Despite the hassle from the Marina yesterday, in making us move, we decided to grace their restaurant in the evening which has a reputation for steaks. Talk about popular, a Wed night and the boats streamed in to tie up directly below the tables - very Caribbean. The steaks were indeed excellent and the Dutch brown ale strong. In the pic the mast on the left outside the window is ours. So a bit wakeful last night due to digesting all that unaccustomed meat, and slow up this morning.
Once started we had a most excellent day with our good friend Eric who came over from Utrecht. First was 11ses in the Toren, a very ship-like cafe across the road and 200m left from Centraal Station old main entrance. It was once the corner of the old city wall, from where wives would wave goodbye to their sailors.
Thence to the National Maritime Museum (pics various) where we appreciated many objects and paintings and a tasty lunch. The weather was foul all day with grey cloud and persistent rain varying from drizzle to downpour, so the NMM was rather busy. A fatigue overcame us all at mid-afternoon so we abandoned any plans for more site seeing and instead caught a 48 bus and the free ferry back to the boat where we could relax and chat in peace.
Eric has lived in Holland for very many years and is fluent in Dutch as well as being a sailor. He helped us understand the Staande Mastroute book with some translations.
Lesley cooked a lovely veg curry while the boys had a beer at the restaurant bar, and much of the world was put to rights by the time Eric left at 2200 - if only the world had been listening.
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