed her directions to the T; at this point Jack was not sure where we were headed but somehow he trusted me.
We finally got to Gronningen and to the hotel. We thought that we would have a pleasant trip north; it ended up as an adventure. But we were safe for the night. The hotel was very nice, another NH hotel. It was in easy walking distance of the town, and we immediately found nice restaurant for our evening meal.
The next day we headed into town and looked up the tourist information bureau to see if they had a walking tour. They did and off we went, looking up at this and down at that. This town is so far north that I thought noone even lived here, but it is a very lovely town, with lots of nice restaurants, a pretty good town hall and a nice cathedral. We checked the cathedral first and found they had Friday noon organ recitals, so we made plans to go. This was a university town, and they have a pretty big music school.
We took it easy here; there wasn't too much to see and we had actually come this far north to get a car and drive into northern Germany. We enjoyed our few days here, wandered around the town, explored the markets and had our usual wine break in the early afternoon.
The town had its usual pedestrian walkway with its stores of shoes, eye glasses, electronics and telephones. But the stores were, as a rule, very junky and I would not buy anything from any of these stores. The merchandise was just not interesting, and the clothes stores were really bad. I am not sure why I say that, except the presentation was just not interesting.
We took our walking tour and saw a lot of the university buildings; school was not yet in session, so this part of town was pretty quiet. It was a pretty little town, and we enjoyed our time there. But we were ready for our next adventure: getting our rental car and driving over to Germany. I had gotten a pretty good map and so I was ready.
We got up early on Monday, August 2, got a cab to Hertz rental company, got the car - little Ford Focus hatchback - and off we took to Germany. It was a beautiful day and we were in good spirits. We had enjoyed our three months in Holland. It is a beautiful little country with lots of history, lots of canals and lot of windmills. We were glad that we had taken the time to explore Holland, and we had a good appreciation of its art and and its geography.
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