The Dutch have many names and stereotypes. From being tall wearing clogs with tulips in our hands to having a head of cheese while smoking weed in orange clothes. But we are never called coffee addicts or caffeinators whereas we are one of the biggest coffee drinking nations on earth. We drink an average of 2.4 cups of coffee a day and on average we consume 8.4 kilograms of coffee a year. That’s more than the Italians, even more than the Finnish, hell it’s more than any other country on earth (statistics from Statista 1st of October 2020).
Nonetheless, no one thinks of coffee when they think of the Dutch, or the other way around. In The Netherlands I’m sure that The Hague is the capital of coffee. It’s the only city where the traditional coffee houses are still standing. Traditional coffee houses are tiny homes, often not more than a shed, on the side of the road where workers come to drink a coffee and have some bread. I even made a book about this Dutch phenomenon (Bakkie Pleuâh). But this time I’m not showing you this coffee house, I’m gonna show you a place where we go every week to get one of the best coffees of The Hague.
Bij Fleur
Around the corner of our home is ‘Bij Fleur’, a small very cute coffee house feeling like home. Besides wonderful coffee (from Roast Coffee) Fleur also sells the most delicious home made cakes. Oh and breakfast, lunch and even beer from The Hague. So, before going on this trip to the other side of the world we of course went to have our last cup of coffee at Fleur.
Fleur dreamed of owning her own coffee house. What attracts Fleur the most about owning a coffee house is that it is so much more than just a place where you get coffee. It’s a meeting place where people relax, work, maintain friendships. Besides, it is the stories behind the people who come to get that cup of coffee and you honestly get to know each other. Whenever we go to Fleur we always have a chat and she is very interested in the stories of everyone. That’s why people keep coming day in day out, week in week out. Fleur, and of course her employees, do make this a place not only to get coffee & cake but also a place to share emotions, stories and whatever you want to share.
Especially during the covid-19 lockdown, people are stuck in their homes and often see no one except Fleur. She has become an outing, getting a cup of coffee, talking to someone, having a social connection. It is very important and Fleur is always there and in for a little chat. She sees it when people are feeling a bit down, when someone needs some attention, when a person is emotionally drained. Thus, Fleur’s coffee house becomes a very important place.
Something I really love about Fleur is that she is using products from local businesses. The coffee is from Roast Coffee which is not only a friend of us but honestly does serve the best coffee of the city. The bread is from Lekker Brood, tea from Kali Tengah and cheese from Ed Boele, all local organisations. Fleur takes ‘keep it local’ to a next level. I love that!
Whenever you are in The Hague, do visit Fleur: Van Bylandtstraat 92, 2562 GL Den Haag
Along the road we will visit many coffee houses and will describe them here.
Wow, I can’t imagine it has only been one week since we voted and left home. We’ve already had so many adventures. From almost freezing to death on the Dutch farmland to eating wonderful home made pizza in Germany and sleeping in the beautiful Schwarzwald. At the moment we are in Switzerland, enjoying snow & sun.
But let’s get back to the Schwarzwald first.
After saying goodbye to Dominik, Nicki & their sweet dog we headed for the Schwarzwald. The last time I explored this wonderful European gem I was 17 I guess. The Schwarzwald is of course known thanks to the brothers Grimm who got inspired by the forests and invented fairy tales like Red Riding Hood, Snow White, Hansel & Gretel, Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel and many more. But the Schwarzwald is also known for amazing hikes, cute little villages and cuckoo clocks.
We didn’t come here for the clocks but we did come here to explore the villages which are often located next to a river in a valley. The villages wind through the mountains following the rivers and surrounded by a dense forest. Like in most villages the church is in the centre of attention with homes surrounding it. In most villages you find a bakery, a hotel, a tiny supermarket and a post office. We have seen some fire fighter stations but no police station.
Outside the villages you find the more typical black forest houses which are byre-dwelling and characterised by a long hipped or half-hipped roof that descends to the height of the ground floor. This type of dwelling is suited to the conditions of the Black Forest: hillside locations, broad tracks, high levels of snowfall and heavy wind loading. While we were hiking we saw so many of these beautiful houses, some with a water wheel next to it, others with animals and we even found a spot to have a schnapps for travellers.
A night in the Black Forest
The first night in the Black Forest we stayed near natural pools. All the hotels and campsites are closed in Germany so it’s gonna be parking lots. In Germany, if you are in transit, you are allowed to stay the night to rest. So, who needs a campsite right?
We decided Ottenhöfen im Schwarzwald would be the perfect place to stay the night. And it was. Alexine, the van, did a great job. She had a little difficulty with climbing and at the end sputtered a little. I guess she grew tired of the highway, so she deserved a night and day rest. We learned in The Netherlands that sleeping in the van can be quite cold and pulled out our sleeping bags. Oh my were we warm. Hot even!
After a good nights rest we woke up early, headed into town for some breakfast. Little did we know that everything on Sundays is closed, except for the bakery. It opened up from 8 to 11, so lucky for us we had a nice breakfast. Love the bread in Germany btw, they have so many options and I haven’t found one that is bad. The cappuccino is a different story though. While at the bakery we ordered a cappuccino but I couldn’t even finish it. I keep that for Italy I guess.
Hiking in the Black Forest
Hiking in the Black Forest is not only a must it is also very easy. Every town, every parking lot, every incredible viewpoint has many hiking paths. There are so many different routes you can take. Want to have an easy short walk? It’s there. Ready for some more adventure and would like to hike about three hours? It’s there? Or are you the crazy type and love to hike a couple of days? You can!
We took an 8km walk through villages, over mountains and visiting a waterfall. It was a great hike actually. We came across animals, farmers, water wheels, schnapps house, dog barking gardens which we had to go through, steep hills, deep slopes, wide roads and tiny paths. We heard many birds and even saw an owl flying away. The waterfall ‘Edelfrauengrab-Wasserfälle’ was beautiful too, but because you can actually park your car there and have a short hike you’ll find many more people there. We didn’t meet anyone on the hike but we did meet many many people at the waterfall. Oh and while the hike should’ve been 8km, somehow we made it 16kms. No idea how, I’ve got some idea why. When we hike we get carried away by tiny paths that look adventurous, mysterious and interesting. Our curiosity where those paths lead takes over often, which means we end up off the road almost all the time. But that’s why we got to see an owl and hiked a very cool path.
Schwarzwaldhochstraße
It was time to get Alexine warmed up for another night in the forest. We drove to Freudenstadt, a one hour drive through the Schwarzwaldhochstraße. OMG! Everywhere was snow and the cloud we drove through blocked the view completely but as far as we could see (which wasn’t that far) it looked amazing!
The Schwarzwaldhochstraße or Black Forest High Road is the oldest and one of the best known themed drives in Germany. It is a part of the B 500 federal highway and leads over 60 km from Baden-Baden to Freudenstadt. The Hochstraße runs at an altitude of between 800 and 1,000 metres above sea level.
Alexine drove like an eagle flies, she took every turn like a dolphin surfs a wave and climbed up the mountains like a sloth moves from tree to tree. Not fast but steady, smooth and free. And wherever we go, we get happy faces along the way. No one cares that we drive 40 where 80 is normal or 60 where 100 is the average. We get there in the end and the people stuck behind us get the time to enjoy the view a little bit longer.
We arrived in Freudenstadt, but for now I’ll leave it with this. Freudenstadt and the night near the city is a different story. Stay tuned.
After a very cold night and great hot shower we crossed the first border. The weather was grey, rainy and cold, so were our feet. OMG! So so cold in the car, the heater isn’t working – never did I think, but now we wished we had a heater installed. Well, we can’t really complain though, it was fun to cross the border and finally get the Volkswagen back onto German roads. I don’t think we’ve ever taken her to Germany, so she’s back home for now.
It’s quite funny because all the way from The Hague to where we are heading now – Kasbach-Ohlenberg – it’s kind of one road. From the A12 in The Netherlands to the 3 in Germany, all the way to Bonn. Not the most beautiful scenery yet but we have just started our trip. Actually after Bonn it starts to get nice with those typical beautiful German villages, mountains with castles and rivers winding through the landscape.
Alexine is doing great. She’s enjoying the trip already. After 5 years of mostly standing still she is now fired up for a big trip. She sounds like birds waking you up in the morning, even though she hasn’t been this heavily loaded by us before. She is around 1300 kilo’s without interior and stuff inside her. I’m sure she’s up to 1500 kilo’s now, which means she’ll have a lot more difficulty with climbing mountains and the Alps are waiting for us. Luckily we are in no rush so she can take however long she needs to climb. But that’s for later. Let’s go back to our second leg.
So, we left The Netherlands behind and drove into Germany without any problems. I absolutely love open borders and wish it was this easy to cross all the borders of the world for everyone. How wonderful travelling is with open borders and not the annoying visa’s and all that. With a bit of traffic jams and work on the roads we arrived in Kasbach-Ohlenberg about half past three.
Dominik welcomed us with a delicious cup of coffee and a warm fire in his wonderful home. We met Dominik in Svalbard about two years ago on the Rembrandt van Rijn while sailing alongside the magnificent Northern island. Dominik told us he makes the best burgers in the world so of course we had to try those. Last time we came here by train and tasted these delicious burgers! This time we arrived with the van and will taste home made pizza from his newly handmade pizza oven in the garden. Dominik and Nicky live in this amazing house, previously owned by a pastor. It has this huge garden and wonderful kitchen. We love being here, drink wine together, eat and have stories about food & travelling mostly. Nicky & Dominik are such nice and hospitable people, they make the start of our long journey amazing and I’m sure when we feel cold or have a glass of nice wine we will think back of our start here.
We still have to figure out some things and finish a bit of work which is nice to do here. I’m not a big planner, yes I’m very organised but I don’t like to plan too much. So, I’ve organised a very nice Google Docs in which I have written for which country we need a visa, what language they speak, which religion they have and what money they use. It included a check list, addresses and government websites which inform us about corona regulations. But, I haven’t installed my GPS tracker yet, haven’t checked if our MiFi (internet) is actually working and have no idea how a satellite phone works (sorry mum & dad ;-)). No worries though, I can figure this out very easily over here. Which I am going to do today!
So the second leg of our journey brought us to a friend in Germany and gives us the time to figure those things out. Also, it’s freezing at night and our next stop will be in the Schwarzwald where it is going to snow this weekend. Not sure if Alexine is up to some snow but I’m not even sure if we are. Luckily we’ve got some extra sleeping bags with us but driving in snow is also quite cold in a car without heater and with lots of cracks in the door.
What do you think? Should we go for some snow fun? Or stay and bake more pizza’s? Let us know in the comments!
On Wednesday 17th of March we woke up early, voted and started our journey towards China. We said goodbye to our parents and headed East. For the night we decided to stay in The Netherlands near the German border, just to make sure we packed everything, we are happy with how we arranged the box and wheel on the roof and to see how Alexine is doing.
We stayed at a campsite on the land of a farmer. We were the only guests and the first ones of the year. The day before he fixed the showers so he now had hot water again. Good for us because it was a very cold night. It was -1 so we slept in our thermo underwear, socks and under extra blankets to make sure we wouldn’t freeze. It wasn’t the best night as we woke up often because of the cold and getting used to the little space we have now. In our home we have a big bed, in the van, well… you can imagine, we don’t have much space.
However, waking up to the sound of birds not cars makes us forget the night easily. And not long after the birds the chickens started waking us up while scurrying around the van. A hot shower was very welcome and soon we were on our way to the first border crossing. Not before Yuri lost his wallet. Yeah, it doesn’t matter how small the van is, you can easily lose things in it! So, we turned the van upside down in search for the wallet. At least now we know everything we have with us and I can tell you; it’s not that much. We still have to figure out what we put where and how we are going to organise ourselves, but we don’t have much stuff with us so that’s a good thing.
Some very necessary things like a volleyball, stroopwafels and peanut butter are of course with us. But we also brought a GPS tracker, satellite phone and MiFi (internet) with us. We also have a lot of camera gear with us and some basic things like pans, cutlery and cooker. Spare parts are on top of the van, we’ve got very good oil (10 liters) with us and a jerrycan with gasoline.
But, because we were in a rush I just threw everything inside the van without really thinking about what should go where. We will figure it out on the road is my believe, as long as we have everything with us.
Our second leg will take us to a friend in Germany. We met each other on our trip through Svalbard. Will tell you more about this in a next post.
Wow! You are going to drive all the way to China? What route will you take?
A question we, not surprisingly, get asked a lot lately. So, let’s share our route. This will be it roughly. Of course there will be things we will add, things we will skip, roads we will take and ways we will omit. The route isn’t written in stone but in Google so it’s ready for changes made while we’re on the road. But, it gives an idea about the route we take and the things we wish to see along the way.
Hi there! We are Milene & Yuri. We are travelling the world together since 2015. Our endless curiosity and will to explore has resulted in many cool, and somewhat extreme, adventures. On MYgrations you'll read all about our adventures, you'll find lots of information about the countries we visit you won't find anywhere else and more. Enjoy!
We’re also grammin’
…
Manage Cookie Consent
Hi there, we use cookies to optimise our website and our service.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
