Took us a little while to leave the suburbs of Alkmaar – when you leave a town you often discover it’s bigger than you thought ! ie not just the historic centre you spent the previous night in . Back to some duny landscape along the coast with a fair bit of cycling traffic , this being a Bank holiday Monday in the Netherlands. Few Bank holiday riders also ! Another mechanical problem with a loose pedal for one of our team that would have to wait for a cycle shop the next day. After some competitive hill racing from recently retired lawyer (I promised not to name you , …..,Angus 🙄) – well OK smallish undulations -to try and destroy me with 18 days yet to go, we arrived in the unremarkable outskirts of Den Helder . Got better as we arrived at the quirky hotel along a waterway with beer and food just opposite – perfect ! Rooms at the top of steep stairs – a feature in this country with tall narrow buildings . An emotional dinner as I bade farewell to my friends who obviously had had enough after 3 days . Ha! In fact most faced an arduous cycle back to Haarlem west of Amsterdam – longer than my stint next day .
The arty Hotel de Werf had a record player plus some albums in each room so some pics below show some of the eclectic selection available -some well known , others less so .. With reference to trawler pic with seagulls following , I was just looking for Eric Cantona to complete the picture !
Days start in Alkmaar
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck …
This was in my room – remember this ?
Round the Netherlands by bike 
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