The surprises of the trip to date are Hamburg and Rotterdam. Two inland cities, both situated on long rivers and both huge port hubs for shipping.  In my mind they also have long held reputations for crime, prostitution and red light areas where tourists go to ogle prostitutes sitting in windows, but that may be a reputation long gone. Full disclosure, I’ve not been to either city before, but am basing my memory from my 20s in Amsterdam when I did go and look at prostitutes sitting in windows. 

We arrive in Hamburg and are immediately swept up by drag queens, S&M costumed party people, and the entire sequinned and skimpily clad LGBTI+ community and all their supporters from Hamburg and surrounds- they are here to par-tay. We land quite literally over the rainbow. It’s the opening weekend of Pride month and there’s a parade and party that just won’t stop. Even if you wish it would, just for a few minutes. It does slow down with the Sunday handovers arriving.  

The most remarkable thing about Hamburg, aside from its many canals and fabulous waterfront, is the stunning Elbphilharmonie Concert Hall which dominates the harbour. It looks ready to set sail. To visit the public area at Plaza level, 37 metres above the water, we take the world’s longest curved escalator (80 metres).  From here we have a 360° panorama of the city. 

Sit down, cos here come some breathtaking statistics. Hamburg is the second largest port in Europe with four container terminals and 8,000 ships passing through each year, with 9.3 million TEUs, 125 million tonnes.  Big? You betcha. But hang on a minute. Rotterdam is way bigger – the largest port in Europe with over 30 container terminals handling more than 13,000 container vessels annually. It processes around 16 million containers aka twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), over 516.8 million tonnes of goods. That’s really hard to get your head around, so in both cities we take harbour cruises and have our minds blown. 

It’s hard to find words to convey the magnitude of Rotterdam’s shipping activity. In an hour we see only a fraction of its capacity: there are what seems like hundreds of canal basins fringed with so many cranes you could never hope to count them. Then there’s storage warehouses, cool stores, barge docks, truck and trailer parks – it goes on and on. 

For a complete contrast, we take a ferry further inland to Kinderdijk, a village in famous for its 19 original 18th-century windmills that still do the job. They’re part of a water-management network that also includes three pumping stations – these are rather more modern – plus dykes and reservoirs that control flooding in the low lying land.  In the original pumping station museum sits the old steam engine, which, in the olden days, would pump out 425,000 litres per minute at full power, before the conversion to electricity in 1924. Walking and cycling paths run through the area and the countryside here is beautiful of course, with the old mills contributing the charm. We do not see the little boy plugging a dyke with his finger to save his country as per the old story. 

What we do see is the equally fabulous Depot gallery. This mirror glassed round tower is the working heart of the (currently closed for refurbishment) Museum Boijmans van Beuningen. The Depot is the world’s first publicly accessible art storage facility, with hundreds of collection pieces on display almost everyday, alongside the working spaces of conservators and artists. I love that, as the gallery spaces are constantly changing, the current favourites are hung against glass so you see the back of the paintings. 

It’s funny to think we only choose to come to Rotterdam because we want to take the ferry to England rather than fly. I can only take so much airport security. We end up loving our time here and find it both fascinating and aesthetically interesting.

The architecture is engaging: apartments are never blocks, but off-set, or with interesting balcony arrangements. Buildings have a twist, or in one singular example, possibly never repeated, the cube houses (built 40 years ago)are rotated 45 degrees.  If you are fascinated, read more here. Kijk-kubusHome | Uncategorised | Englishkubuswoning Unfortunately we don’t get a chance to visit. 

The ferry to Hull is massive. We leave at 9:00pm while it is still light, so get to enjoy our last views of the lowlands, out into the North Sea. Let’s hope those windmills keep turning and the pumps keep pumping. If it all fails, fingers in the dykes will not stop the flood.

I still don’t see the point of clogs.