newcastle - holland - germany

On the newcastle - amsterdam ferry

The time on the ship goes directly to European time as soon as you board, but; my phone and watch didn’t! this is confusing for me, I should really have made the change happen on my phone, it does the opposite on the way back when boarding in holland it goes direct to UK time, to save me this confusion I now change the phone time whenever I board, I’ve also learned from experience to switch the phone to flight mode as soon as it moves! Otherwise, you can get caught for expensive maritime rates of data, I took a photograph of the bulkhead door nearest to where the car was parked to remind me which route to take back to it, my cabin was very nice much higher up in the boat than I would normally have got and with a sea view, this was because there were so few passengers, everyone was getting the best cabins at the same price as would normally have bought you right down below - Ver near at the engine room,

While I was parked up killing time at the ferry terminal car que, a Dutch girl had asked me some stuff about PCR tests and directions to the boarding office, when I had bought a beer at the bar and went to sit up decks, she was sitting out on the sun deck with a beer, I asked her if she minded me joining her? to which she replied not at all, her name was Nathalie it turned out she was from holland and still worked for the Dutch military, she had married a Scotsman and emigrated to a town not far from where I live, we chatted all night ended up having dinner together (the vegan choices were rubbish), after dinner we went to the café bar which was closing at nine, we had a beer and went to order another, it was nine pm European time! we thought it was still eight UK time, they hadn’t even shouted last orders, normally this boats bars are open all night the ferry is normally a fun party, it was Nathalie’s round; as we went to our separate rooms she said she would buy me coffee in the morning which she did There was a que of vans and cars waiting to go past border control and customs, there was lots of car searches and questioning getting done, when it was my turn the two border soldiers approached the car window, they were young chaps (to me), they asked for my passport and where I was going? I had my glasses off and leaning out the window as I replied Bulgaria, he then asked how my ferry journey was? I said loudly and happily that it was rubbish as they had shut the bar at eight o clock so there was no party, they laughed waved me through and gave my passport at the office where it was stamped and the barrier lifted, I was passed yet another hurdle all seemed to be going too easily!

The roads in the Netherlands are fantastic they are way ahead of Scotland! so far ahead it made me think we were a backwards country, I stopped for fuel at a motorway service station there was lots of people coming in and out the service station café, shop, toilets etc: I was shocked to see only one or two people were wearing masks as they strolled around shopping paying for fuel going to and from the loo, no masks! Wow it was brilliant I loved it, I could smell the freedom from the covid prison liberty day was coming for the UK, but; it already looked like it had arrived in holland,

This motorway petrol stop was close to the city of Arnhem, which was the chosen route I was taking to get me to Mannheim Germany, unbeknownst to me at that time the banks of the rhine had burst in places all over Germany there was terrible flooding throughout the country, I will never know for sure if it was this or roadworks or just an outdated route finder? BUT; the journey that should have taken me five or at most seven hours took me nearly nine hours! The sat nav popped up with things like road works up ahead would you like to calculate a quicker route, maybe? I shouldn’t have clicked yes! I eventually approached Mannheim from the south east skirting passed Frankfurt, I should have come in from the north west? without a paper map to check and no passenger to help with route finding I will now never know where I went wrong,

I phoned Cameron at this stage who said I would be better using my telephones sat nav, or even the Garmin device as the cars sat nav was proving unreliable, I switched it on my phone as I approached Mannheim putting in the postcode for Cameron’s gym were he said; he would meet me, due to road works on a slip road it ended up a long route in, then once in the city both sat navs were giving me conflicting directions, I couldn’t stop to work out how to switch at least one of them off! Two sat nav devices giving me conflicting directions was frazzling my brain! I seen a KFC and pulled over into it calling Cameron to tell him where I was, it turned out that I was much closer to his house than the original planned car park meet up, I stayed in the car where I was, Cammy was at the car window in less than five mins,

Cameron’s city centre flat has a basement car park, it’s a cool looking set up with cars on a lift to maximum space usage, he had cold beers ready for me arriving I had a shower and got changed to go out, he was very pleased to see me or was it all the Scottish meat and pickled onion monster munch he was pleased to see? His girlfriend Louisa was still working when I arrived, once home she didn’t take long to get showered and changed for us to head out, this is one of the things Cammy likes about her, she doesn’t get too hung up on how she looks preferring to just be herself, it was July in the middle of Germany the weather was wonderful, we strolled through the centre of scenic Mannheim passing street cafes and couples out for a walk in the parks, life felt good I could see why Cameron like’s it in Germany

On other visits to Mannheim me and Cammy would go to murphy’s bar which is one of three Irish theme bars in Mannheim, on this occasion all the people that worked at Cameron’s work were banned from murphy’s, this was due to a couple of the younger ones not following covid rules during the ease of lockdown period! Instead of dealing with the couple of dafties, the pub had just put a cover ban on all Colemans employees, this annoyed Cammy so; even though the manager had said to him he could get back in if he sat through the back out of site he wasn’t going, this meant we had a longer stroll to another Irish bar , I didn’t mind it was a pleasant walk perfect for building a thirst for a cold pint of stout (which was wonderful) we had a great evening