Into the Great Wide Open

Last weekend me and the 'lads' went to a little island in the north of the Netherlands called Vlieland. This Island is part of the province of Friesland and judging by the look of the average local they were all of viking decent.
We stayed one night in Harlingen and caught the early boats over. H and I on the fast ferry the others on the slow. We arrived within 15 min of each other on the other side. Picked up our rented bikes and headed for our accomodation for the weekend which was only a few min away.

First impressions were there were many more trees than I expected and there was lots and lots of sand.
We happened to be staying near the festival site and could bike there in less than 15 min as well which was convienient.
The first day we went for a bike ride to get the lay of the land and had a look at the festival grounds, and went for a peek in the shopping street.
We headed over to the festival and saw an act before going home to grab a bite and then back to the festival. It was wet.. and I was feeling not much like staying in the rain so I headed back before the others.

Sat was a fine day and Helen convinced us minus one to go to a bike ride. Cors turned around after many sand dunes and the wind against you not the mention the with the extra 15 kilos on his bike and in hindsight I think he was smart to do so... my calves still ache from the ride which seemed to go on and on. But we saw wild cranberry patches, 'muckle coos' (Scottish highland) cows, large waves off the coast and more hills than we have in the whole of the Area we live in.
After we got back to the house we had a glass of wine, made some food and then headed back to the festival to catch Emiliana Torrini who was as wonderful as ususal. I must admit that by this time I was starting to feel the effects of the cold and was not entirely in the mood to stick around at least it stayed dry.
On sunday we had to be up and out by 11 and the festival started again at 12. The others changed their ferry ticket to an early one and headed over to Harlingen for the afternoon to wait for H and I to come on a later ferry.
We went to see Alela Diane and then for a nice long walk through the art trail in the forrest. Which was really nicely done, we also went for another bike ride and visited some friends of H's for some tea.

We also were hoping to get on an earlier ferry and managed to sweet talk ourway onto the boat a few hours earlier than we were booked arriving us home almost before it was dark which was a pleasent change.
It was a lovely festival with a real family vibe to it. I doubt it will or should get much bigger the accomodation and campsites were already heaving from the extra people and I doubt the island could have coped but nice none-the-less. I felt a little bad that I was not in a better mood for the music but it was a nice weekend to be out of the Randstad for a change.