Busy, Busy day! Nearly 200 photos, and not much time to select ones for the blog. We started off with a short bike ride from our mooring in Tholen to a point on the river where the barge was waiting for us. It was a nominally 20 mile ride, but I managed to make it about 23 by missing a turn. The great thing about the way ExperiencePlus marks the routes with chalk arrows is that once you realize that you haven't seen an arrow for a while, you simply backtrack until you find the one that you missed, and you are back on course. So, I had no problem making it back to the barge for our noon departure for a sailing luncheon to Antwerp. The lunch was outstanding, with a shrimp cocktail followed by a smoked salmon wrap and concluding with sorbet and fruit.
Lest I forget -- here is the video of today's ride:
https://www.relive.cc/view/gh38192774940
The highlight of the day's cycling was a water crossing that was actually below the water level (see the picture), and a climb up a very interesting monument that reminded me of the work "Ascending and Descending" by the Dutch artist M.C.Escher. I climbed to the top and found that the view was not all that spectacular. For a good part of the day we were in forested areas which was a change from the heavily agricultural areas of previous days.
I need to digress and put up a few photos from last night's visit to a working windmill. It is for sale, by the way. The owner bought the property as a residence (the house is attached) but as the brick work started to crumble he realized the need to take corrective action and after a lot of effort goat approval and funding for a restoration that ended up costing 750,000 Euro.
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Kurt turning the "hat" of the windmill
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Back to today -- We arrived in Antwerp, passing through the very large port. Of particcular interest was the "port house," pictured below.
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| Amtwerp Port House |
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Janice, one of our excellent guides
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We had a two or three hour guided walking tour of Antwerp, ending at the Cathedral with two massive Rubens masterpieces. Dinner was on our own, and four of us had dinner in an excellent Italian restaurant adjacent to the MAS (a large, new museum). After dinner, we took a series of escalators to the top of the museum where we had a panoramic view of the City of Antwerp.
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| The MAS |
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| Draw birdge -- picks up two motor vehicle lanes and two bicycle lanes. |
So, here it is, 9:30 in the evening, and I am ready to close my shipboard office.
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| Aboard the Magnifique |
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