Leiden to Delft

I am a rotten photographer

But that doesn't stop me from trying.  Mr friend Taco thought the ride from Leiden to Delft might be boring.  I assured him it was not and that it was quite pretty.  

So this past Monday I took the camera and randomly took pictures as I held the camera in my hand and rode.  I started just outside Leiden and kept snapping right into Delft.  I then mounted the camera on my handlebars for the ride home in the evening, but gave up because they were all motion-blurred.  I left a few of those at the end.  I am afraid I did not make my point very well and may have confirmed his worries instead.  

Video

I still maintain it is a lovely ride.  Twentyfive km through horse farms, and wild preserves, and a yacht club/goat farm, and small cities.   The goat farm/yacht club had a sign advertising goat meat and mutton next to the pen.  I thought that was just adding insult to injury.  I hope they have the decency not to teach the animals to read.

It was about -1 when I started and only got up to around +1 or +2 so the ice was quite thin, but stayed on many to the canals.  There's a picture of some ducks breaking a little trail through the ice with their feet.  It was pretty funny to watch.

Here is a quicktime video of the photos.

Stills here.

Killer ducks

I see packs (ok flocks maybe) of these black birds with ivory beaks.  I asked Thomas if he knew what they were.  He told me, but I have now forgotten.  I have forgotten because my brain was overloaded with his warning that they are quite aggressive.  I'll be sure to pack my holy hand grenade of antioch.

Civilization

The thing you might notice is that the bike road is everywhere well maintained.  This is not some nature preserve, sight-seeing trail.  This is how people get around. It's how I go to work in Delft.  This is the norm.  The voting population demands well maintained bike roads.  They get salted long before the car roads.  My second week here, they closed the A4 for a bit because of the ice, but the bike trails were salted.

Stan Lee makes road policy

With great power comes great responsibility.

In the country, the road is wide enough for a car and two bikes to pass.  Cars are allowed but in a reversal of the perverse US policy, bikes always have the priority.  Imagine that, the guy in a two ton (or here more likely one ton) killing machine bears a greater burden of responsibility  than the guy on a fifteen kg bike.  Country speed limits are typically 50 kph , sometimes 60 kph, and usually in town it drops to 30 kph.  

If there is a bike-car collision it is almost invariably the legal fault of the car.  This policy has a noticeable effect on driving habits.  I have not yet been given the old right hook here ( a driver passes on the left then makes a quick right turn cutting off the biker).  It is an almost daily occurrence for me in the States. 

A fly in the ointment

The one thing I object to here is that small motorcycles (aka scooters) are mostly treated like bikes and are allowed on the bike-only trails.    Little old ladies and sensible folk are fine, but there is often some teenager zipping along at well over the speed limit and menacing the rest of the trail users.  I don't know why these vehicles are not treated the same as full-sized motorcycles since most of them will go a good 80 or 100 kph and could easily hold their own on regular roads (not the superhighways).  I never see any policing of these guys, so there is a bit of wild-west attitude.  Occasionally there is a recognition of the insanity and scooters are signaled to the main road.

Word of the day

begrijp.  Understand.  Ik niet u begrijp.  A.u.b. sprekt u langzaam.  I don't understand you.  Please speak slowly.