We have quite an itinerary this summer, starting with a flight from Perth to Vienna to do an 8-day self-guided bike ride from Vienna to Budapest in late May. We will then return to Lady M taking the night train from Vienna to Amsterdam, and then by car.
We are planning to spend all of June, July and most of August on Lady M visiting north-west Germany and as far south as Dortmund, passing through the Netherlands provinces of Friesland and Groningen & Drenthe along the way.
On our return to RFU in Jirnsum for winter storage, we will also prepare Lady M for sale at the end of our season, in the hope of finding a similar-sized ‘sedan-configuration’ motor cruiser to replace her and continue our travels in future years.
Portugal is our next destination – Lisbon for a few days before doing a self-guided hike with friends to visit various windmills and villages in the Coimbra region. This will be followed by some time in the city of Porto, and then a couple of days with friends in Viana do Castello, before returning to Lisbon by train for our flight home in mid-September.
Vienna to Budapest by bike
We have used a local bike tour company to arrange bikes, accommodation and luggage transport for our 8D/7N self-guided ride along the Danube river, averaging about 55km/day of easy / moderate terrain in Austria, Bratislava and Hungary.
We have done a number of similar tours over the years, in counties including Italy, Vietnam, Portugal, Spain and Croatia, and have always found that cycling (very much like boating) is an ideal way to explore and meet the local people at a sensible pace, whilst giving us time to ‘soak in’ the experiences along the way. We will spend two extra nights to explore Vienna before we start the ride, and similarly three extra nights in Budapest before heading to Lady M.
Our plans on the water
We are planning to depart Jirnsum on 2 June, crossing northern Friesland via Dokkum, Zoutkamp, Groningen and Delfzijl, and entering Germany via the tidal Ems River. Travelling south on the Ems along the border to Dortmund we will do a clockwise loop, including a section along the Rhine (with the current) from Duisberg to Wesel, before returning north on the Ems then east along the Mittellandkanal to Minden and possibly to Hanover.
We will then make our way back north from Minden via Bremen on the Weser River, and hope to then return via Bremerhaven, then cross-country via Wilhelmshaven, Aurich and Emden before re-entering the Netherlands at Delfzijl. We will return to our winter storage at RFU in Jirnsum via the Eemskanaal to Groingen and then the Van Starkenborghkanaal.
At this stage we have three lots of visitors planned to join us along the way, two in the first two weeks, and the third group in our final week, so that will certainly keep us on our toes!
Portugal
We had hoped to get from the Netherlands to Portugal by train, but it is looking like a flight will be the most viable (though not our preferred) option. We have four nights to see a bit more of Lisbon (the last time we were there was in May 2013 – that’s 11 years ago!), then off to Coimbra and surrounds for week, during which we will spend five days doing the “Ancient Windmills’ self-guided walk with a local company.
We will then take the local train to Porto to spend four days exploring this ancient city, followed by a couple of nights staying with old friends in Viana do Castello (which is about 80km north of Porto) before taking the train back to Lisbon and flying home in mid-September.
All-in-all its a fairly long holiday with a busy start and finish, and plenty of relaxing time on the water in between to enjoy what will almost certainly be our last summer on our lovely Lady M.
We hope to do our first post on the water around mid-June (after our early guests have departed) . . . . .
Our travels aboard Lady M 