While in Amsterdam I read about Kinderdijk, and that I could get to it by bike from Rotterdam. It was another Amanda adventure as I pursued my passion for preindustrial tech at this UNESCO windmill site. Plus I discovered that windmills are tiny houses! Who knew?

I read a travelers notes about the UNESCO site that told me you could get there by taking the train to Rotterdam then riding a bicycle to Kinderdijk. There was a guided tour offered for $500 as a bicycle ride from Rotterdam for a half day event, so I thought I ought to be able to manage that on my own with my new skills using Apple Maps. All I had to do was copy the address from the tour’s itinerary.

I could take the bike on transit with it’s own ticket. Leaving at noon I arrived in Rotterdam where I took out my lunch of Gouda cheese, salami sticks and mixed nuts while I contemplated the route ahead which I had studied view-by-view the night before.

My phone was leashed around my neck and could sit happily in the inside pocket of my jacket where I could hear the directions just fine. In this fashion I managed to get out of town onto a country road. As I rode along I saw a man, a Black man with his bike parked by the side of the road eating blackberries from a hedge. 

I stopped to do the same. Those were the sweetest berries I had ever tasted, and I decided to take a picture of this roadside eatery. That’s when the low power notification flashed on my screen. I got out my back-up power bank and looked for my cord. I couldn’t find it anywhere. In a panic I struggled to shut off the map app, figured out how to lower power usage on my iPhone, and shut off the phone. 

Then I stood there for a long time contemplating my options. I could play it safe and turn back, but the object of my quest was too compelling. Even if I did come this way again it wouldn’t be for another year. I had given the route a hurried looking over before I shut off the phone. I saw that it followed the canal all the rest of the way on a bike path. It was 3:11 p.m. My arrival time had said 3:36 p.m. given that I didn’t get lost. I had to try at least. 

So I set off. I was going great for miles and then the path seemed to merge with the highway and there were too many choices of bike paths. I followed other cyclists into an underpass. The signpost said Centrum a word I’d seen before. I asked a man sitting on a rock which way to the windmills. He shrugged raising his hands in the I don’t speak English gesture. I mimed windmills with my arms and he shrugged again and we both laughed.

I followed a cycling couple in full cycling gear including helmets. No one wears helmets here except with those racing bicycles.

“Hello can you tell me how to get to the UNESCO windmill site?” I asked. 

“Oh you mean Kinderdijk.”

“Yes, yes.” I said enthusiastically. I couldn’t pronounce the name so hadn’t said it.

“It’s a long way from here,” said the man hoping to discourage me on me townie bike.

“I have already come a long way. I came from Rotterdam,” I said which was three times the distance. “But my phone died and I can’t find it now,” I explained. He looked at his wife and she took over while he went into the Lilly snack shop.

“This is Krimpen aan den I Jissel,” she said painting to the ground, “and you want to take the road to Krimpen aan de Lek,” she said pointing in the general direction. The terrified look on my face prompted her to take out her phone so she could show me the road. 

“And how do I get to that road?” I asked. She described the route, I had just come, under the underpass to this Centrum, which I realized meant shopping mall or maybe city center.

“Oh that’s where I went wrong,” I said. I repeated the name of my destination thanked her profusely and headed off. Between a little jissel and a lot of luck, I would find my way.

I knew that my journey entailed a ferry ride across the river. I just had to find the ferry. I wasn’t seeing it. One more ask of an elder man walking on the path and I was pointed down the road I had just crossed. Down that road a piece and I found the line of cars for the ferry along with another cycling couple in street clothes who were smiling at me. OMG, friendly Dutch people! They were looking at me just waiting for an introduction.

“I’m going to the windmills,” I said elated. “I rode all the way from Rotterdam on this beast,” I added thumping the saddle. They laughed and asked where I was from. I told them San Francisco and we chatted a bit about the high cost of Bay Area housing, the tech giants with their large compounds, and why people were choosing to move here to Europe. I asked if they were locals. Yes. Just one town over. When we got to the other side they kindly escorted me to the correct left hand turn to get to my destination.

Kinderdijk is basically an island, surrounded by a canal, with 16 original windmills and a working mill. The museum part had a working pumping station to move water in the canal, and a movie theater building that showed a sophisticated animation without words about the movement of water and what was built to handle the floods. 

An American woman, with a Southern accent, taught me and others how to play with the site’s model to turn all the windmills so the blades would turn with the wind. Once all the blades of the windmills were spinning you got a smilie face lit up. We had a spirited game of it. I just had to see the inside of a windmill and then I would be satisfied.

Since I refused to get on the hop-on/hop-off boat and be stuck with a crowd of people at every site, I set out on my bike getting lost every which way until I finally found a path that accessed one of the two windmills. It was just about closing time, but as they were still waiting for one more tour group, they let me in so I could examine this tiny house windmill.

Every detail satisfied me with its authenticity, down to the hand crank Singer sewing machine. The ladders up each level reminded me of my own loft ladder. There were different bedrooms and a sitting room which was the only room heated. Same in my house. I could easily imagine living there except for the constant cranking noise of the wood gears of the blade. I bet they knew what was going on outside with every sound change. I inspected the fully equipped wood shop, delighted at the duck pen, and was pleased at the size of the vegetables in the garden. 

I didn’t get to see inside the mill or the other windmill, but I was satisfied and this would give me a reason to come back.

My legs were aching so badly by this time that I really did not want to ride all the way back to Rotterdam. I pictured a nice train I could board with the bike. Meanwhile I was miles down the road when I realized I was going the wrong way and turned back. It was amazing I could still ride though it hurt to sit down on the saddle.

I could not find the ferry to get across the river again and I was yelling “ferry” to every cyclist I passed hoping for some information. One woman yelled “ferry” back but did not stop. I got back to the Kinderjilk road to ask someone and found that I had missed the last ferry an hour ago. This could be really bad I thought, as the wind picked up. I rode on a bit further and found people waiting at a bus stop. 

There were tourists who would know nothing. I looked for a local and saw a young person looking at her phone. Now that I knew that Dutch teenagers had six languages stuffed into their heads, I was confident she could help me. She was a brown person  wearing a hijab. I was a brown person wearing my Lawrence of Arabia hat which had blown back so that the flaps that were snapped together rested at my chin. I pushed my bike in front of her.

“Hello,” I said, “Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure,” she said.

“Can I put this bike on that bus,” I said pointing to the bus stop sign.

“No,” she said sadly, “but you could lock it up and come back for it tomorrow.” Her English had an English accent that comforted me.

“That would be a long way to come. I rode from Rotterdam,” I explained.

“You could ride to Rotterdam from here. I’ve done it, but I don’t know the way,” she said. “There’s a bike rental place down there,” she pointed. “They could tell you.”

“It’s probably closed,” I said steeling myself.

“No it’s still open,” she assured me. I crossed the street and started going towards the street level building. It looked abandoned.

“Not that one,” she called out to me. “Down there”, she pointed to a driveway that tracked way below the dike we were standing on. I saw the bikes and walked down the dirt road to the bike rental shop. 

A man came out as if expecting me. A brown man, possibly Pakistani. Maybe he had gotten a text from the brown people’s network. Ok, the girl.

“Can I help you,” he said. 

“Yes. I’m afraid I’ve gotten myself into trouble,” I said and explained about missing the ferry and the phone going dead and needing to get back to Rotterdam. He invited me to come in and charge my phone.

“It’s an old phone that uses a fire wire cable,” I said.

“Well that’s the same as mine,” he said offering the cable end to me. Miracle of miracles. He and the other bike shop attendant, a Dutch fellow of European descent, discussed my many options.

“Where did you come from” the Dutch fellow asked. 

“San Francisco,” I said and they both laughed.

“That’s a long way to come on a bike.” Ha ha. But he knew to ask that my final destination was Amsterdam not Rotterdam so adjusted the plan accordingly. There was a boat I could take up the river 8 minutes up the road, which would take me to Dordrecht. There another 8 minute ride would get me to the train station which would get me to Amsterdam.

My original helper gave me a piece of paper to write down directions, a map upon which he circled all my destinations, and finally he gave me the fire wire cable when I showed him my back-up power bank for which I had somehow forgotten or lost my cable for it. I was astonished. That would help me immensely from getting lost again.

“You are so kind,” I said.

“Next time come and rent a bicycle from us,” he said.

“I will and I’ll bring others,” I said as a gesture of my gratitude for his help.

I enjoyed the slow boat up the river and had a final angel help me as I attempted to get the bike through the gate at the train station because the ticket I was using was for another system. The younger station attendant came out to figure out my problem and went to the ticket kiosk to get a ticket out for me himself. An express ticket to Amsterdam.

“I suppose I’ll have to wait a while for it” I said as I stood on the platform. He looked at his hand held schedule device. 

“There’s one coming in one minute,” he said.

“That’s miraculous,” I said and thanked him profusely.

It was 10 p.m. by the time I got to my hostel, but it was still light out which was the final gift of these long Northern days and why I knew it would all work out somehow.