The Island of Schiermonikoog

Taking a 1 hour ferry from the north of the Netherlands, out to an island called Schiermonnikoog (Shkeer-mon-Koe)
The island is 10 miles long, by 2.5 miles wide.

The Red marker is the island, just off the north shore of the Netherlands.

And then the zoom-in:

There must be 25 islands that dot this coastline but most are uninhabited. During our 2nd week, we stayed in the town of Sneek (just to the left of Drachten, in the lower left part of the map)

This was a hot, gorgeous July day!

So hot we had to sit downstairs on the ferry and have coffee and biscuits.

More beautiful bike paths as we land on the island. We rented bikes (along with 350 other ferry passengers), right at the ferry terminal, and then off you go. It was about a 3 mile ride into the main village.

This island had a surprisingly large town on it (1,000 permanent residents) but really, it's all just a massive sand bar out in the ocean, northwest of Holland. Apparently, over 300,000 visitors come to this island every year. There are 200 cars on the island (mostly for farmers who live there) but essentially it is a car-free island, which makes for really nice biking.

 I don't ever want to forget biking past this field. First, this path was just gorgeous, with the ocean on your left, and corn fields on your right - but the memory I want to keep is the smell of corn in the hot sun. It was almost like smelling corn tortillas or chips being warmed in an oven but it was just the crops in the sunshine. I can't possibly describe it but it was incredible to be biking along the water in the Netherlands, in the warm sunshine with our family, smelling those fields.

You saw this a lot - here's a young family with their little cart behind the mom's bike and the Dad had a special rack which carried the new baby's carseat. Loved this set-up.

The sand was soooo soft and the water was sooo warm. It felt so foreign after being in Irish waters.

After the beach, we rode around for awhile and found this park with a petting zoo and an awesome playground for Norah. I told Wayne I thought I could live on this island and he laughed at me. He said I wouldn't last a week. :)

Just like the old days - you'd tie up your horse outside the saloon - well, here in Schiermonnikoog, you prop up your bike outside a restaurant.