Alphabettrip: Zwaantje

The barge, Zwaantje, will be our home for the next 13 days. We took the Metro to the Pont du Bercy along the Seine, where the Zwaantje was docked and were first met by Ferry, one of our Dutch tour guides. We were overjoyed to see that Jannicke, who was our guide on the last bike/barge trip would also be guiding this trip. After greeting our guides, first order of events was to take a short spin to check out the fit of our bikes. Then we were escorted to our cabin to unpack. It's very, very small, with an even smaller bathroom en suite. After all, our time will be spent on our bikes or in the lounge of the barge, not in our rooms. Here are pics of the boat, bikes, our room and bathroom and the common areas on the barge. Besides the bedroom areas and the crew space and engine room, there is a large lounge and breakfast room and a really big deck on top, where you can watch the river traffic go by.

One thingmabout this barge, though, that is vastly different from the barge and crew of the Angeline, with whom we sailed on our first bike/barge trip -- this entire crew is Dutch. (The Angeline crew was English and Australian.) while this doesn't sound like a big difference, it changes vastly how things operate on the barge. although we may be in France physically, we are in the Netherlands culturally.

The food is Dutch, the barge rules are Dutch, the wine is South African (once a Dutch colony, after all).

So the cultural experience on the bikes and out in the countryside is French, and then, we are in the Netherlands once we step on the barge. Different than our expectations, but not bad.

We spent the rest of the afternoon greeting the other 20 members of our tour group. Then there was an orientation meeting where we met the 4-person barge crew and learned how the trip would operate. Of the 22 participants, all but 3 or 4 were repeat customers, as we are. The overwhelming majority are retired folks. Supper was next. Menu was Italian tonight: aqua cotta soup, tomato and avocado salad, pasta bolognese and tuna pasta, followed by a whipped mascarpone with rum and nutmeg pudding for dessert. Jannicke took those who were interested on a metro ride and walk through historic Paris, but William and I stayed behind and went instead to the village of Bercy for a glass of wine.