It was good to see Courlis was nice and dry after the very cold and snowy winter spent on the hardstand in Eibertsnest Marina in Kuikhorne, Zwagwesteinde
Edie and Otto were here, having just had their boat taken out of the hall and put in the water, they stayed a few days before going back to Germany by car for a couple of weeks. On Tuesday Edie took us shopping to get all of the heavy groceries, beer and wine, then it was time to unload the bikes, fenders, etc put inside for the winter and start to get some order into the boat.
On Monday 3rd May the cold weather started. 6 days of the coldest weather we have experienced has had us searching under the bed for all of our warm clothes. The wind is coming from the North Pole and the days have been constantly around the 10 deg C in the day and 5 deg at night. Even Kevin who does not usually feel the cold like I do has been wearing a woollen beanie and scarf as well as jumpers and coats. Going to the loo is a big decision, no central heating makes timing critical when having to remove so many layers. Going shopping was also a big production with our wet weather gear on top of all the coats. It is a wonder the tyres held out.
Yesterday, Sunday we had our first sunny day although the wind is still coming from the North Pole, we finished doing all of our getting ready to cruise things but decided not to set off yet hoping it might warm up in the next few days.
Monday and it is cold and rainy so we decided to take the bus to Leeuwarden and then onto Franeker to see the Eise Eisinga Planetarium. We had missed seeing it when we passed through Franeker on the way to Harlingen in 2008. After checking on the internet that it was open off we went to the bus stop. In Friesland travelling by bus is very reasonably priced and a good way to sight see.
Eise Eisinger built the scale model of the solar system in his living room in his house in Franeker starting in 1774 and finishing in1781. It was finished just before the discovery of Neptune which was lucky for Eise as he would have needed a mighty big living room for the accurate scale model.
The planetarium is the oldest working planetarium in the world and driven by a mechanism using 10 000 nails as gear teeth in the cogs. All of the working parts can be seen by climbing steps up into the roof space above the living room.
Tours of the living room are given at half hour intervals so we did not have to wait long for the English commentary. All through the museum the written explanation is in Dutch and English which was such a pleasure and very interesting.
The Eise Eisinga Planetarium is an amazing accurate piece of technology built over 229 years ago and a must see when you come to Friesland. Here is the address.
Tuesday afternoon we ventured away from the heater again and rode our bikes down to catch the bus to Kollumerzwag, a small town well known for its huge secondhand shop. The building covers about 80x50 metres and has two stories. I got some green stemmed wine glasses from the glassware section. As you can see there were plenty to choose from.
Then we ventured into the tools section. Here there were men diving into boxes of old tools and fossicking among the shelves which held a real treasure trove for the males of the family.
Next we went looking for hiking poles without luck, then saw a nice barometer we got for 6 euros and to another section where I got a thingummy I liked,.
After going through the winter jacket section Kevin got a very nice warm jacket and I got two raincoats. Just as we were wondering how we would carry all of this we spied a beaut little gas barbeque so that came home too.
On the way back to the bus I took a photo of the beautiful street trees.
May 12
we are inside the boat with all the curtains closed, reading books and keeping warm thanks to our little heater. In all the 6 years we have had the boat we have never used the heater as much as this year. I have completely changed my mind about wanting to spend a winter in Paris in a boat. We were going to leave today but it is too cold.
