I have friction burns on the inside of my thighs. Sorry if that’s not how you expected me to start this update, but it’s been 17km today in a body designed to walk a tenth of that. Apparently it’s the hottest April day on record in the UK but my walking was done somewhere warmer – over 30C in the shade. The Dutch know how to respond too; every patch of green covered in sunbathers, and the sand on the Rhine bank treated as a beach by mothers and their children. Speaking of sand, every time I return to my car it’s been covered in a fine layer of yellow sand; guess the hot weather’s been imported from the Sahara. I should enjoy it while I can though, looks like I’m holidaying in the rain from Sunday onwards.

I saw the Rhine from a bridge, which wasn’t too far at all now the Germans have gone. I passed over it on my way to a museum that’s quite strange. Lets say you build a nice farmhouse, you, your family and other people live in it for 400 years (1600 to 2001) then some bugger goes, “Sorry, we’re building a high speed rail link and your home is in the way.” What do you do?!

The Dutch have an easy answer. They cut the building in half, stick it on some impressive trucks and take it to Arnhem, where it joins dozens of other buildings that they’ve transplanted from across Holland. The oldest migration I could find was 1901, so they’ve been at it for a while.

So breakfast was a hot sausage roll from a transplanted 1860 bakery. The guide includes a ‘key highlights’ option if you don’t have all day to spend there, but I did so I skipped it. Two hours later I’d seen everything and photographed large chunks of it. Annoyingly I was so focussed on getting a photograph on my phone to share with you here that I didn’t get one of this scene with my camera.

Not just a windmill, but a wind powered sawmill too, and if you look at the shadow on the water, photograph taken from ancient Dutch draw bridge thing.

The site was infested with schoolchildren. I think being a teacher in Holland must be extremely easy, just dump your class in the nearest museum, give them a treasure hunt to assure they look at some of the exhibits, and sit in the cafe for a few hours enjoying a beer. Happened at the outdoor museum, happened in Overloon yesterday and happened in the museum I visited next.

Which was unfortunate. To make me cry is really easy. Just show me a couple of ounces of bronze with the words ‘for valour’ written on them, attached to a bit of purple cloth. Fortunately the museum didn’t have one on display. Unfortunately they’ve got a special guest exhibit of all five of them won at Arnhem. 40 Dutch kids looked confused at the large man in tears.

Holland is neat and clean and tidy, but even compared to Dutch standards my next stop was just pristine. If you can tell a nation by how it honours its dead then the UK has nothing to fear. I like war cemeteries, as they’re quiet, thoughtful and the layouts follow simple patterns that my brain likes. I’m generally not doing them on this trip, not least because I’ve already driven within a hundred yards of at least eight – they’re hard to avoid in this part of Europe. But as I’d finished both planned museums by lunchtime I had time to spare, so popped briefly into one.

After that it was back to the bridge, a surprise museum (in which a Dutch lady told me she’s grateful to the UK for liberating Holland from the Germans) and some photographs.

And it was still only 3pm! So I went to the zoo.

There are photographs. About 400 of them. I shall publish when I get home 🙂

The zoo finished me off though. I think it was walking into the greenhoused ‘desert’ section and feeling relief at how cool it was that made me realise how dehydrated I’d become. I think I saw most of the animals though, before I fled. I needed to, it’s not a cheap zoo to get into. In all the day’s cost over £50 in entry fees and carparking.

Dinner was on the hotel terrace, lovely view. Having dinner there and not in the restaurant caused confusion for one waiter, but the one serving drinks on the terrace seemed well up for doing some food too. Unfortunately his English isn’t great so it was all a bit of a gamble how my steak would be done. Mushrooms to start, t-bone steak for main. Done to perfection.

Today’s warscore:
Arnhem, Oosterbeek, everything was a win for the dastardly Hun. 4-1 in the final reckoning, although had the British listened to the Dutch fans telling them the Germans had 14 players on the pitch then things might have finished differently. Nonetheless a defeat the Parachute Regiment includes in its battle honours as highly as any victory.

Today’s drive was quite short, as mostly I was walking:

Third night in this hotel but checking out in the morning. Something special planned for tomorrow 🙂