Another early start and out for a stroll around this picturesque neighbourhood. As most of the houses don’t have curtains on the ground floor, you get a great view into people’s living rooms. I’m struck by the ‘cool’ simplicity of the interior design – no clutter, lots of space. It takes a well-trained and disciplined eye to achieve that. The sound of the Formula 3 cars can be heard practicing for tomorrow’s race in Zandvoort (it was won by ). Time for another box to be ticked on the Dutch experience and so, off on a bike into the center of Haarlem. This is my kind of cycling, no hills though there is a kind of cycling etiquette and bicycles seem to rule the road but no-one seemed to notice my total ignorance. There was a major comic-fest in the center of town and the main square was full of stalls selling all kinds of wares as well as a lot of illustrators plying their craft. I stocked up on some Star Trek. It took me about twenty minutes to find one of the oldest bars in town, the ‘In den Uiver’, http://www.indenuiver.nl, decorated with Aeroplanes. The original owner had been the purser on the first KLM flight to Australia and it has the distinction of being voted 4^th best bar in Holland. It took another five minutes to find the Irish Bar, Tierneys, complete with cider on tap and Sky Sports. I took what I thought to be the route to the river and found myself in the (tiny) red-light district. It wasn’t even One O’clock and there were scantily clad ladies waving from their windows, well one scantily-clad lady. The river was alive with all kinds of craft cruising up and down, everyone taking advantage of the great weather. I walked around both sides of the river. This is a beautiful town and well-worth a visit if you’re in the area. Great shops and restaurants and the center is quite compact. A beer by the big wind-mill on the banks of the Spaarne was obligatory and it was here I saw a partly submerged fishing trawler. Two guys were trying to patch her up to get her pumped out. It turned out the new owner was Irish, quite surreal to come across a half-sunken trawler with the new master, a thick Irish brogue swearing they’d never sink his boat. Meet up in the Main square for beers and Bitterballen, now becoming a firm, if deceptively hot tapa on the terraza at XO, people-watching well, bike-watching in my case. I’ve never seen so many different ways to get children on to a bicycle. I was to take the train back as the station in Haarlem is the oldest in Holland, in fact it’s a station within a station, the original one having been preserved within a much bigger, covered structure. The family were visiting so it was an evening of bar-b-que and beer and children covered in chips and ketchup and squashed snails, the children, not the bar-b-q, that general, normal family outing sort of thing. We feasted a selection of sausages with salads, baked potatoes and garlic butter. A very early, happy, smiley night.