Holland to England

July 28, 2015

Leaving the Continent

Today would be an interesting day of travel for us.  We checked out of our wonderful Amsterdam hotel early in this blustery morning to catch the ferry to England.  Our Dutch taxi moved effortlessly through the morning traffic to the station where were scheduled to take the train to Rotterdam and then make connections  Our timetable showed this as a 30 minute trip, while the same trip four days before and taken us 90 minutes. Little we realize that we were booked on the high-speed Thalys for the first leg.  Unlike Brussels, Amsterdam has elevators that make train travel a pleasure.

We had ridden the same train from Paris to Brussels and marveled at the speed and comfort.  We even found a place to stow our large suitcase!  The helpfulness of the train passengers all over this part of Europe is amazing, since trains in this area don’t check luggage or have porters.

We were soon in Rotterdam and waited a short time for the local train to Hook of Holland, where we would board our ferry. The train ride was a run of less than 20 miles and stopped every mile or two, a real “milk run.”

The Hollandia, our ferry

Our stop in Hook of Holland was at a vacant station in an industrial port area.  We spotted our ferry about a block away.  We found the nearly-empty passenger terminal, checked our baggage and waited to board the ship.  When we hear the word “ferry,” we visualize a rather small craft.  The Stena Line’s Hollandia, by contrast, is an oceangoing ship, complete with staterooms and the ability to carry hundreds of cars and trucks. Kari had reserved us space in a first-class passenger lounge and we enjoyed the six hour crossing from Holland, across the English Channel and North Sea, to Harwich, in Essex.

The weather was not pleasant, but the crossing was uneventful.  Although the vehicle decks were packed, there were very few walk-ons, like us. 
We eventually reached the terminal, went through a rather awkward disembarking and unorganized, but we caught a British taxi which brought us to our quirky hotel.