Home -> Europe -> Scotland -> Travelogue 2004 -> Monday 29 March

Back to Holland, a reunion at Rotterdam

After breakfast (why does it take so long....) we quickly drive to Edinburgh and arrive within an hour an a half at the airport. Normally we just hand in the carkey and go to the terminal, but today the car is thoroughly checked. When we confess we have smoked in the car, despite the no-smoking sticker, the man tells us that is more to discourage smoking, not to forbid it.
On the airport we do our usual things: are there any souvenirs we still have to buy? No, then we go to our regular bar and have a coffee. Time flies and in a few hours we are backl at Schiphol, far away from the island where we love to stay.

But this time we don't go home immediately, no, first we take the train to Rotterdam where we have booked a room at Hotel New York. We have a huge hall as bedroom, a former room of the board of directors of the Rotterdam-America shipping line.

The hotel is not far from the central trainstation, unlike the Surinamese cabdriver tells us. It takes 45 minutes before we arrive at the hotel and she keeps on talking, about the fact that this is her first day at the job and that she has so many unfair colleagues. In the end we have to pay € 23,70 and when we walk from the hotel back to the train station the next day we are sure that we have been conned!

At first, we don't like the room too much: it is too big, the furniture could have been bought at a recycling shop and the windows are too high for a nive view. We try to convince ourselves it is all art, but we don't succeed. The windows are also very dirty so our view is not as nice as we had been promised. So we feel a bit of a damper in the beginning. And that for more than€ 200!

But fortunately our gloominess is chased away when we hear the knock on our door and our friends Susan and Astrid stand there, the two girls we have met in Egypt. They totally agree with our comments on the room and then we just forget about it: we are here to meet some friends, not only for the room! They have brought champagne and later we enjoy a good meal downstairs. The waiters probably went mad from us, but we have a fantastic night.

Back in the room we have to turn on the lights and now it looks completely different, certainly after we order a log for the fireplace. It feels as if our holiday will not end yet, not for a long time, even when we are no longer in Scotland!

Travel through Europe and Africa

with Elisabeth and Teije