Holland on Eurostar

It's off to Holland for a long weekend of cycling and running.

We started yesterday with an afternoon train from the not very glamorous Bicester North station to Marylebone.

For the evening entertainment we went to the theatre to see 'Standing at the sky's edge'. This was a brilliant new musical about three different families living in a tower block in Sheffield.

This sounds extremely unglamorous, which it was, but it was a great show and we stayed until the end three hours later, and didn't nod off once.

This is the set, a five story mock up of the flats taken from our seat on the front row.

Today the trip really started as we caught the 8.16am Eurostar from St Pancras station.

The train set off exactly on time and it quietly and efficiently delivered us to Rotterdam exactly on time.

Once we got out of the station we joined thousands of Dutch cyclists on the amazing network of cycle tracks, and set off for Delft. We crossed backwards and forwards over cycle bridges with lovely views of the flat countryside.

At the outskirts of Delft we got caught in a huge gridlock of cyclists waiting to get over a bridge, and then suddenly we were part of an enormous peloton chugging and weaving along a fairly narrow cycle path.

All went well until we had to do a left hand turn across the wall of cyclists heading our way, and the numerous cyclists coming towards us.

Darren managed it, but I got stuck and had to wait for ages by the side of the road before I could dash across. Quite a disconcerting experience.

However it was soon forgotten as we reached the market square and stopped for a couple of cherry beers before checking in at our hotel.