Waking up near the quiet forest we packed and readied ourselves for breakfast. A more basic breakfast but sufficient.

Carved animal by the front door bid us tot ziens (bye).

A beautiful day awaited, hot forecast, but a pleasant 19C when we headed off. We would follow canals today and see lakes.

We came all the way to the Netherlands to see a wallaby! There were five I spotted, including three white ones.

We crossed over by this ‘thing’. Make of it what you will.

Nice part of the canal in a small village.

Pretty and peaceful.

We stopped to ‘talk to’ these miniature ponies. Very cute, but that hair!

That’s better, I rearranged what was very coarse hair around the blonde one’s ears. We had a good giggle. One good flick of the head and the mane will be restored. At least she could see now!

A floating duck….

Pretty chateau.

Statue in the park at Heerde where we found a supermarket to replenish our cold liquids and some nourishment.

Heerde was setting up for the finish of a cycle event. Me at the finish line.

Then another Aussie. This was on the Sunweb bus. Michael Matthews is an Australian cyclist, having won stages at the Giro, Vuelta and Tour de France.

He is not with this team now so their bus needs updating but nice to see. He rides with the Australian Jayco team, and recovering from a crash breaking both wrists.

I do have a Michael Matthews story. On Zwift years ago I used to lead an event called Crikey Down Under. We would ride as a group then at a certain point, the fastest riders would form a group called the Galahs and try to lap my group, the Wombats.

The route was around London and about 5.5 km laps, so the galahs had to work hard.

Michael Matthews joined one time and ‘asked me’ if he could participate. I was honoured he joined…no asking needed. The other Aussies in the event were also excited.

You might think he’d be a Galah, but he went as a Sag rider, picking up riders dropped off to bring them back.

Humble for a man known as Bling. Always had a soft spot for him since.

Super nice to see an Aussie on the side of a bus so far from home.

I laughed at the cow on the right who was scratching its head on the other cows bum, need to be careful with those horns!

One might think we are in the Netherlands.

A fortification in a village. Note the long wall.

Lovely river, with the horses enjoying the coolness of the water.

A pretty house boat. This looks a permanent fixture.

We even saw dinosaurs.

Zwolle is a very happening city with vibe. I did wonder about our partial glimpse of this structure over the waterway. The building with a growth.

It is the museum. This photo is from their website. A mix of architectural styles.

Zwolle, castle just appearing in the background through the fountain, people enjoying the water riding through the fountain sprays.

The castle we could see through the water spray is this, actually a city gate.

Sassenport was built in 1409, and listed as one of the top 100 Dutch heritage sites.

We crossed another bridge and stopped to watch the water activities. Predominantly young people in the boats, with some families. They were all having a ball.

This bridge reminds me of one of the tools in my Swiss Army knife present recently received from Ben.

All kinds of users on the paths.

We followed this canal up towards our overnight destination. It was super warm cycling now pushing towards 30C.

A little farmhouse had a sign out saying ijsje…we’ve learned that word quickly, it’s ice ream. We got two icy Calypos and two cold cans of saucy (water).

The view from the cafe canalside.

A family pulled in with mum and kids hopping off to grab refreshments.

We thought we were minutes away from our overnight stay in Giethoorn. We passed by a sign that said car parks were all full. I wondered about that.

We passed by some emus in a yard…another Aussie connection.

We only had a few turns to arrive, then pandemonium on a bike.

Every man, woman and child that was not in a boat was here, Taking up all available footpath space.

Today was a public holiday hence all the people.

We literally walked the last few km, save a few times we could scooter the bike.

Giethoorn has 2600 residents, with homes along 90km of canal network. It is known as the Dutch Venice.

The village is located in the heart of De Wieden, one of the largest nature reserves in the Netherlands. Together with De Weerribben it forms the largest peat bog in North Western Europe.

Centuries ago, peat cutting and floods created the lakes and the canals.

Most of the homes are thatched farmhouses, accessed by wooden bridges.

The bridges are super steep when pushing a bike with gear. I reckon we crossed a good dozen getting to our place.

Some of the local homes.

Found our place eventually. Crossed the bridge and onto our own island. You can tell where we are staying by the clothes that are drying.

We went searching for food, the crowds had started to thin. We knew many food establishments were open having passed by on our 2 km push a bike trip in.

We did enjoy a lovely meal, by the canal. From our table we watched this Great Dane. He was on the other side of the canal, on his owners island, watching each boat pass by.

Every now and then he singled one out and bark at them. Lots. We laughed as it reminded us of our Khaleesi. Some people can go by our place without her reacting, others she lets rip.

We wandered out to the large lake that our island backs onto.

It is huge and super popular even at 6 pm.

Walking back to our unit we smiled.

Our bridge. It is steeper than it looks, with timber trim on either side for foot grips. It was not easy getting our loaded bikes up, through the gate, down.

We sat on our deck enjoying the cooler air. We are amazed at the number of hire boats ploughing up and down the canal. Some of the drivers are terrible, bit like some of the cyclists we’ve seen. No sense of steering straight hitting the side of the canal, crashing into other boats.

I filmed these lads enjoying themselves.

Inching our way to Northern Netherlands, this is today’s route.

Today was a fantastic day on the bike. Bit too hot, but that aside, just brilliant. The scenery, the cycling infrastructure made it a very enjoyable touring day.

94 km today, 1077 km total.

🚴❣️😊