Thread by @Voidjumper

Tomorrow I'm planning to hike cross-country from Enschede to Amsterdam as a sequel to this hike:

This will be the thread for collecting any notes, take-aways, or pictures I have of the trip, whenever I have the power & data to spare.

https://twitter.com/Voidjumper/status/1198726063372804097?s=20

https://twitter.com/Voidjumper/status/1426140258886987776?s=20

The context for this hike was a joke we were making along the way about our next trip being us walking to Amsterdam. Cut forward almost to years later and at a meet-up braai we're discussing summer plans. A friend posits doing something physical.

We briefly contemplate doing the Pieterpad, from Pieterburen in Groningen to Maastricht in Limburg—down the length of the country. But between vaccinations and work and other commitments we couldn't get a schedule together.

So the old joke returned: What if we hiked the breadth: from here to Amsterdam? And that became the plan. The original trio who made it home from Ootmarsum, plus a good friend from theatre we all knew.

Thing is, besides some hikes up Table Mountain and around the Garden Route towns, I've never really done a big, long, multi-day thing. None of us has.

And the weather in this swamp is unpredictable. It's technically summer so it might be hot and muggy, but it can easily rain & thunderstorm. Packing for eventualities is space & weight we don't have.

Always good to start something off like this with less than 3 hours sleep.

It's a beautiful morning ☀️

Op pad.

Day 1 roundup:

Made it to Markelo's camping site. It's really nice. But we have almost no place to charge devices so I'm going into conserve mode.

I was draining my battery pretty heavily listening to music to keep pumped up, also taking a lot of photos (which kept me back from the group) and videos (maybe edit it inyo something?)

We managed to yoink some charge at a Jumbo's café corner when we took an extended break because some of us are suffering more than others.

I am still operating on 1.5 hours sleep and I stretched leg muscle a bit. At some point my stupid "I have to complete this" mentality was replaced with a serious entertainment of the idea of packing it up.

I would advise my friend to, if they felt bad. I don't feel down and out just yet but a friend is taking it tough. Can we ride the bus for short stretches to make it to the camping site if someone's past their limits?

Does that nullify the almost impossible-to-measure "walk ALL THE WAY to Amsterdam!"?

I am also carrying a lot of weight, and my shoes are not yet broken in. It is uncomfortable at times. I am deliberating what I feel and what my philosophy should be.

01:24, maybe I'll start to get some sleep. Honestly, I'm surprised I held up so well. Almost entirely conciously unnoticeable, but probably manifested in my patience and stamina.

My stuff is lying everywhere, the tight pack job undone. Like planning the packing day, today's trajectory, and most things in my life, I do an awful load of preparation for what is essentially an out-of-time-budget whirlwind.

The stars out here are beautiful and noticeable. Not SA or dark sky levels by any chance, but something. Looking at them briefly felt good, but my patience is wearing low.

As always, I should be congratulating myself on an impressive amount done for a man with almost-crippling OCD. Considering I am handful of steps away from a freakout and would be "safer" in my lil tightly controlled room, I do a lot.

Getting ready to leave campsite Monte Bello in Markelo—whose facilities are excellent by the way—and get back on the road for Twello.

Well one teammate is taking it really rough but doesn't want to give in. So we offloaded some of the goods from the two vanguard walkers and her and I are gonna take the bus from Markelo to Deventer and set up camp there before exploring Deventer a bit.

There we can recuperate, my pulled knee & her energy and then get ready for tomorrow, which is by far the longest—and possibly wettest—day.

There are no busses that run on Sunday. So I guess we are doing a cheeky little 10 kay to Holten. Met a lovely old man with a frame on the way, who said he'd lain 7 weeks in the hospital due to Corona. Weather is just about perfect.

Oak tree break time.

Okay so brief roundup as DAY TWO draws to an end: After our split in two group one (Team public transport to next campsite) basically had to make a long walk despite this day being specifically for them to rest, now carrying even more than before as we offered to take t2's weight

Carrying extra & burnt out, we needed frequent breaks, which we gladly took. Coupled with lack of pressure of HAVING to get there in the same way we spent time stopping every kilometre or so.

I fell asleep nearly every stop. In the shade I was almost shivering, in the sun cooking

When we finally got to Holten all the stores were closed, so my partner couldn't stack up on drinks—and wouldn't drink lukewarm water.

In Holten we took the train to Twello, where we stole some charge from the train. It still look us more than an hour to get to Buiten Post camping grounds.

Unlimited showers, greenhouses, clean facilities, a streekwinkel, a lovely bar, the place is gorgeous. It's 1 member's birthday tomorrow. They're not feeling well. We met another traveller & the bar crew & drank afterhours with them until 02:30. We will probably OV the next step.

They have their own nursery & vineyards too. And a collaboration with a craft beer for their own witbier—my favourite.

Not the joint chaser is helping...

Beginning of DAY THREE:

It's a rainy morning. People are taking it slow.

This is already common knowledge to everyone but not having something makes you very appreciative of the value of that thing. When power and water and shelter and warmth and rest and a place to get clean are in short supply, suddenly the world becomes incredibly isolating.

Without money or access none of these things are available to you. This is often a luxury we take for granted—common knowledge, as I said.

Maybe only tangentially related but the power and speed of modern rail systems, the quality of infrastructure, availablity of high-quality, processed goods at any supermarket, and the size and sovereignty of land are all things I am gaining a strengthened appreciation for.

On the last point: You think this country is small—and it is—but it is so much more appropriate when you traverse it on foot, y'know: the way people usually were forced to get about. I understand why every village flies its own little flag.

How much made sense for any one power to rule. Even though only my province back home is 3x the size of this whole country, really that just into stark realisation how BIG the world is. Jets & maps being all you are familiar with really rob you of that feeling.

Also: this trip has strangely made me want to find a job and start working more than I've wanted to in the past few months so that's something.

DAY THREE roundup? I'll try to see if I can add some pictures too, but I should go to bed.

We're at minicamping Gervense Heide. It's all right. Our birthday girl trained home for the day and rejoined us at 20h. Her morale is back up. Team Stayed took our break day today instead.

Hungover, blistered, and having fucked yesterday's logistics up tStayed decided to leave late (11:20 or so) to walk through the rain back the way we came to Deventer. We had a relatively disappointing toasted sandwich and got on the train to Apeldoorn.

Re-crossing the IJssel.

I straight up forgot to take pictures of most of the pretty things we saw today, but in my excuse I hadn't eaten breakfast or dinner the night before & only snacked on fruit, nuts, and energy bars the entire day before.

I have a bunch of video footage I've taken that I might muck around with when I get back. Not sure what I want to do with it yet...

This is lunch-serving-as-breakfast before we went up Apeldoorn.

Apeldoorn was nothing but walk to the Lidl, buy groceries for supper & breakfast and go back to the bus station. If yesterday was even worse than it would have been, then today we'd take that damn rest.

Two busses to Putten then we'd get back on the road to the campsite. Even though we did nothing but walk to stations & buy groceries today felt heavy.

The days seem so long stretching out before you, so short as you realise it's already late afternoon, and so long again reflecting upon them in the shower. As both @BecomingCritter and I like to profusely espouse: Time does not exist.

Trekkin' on to the camp. Ignas is a perpetual source of energy and a camera cures all his hangover ills instantly.

Mb, forgot to untag Critter.

Been having this album carry me through the hike. It has glassy vocals and such a pure 60s energy to it. It reminds me of plenty of Ghibli songs—like Kiki's Yumi Arai's track No. 3 off MISSLIM:

open.spotify.com/album/5VshQXqk…

Which is great because the only reason I've wanted to tour Japan is to see the quaint, rural countryside. And the neat fields and reedy brooks and clean yet old-fashioned villages here have been filling that desire so well...

Too much stuff:

Okay, enough asides, it's already nearly 01:00. I started tweeting an hour ago... I might show you more of yesterday's hippyster-ass campsite later.

Last stretch & campsite. Sun came out. Birthday Ludo with the reunited 4 (she won!)

Beginning of DAY FOUR.

Feeling good, feeling strong. Spirits are high. First stop is in Nijkerk for coffee with Susan's friend. End goal: Hilversum.

Quick lil jaunt to Nijkerk; entering the Bible Belt.

On going series where we take a selfie with every single town board we come across.

We stopped in Nijkerk for coffee with Susan's friend. On the way out the door the extra weight finally snapped the main strap on my backpack. We duct-taped it together on the driveway. I fell behind. Spirits dipped.

Rain, wind, long grasses. Reminded me of my trip to the Hebrides. Channeled my inner Ogion from Earthsea and walked in magic & enjoyed it thoroughly.

↓↓↓

https://twitter.com/Voidjumper/status/1167471104933408768?t=LJ24G47igMlTskCOkPYt2w&s=19

We made it to just outside of Bunschoten-Spakenburg powerwalking through the wind & the rain. I was feeling this Earth & the swamp & the mushi & kami of the land.

Shoutsouts to this playlist I found whose repetitive, trance-like sounds kept me in tune:

open.spotify.com/playlist/2Lqqp…

There we pulled into De Kooi, a farmhouse that had evolved into a grandcafé over its lifespan for recuperating & a quasi-celebration for Susan's birthday the day before.

Evelien was kinda beat so the plan was to bus to Soest & continue from there. We rushed out the restaurant to make the bus. It wasn't there. The next one, a minibus, took us to Amersfoort instead.

We decide to catch a quick train to Baarn & walk from there. No one's OV cards are topped properly, we're encumbered, the train's on another platform, and it's not staying for long.

On the train to Baarn, Evelien decides to stay on until Hilversum—our destination. We part ways.

Once again shoutout to this country's absurd public transport infrastructure. Alhamduillah. Thank your local bus driver today.

Team Hike-to-Hilversum leaves Baarn pretty immediately to enter the forests of the Utrechtse Heuvelrug. Somewhere along the reedy road to Bunschoten-Spakenburg we'd entered the province of Utrecht.

Rain in the Hooge Vuursche bos. Soft horse trails are remarkably harder to walk through. Somewhere in this forest I dropped the tent into dogshit. My OCD did find that very fun AT ALL.

At some point we emerge to the greeting we are entering the province of North Holland. Getting close now.

We enter the media city of Hilversum. After some illegal jaunts down the middle of a freeway at Google Maps' behest we get through into some more forested land, looking to eat up the last few kays until camp.

Out of nowhere the forest opened up to fields of heather. Mist sat—obscuring the distance—the rain continued to drizzle. An honest-to-God real hill sat on the horizon. It was the second most magical thing I'd seen today.

Google Maps was just useless since the Vuursche. Everything looked inaccurate ir contradictory. All we needed to do was cross the fen and get to the campsite. I felt like shit, my OCD was not enjoying, Susan was done, Ignas had hurt his leg running.

(I forgot to mention I accidentally ate something tinted with red onion at De Kooi and started feeling ill. I slammed some medicine that will probably have adverse effects in the coming days but I couldn't risk anything.)

Need I say more?

Out on the heather.

A bad decision is incoming.

>I will run this as a meme.
>"oh no, my leg hurts"
>"you can only heal yourself with what hurts you"
>runs again

Camp.

We eat out twice in one day with some schnitzel. It's heavy on my ill guts. The beers help me loosen the discomfort a lot. We plan tomorrow. A very friendly, beat-up ginger tomcat makes my lap his home for an hour. At some point I'm shivering & bouncing and just want to shower.

Nah, but seriously: fuck this camp. It's the worst one so far. Everything costs extra. Outside ablutions. Stingy coin-operated showers. No soap in sinks. Paid WiFi & elec. Owners were p right-wingy, conspiracy types. Kinda made fun or ignored us in the rstrnt. I miss my hipsters.

Goodnight. This concludes DAY FOUR.

DAY FIVE.

Everything smells like wet. Everything IS wet. I slept for 8 hours and my hair didn't even dry, which it usually does in an hour or two.

About fifteen prop planes have landed across the road, cutting right across the camp's treetop.

Yeah? Aren't they all??

Back through the heather & into Hilversum. Everyone's pretty beat. Taking the train to Abcoude where we have a friend. We'll drop our bags off their and walk into Amsterdam proper to get a sign shot. Fitness watch is reporting we've made 120+ kilometres and many, many kgs so far.

My masks (& everything) were wet. Borrowing this super cute one from Evelien.

Okay, good morning from DAY SIX. Let me conclude the events of DAY FIVE:

We had just hiked back into Hilversum. It's nicer than I gave it credit for and its Centrum has a lot of cute places I'd like to visit.

We got the train there to Abcoude to stay with a friend.

Abcoude is right outside the Amsterdam city boundaries. We dropped our bags off at our friend's and then when to a walk to the supermarket & the sign just beyond that.

We thought sprinting the last few hundred metres would be a fun idea.

Yes, I know this looks like that one wojak.

Closing comments.

We had lunch with our friend then went into Amsterdam for a celebration. Unfortunately, Ignas had work the next day and had to leave us to get home.

We hopped a few bars. Got some beers, got some cocktails, got a joint. I forgot what it's like to be in a metropolis like Amsterdam, dirty & quaint at the same time.

Cute shops next to tourist traps. People from across Europe & the world drifting through its streets. A place much larger than you. Once that feels like riding an escalator: safe, and usual, but a chewing machine capable of great harm just under the surface.

Unpleasantly strong cocktails concluded we sat down under the National Monument in the Dam square—about as close to the heart of the city as you can get—and did what anyone would do: get high.

(Before we wander back to the Dam)

A very unimpressive view of a Wednesday night in August in the capital of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

I woke up this morning with time still a bit drippy to the ladies telling me they're already departing for the trains back to their respective homes. I got up & had a shower and left to go make my own way back.

After being with people for almost a week solid and with my mind & energy aligned to that I am suddenly slammed back into the mode of being I usually find myself in, a sort of drifting watcher, removed from the spaces I move through.

The return is mildly unpleasant. I'm on the train now, headed back home. I'll put on some Gizzard now that I'm done tweeting updates and hopefully zone into less cynical thoughts.

Back home. Cooking eggs. Left a cup of tea & mint leaves on my desk that turned into a fruit fly bomb on my return. Unhappy with that. This has been a weird end.

I feel like I spent five days slipping into a pleasant and rather different state of interaction between my bodymind and the lands and country and people I live with and then I woke up this morning and was just thrown back to a me I don't really like, a vision I am used to.

Put on 'The Wind Rises' then took a nap. I'll see if I can find a steps & kays screenshot soon. This is very likely almost the end of the thread. Thanks so much for following along!

Approximate metrics:

Total “flânerie” time: 5 days • Total covered paces: 175,292 steps • Total walked distance: 130.91 kilometres.

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