Netherlands' countryside visit and back to Prague

Monday, 4^th February 2013 – Travelling – permalink

For the weekend I am going to visit Fanny - a friend I met during her exchange in Prague. Her parents have a farm, so I am excited to see everyhing and mainly a bit differnet country side.

Peat moor near Deurne, source: my picture

On Friday it was raining in Maastricht and I worried a bit about the weather for the weekend. On Friday afternoon it got better, for a dinner I met my Czech friends again and after having a dinner together I went to meet Mathilde for salsa evening. Well, I forgot everything but basic steps, but I was just looking forward to the atmosphere. Luckily I also met another friend I met during my stay in Maastricht, who is from Lithuania. Awesome evening with friends.

On the next day when I woke up, it was raining again, but at the time I get on the train the sun was shining and I left Maastricht again – this time to Deurne. After about an hour and a half and one change of the train in Eindhoven I arrived to Deurne. Fanny came to pick me up and drive to her parent's place – a farm.

Countryside in the Netherlands

As I stated a few times on my blog, the country side in the Netherlands is different compared to the Czech Republic. Firstly, it's completely flat and also people are more spread, there are just houses everywhere I also experienced for the first time a road in NL, which had big holes in it Not everything is perfect here But back to the farm. They breed cows for milk, and I could see everything. It's so cool, how the latest technology makes the production not only effective, but also clean. The farm is surrounded by acres of land, now covered with grass.

We took a short hike to the nearby forest with small river. There is a war memorial, as a bomber was shut down and crashed here. I was a bit disappointed, because there were no remains of the plane, just a board about the history of the aircraft and a small memorial. The sun was still shining so when we walked thought the alley back home, it seemed like there is spring already in the Nethelands, no winter any more.

On the next day, we visited a peat moor quite close by. It was something different and I liked it, though it was like in a detective story placed in England by Sir Authur Connan Doyle. The weather was windy, grey clouds everywhere and cold. I bit depressing, you walk on a path and on both sides you can see moors filled with water and fallen trees. If you would add some mist, it would be just it. I enjoyed the walk and then also the ride through the countryside back. It's really nice, that there are houses everywhere

During my stay at the farm, I also visited a Korfball match, played games and enjoyed drinks with Fanny's friends and it made my stay even better, but I had to leave on Monday. So back from Deurne to Eindhoven.

Eindhoven Airport

Accommodation at Eindhoven airport, source: my picture

When I got out of the train I headed directly to the bus to the airport. But they changed the system of tickets. Previously, I had to buy a ticket in the machine located in the middle of the bus, but now I had to go back to the train station where they sold me the ticket for 3,5€ at a special counter. Hm, new, but more complicated and expensive system. And nobody checks the validity of the tickets anyway.

Airport in Eindhoven changed a lot since my last visit in June. They are building a new accommodation facility on the top of the airport building and the they are enlarging the airport building as such too. The also moved and extended number of security check controls. This airport is really growing but there is not enough space for passengers at the gates and I found only one socket where I could charge my laptop. They also put restriction on the free internet connection and limited it to 3 hours. Well, better than 15mins in Prague. The airport was very busy, as within 30 minutes 4 planes from 3 different companies arrived and were scheduled to departure again. Crazy.

Wizzair has a new policy about hand-luggage you can take with you on board, but do not know if they even check it. I was only asked to show my bag at the gate, but I didn't have to put it into the metal cage nearby. A guy behind me, had a bag, camera and even an umbrella and nobody said anything to him. Hopefully they will stick to not checking it.

Flight home was ok, but train to Prague was so delayed that I took a different one. On the other hand, I met an old friend of mine from high-school at the train station, who was travelling until Pardubice with the same train, so it was very nice to travel together. So after a long day, I finally arrived in Prague, which would be much faster if only Wizzair would not cancel the line flights between Eindhoven and Prague – and the company still has then in their newest brochure, what a shame!