More summer holidays

Piet's main cycling goal this year was l'Etape du Tour, one of the stages of the Tour de France that is selected and made available for 15,000 cycling enthousiasts, a few days before the pro's ride the same course. The best part of the event is that the roads are completely clear of all other traffic, like the real Tour. This year the stage Briancon-Col d'izoard was selected, which made it logistically easy to participate. After some serious preparation around our own valley Piet was dropped off by Mary in Briancon, but obviously she couldn't follow him by car. She did her own bike ride, and connected to the Etape at a point after some 150 km where she could reach the course and support Piet with food and drinks. At that point Piet had already crossed the Col de Vars, and was in good spirits. The last part, cycling up the Izoard in the afternoon heat, proved to be a real challenge, and arriving at the top required two short stops to recover from overheating and cramps. In the end all went well, and the reward was a long descend toward Briancon, on an excellent road without any traffic, completing a 200 km ride.

The rest of the holidays was spend around the house, with regular horse and garden duties. Dorien worked for 2 weeks in restaurant La Romanche, then her boyfriend Lars arrived, and a few days later 4 friends from their outdoor sports club Slopend. They have planned a 10 day hike around Parc des Ecrins, with as little support as possible.

Then Paula arrived with 3 friends, and they have also planned a week of outdoor activities. As Paula is still recovering she has to take it (relatively) easy, but that hasn't stopped them to go for a 2 and 3 day hike.

In the same weekend 7 family members dropped by, creating a full house. As always we had a great time together, and Piet and his nephews did a few bike rides. This year Sam brought his racing bike and rode a personal record on Alpe d'Huez, beating Piet for the first time. Unfortunately Piet had to return to The Hague that same afternoon to go back to the office. However, there is a final week of holidays to look forward to!

Piet at the start of l'Etape du Tour, in Briancon

Mary doing her own ride to Col de l'Echelle

Casse Deserte, the famous landscape near the top of Col d'izoard

Finish at the top of Col d'Izoard

Regular holidays: Dorien and Mary on a short horseback ride

Jeroen and Piet on top of Col de la Croix de Fer

Piet on top of Col du Glandon, which comes for free in the descend of the Croix de Fer

Dorien and company at the start of their 10 day hike

Jelle, Tim, Paula and Lucas ready to hike to Refuge du Source 

Start of the summer holidays

The planning for the summer holidays is getting more complicated, as the girls are determining their own holidays now. For starters Mary, Piet and Beau drove out on a Friday night, arriving early morning. One of the key concerns was to find a companion for Beau, as the village pony Image, his friend for the last few summers, passed away last winter. When Beau was let out of the trailer another horse was walking around the parking in the village. As we couldn't do anything we let this horse follow us to the garden. in the evening the owner, a former butcher who has several horses scattered across the fields in the valley, turned up and we agreed that the horse, Quinaille, could stay. After a few days they were used to each other, and spend the day together. At night Beau stays in the stable (he is a city horse after all) and his friend remains outside.

The first week was spend in recovery mode, after a very hectic period with a renovation of our bathroom, the broken leg of Paula, a major clean-up of our apartment in Utrecht, and many other things. We did very little; a bit of work around the house and garden, some cycling and lots of reading. We really needed this! After a week Piet went back to work, planning to return a few days later with Dorien.

Beau and Quinaille happily eating our grass

Mary is training Quinaille

Collecting horse shit

 Mary arriving in Le Mollard

Windhoek and surroundings

Piet went to Windhoek again, for his regular bi-yearly engagements with his counterparts in the Namibian government. This was fairly uneventful, with the exception of the weekend. As the meetings lasted from Thursday to Monday Piet had to stay in Windhoek. He worked in the mornings, but in the afternoons he managed two short trips. On Saturday he visited Na'an Kuse, a wildlife rehabilitation centre, mainly for carnivores. Here rescued animals are either prepared for release in the wild, or kept in enormous enclosures for a good captive life. Most of these animals are victims of encounters with farmers, where adults are killed, and pups are kept as pets, and later donated to the centre. Piet joined the carnivore feeding tour and saw cheetahs, lions, wild dogs, jaguars and caracals.

On Sunday afternoon Piet went to the other side of Windhoek, to Daan Viljoen game reserve. As there are no large predators you can walk around freely, and Piet did a nice 7 km hike, without seeing any wildlife. On the drive back to the hotel he got a bonus: a large group of giraffes was leisurely crossing the road.

Na'an Kuse: African wild dog

Na'an Kuse: a caracal

Na'an Kuse: a cheetah with its food: a piece of horse meat

Na'an Kuse: a lion with a large piece of horse

Daan Viljoen game reserve, on the way out

Proof of work: Piet and Dennis with their stakeholders from the Ministry and state oil company NAMCOR

A week in France

Piet and Mary went to the house in France for a well-deserved break from a hectic few months. They enjoyed a week of beautiful summer weather and spend most time in the garden (preparing for Beau's arrival), on the bike (to train for l'Etape du Tour) and on the terrace (reading a book).

They also made a 2 day trip to the Rhone valley, following some of the highlights of Piet's wine trip from March, earlier this year. They visited the Grotte de Choranche, made a nice walk near Valence and ended the first day at La Cachette. This is a restaurant where food is treated as art, and also tastes like that: one of the best dinners we ever had! The following day we did a short walk around the medical village of Malleval, where we finished off a simple lunch with tasty ripe cherries, hanging off many trees. A stop in Vienne was postponed to a later date.

In the evenings they followed the Giro d'Italia, and arrived home just in time to witness Tom Dumoulin take a historic victory. And to see Paula of course, who survived a week by herself, hobbling around with, and without crutches. The wheelchair can be returned!

Grotte de Choranche 

Chateau de Crussol, above Valence 

Food is art in La Cachette 

The medieval village of Malleval

Lunch below a cherry tree

A survival run

Dorien's sports club Slopend organised a survival run for all the students in Delft. It is one of the biggest events of the year, and requires a lot of organisation. Everybody is involved, and has to supervise an obstacle, act as marshal or carry out some other task. In order to prepare for the event  the whole club tested the course a few days earlier. Below are some images from Dorien.

 Evaluating the course

Running across water

Berend and Dorien are helping a Sloper over the wall

Happy afterwards

Horse riding in Belgium

Mary has been following horsemanship courses in Drenthe, in the northeast of the Netherlands, with her friend Marion for the last 3 years. Last year they met two Belgian ladies with whom they got along very well. These ladies are running a stable in the centre of Belgium, and it was always the plan to visit them at some point. Finally arrangements were made for the Kingsday weekend to take Beau and Marion's horse Cascade for a short holiday. Also Piet and PP, Marion's partner came along, with their mountainbikes. The set up was pretty simple: the ladies went out riding with the horses, and the men with their bikes. They stayed in a B&B nearby, in the Merode region, which consist mainly of farmland with small patches of trees.
The stable owned by the ladies is called De Poedertoren, and is run very informally. Their key aim is to give the horses a good life, which normally means that it is difficult to earn a living. Therefore they combine their stable with team building activities and other events for companies. In addition all animals can wonder freely about: dogs, cats, donkeys, sheep, a very fat pig and horses of course. The riding in the area was great, with many different routes. And they will definitely return at some point...

Mary and Beau

Preparing for a ride at the Poedertoren

Ready to leave

Beau is scratching his back after a ride; Cascade is going to join

Monte Cervino

Some time ago Mary and the girls registered for a climbing course with the Dutch Alpine Club at Monte Cervino, near Rotterdam. Obviously Paula couldn't participate, and Dorien's friend Lars was keen to take her place. The weather on the day was perfect, and we turned it into a family outing. Mary, Dorien and Lars left early to follow a day of instructions and practise; Piet and Paula came separately with wheelchair and mountainbike. Monte Cervino is in Bergschenhoek, in a large park where many outdoor activities take place. The park is build on top of an old rubbish dump, creating some artificial relief. There is a challenging mountainbike trail, with steep climbs and descends, and Piet tried a few laps while Paula watched the others. Monte Cervino is a massive, 35 m high structure, with many, many climbing routes. It was extremely busy this day, with ropes and people everywhere. They practiced falls, abseiling and some other techniques that will support them for potential future trips in the Alps. Piet and Paula left them after lunch to look after Beau, the others returned sunburned and satisfied at at the end of the day.

Monte Cervino from the mountainbike trail

Dorien practicing falling techniques

Getting instructions

Busy at the climbing wall: a perfect April day

Mary is stunting on the wall