Slot Loevestein castle sits in an enclosed fortification, along with a garrison village that used to house soldiers and local villagers.
Now that the entire area is a museum, there are now exhibits in most of the buildings and cafes open for the tourists that arrive…
We had arrived at about 10.30 and were looking for a drink, so went inside.
The kids spotted toasted sandwiches on the menu and decided that they were also rather hungry, so before we knew it we were all sitting down to an early lunch of toasted sandwiches.
The food on offer is extremely basic… nothing spectacular, and it certainly wasn’t cheap. The staff acted like they could care less if we were there or not and totally ignored Hubby when he tried to ask a question. They appeared to be more involved with their own personal converations rather than the customers needs, so we were less than impressed.
Typical tourist trap fare. Oh well… I suppose that quite literally comes with the territory.
For the money we paid I don’t think we got particularly great value so if we were to come here again I think I would be packing a far tastier home-made lunch into a cool box and doing things picnic style.
The teddy bear is the class mascot from school and the photo are to prove that Bear has been furthering his education about Dutch history by visiting a castle.
We have decided that we would like to make a family day out to a castle. We choose Slot Loevestein Castle and since Himself and I are known for being geographically challenged, we set the Sat.Nav. and headed out.
All goes perfectly until we reach the town of Gorinchem, located on the river Waal.
Since I am occasionally teaching you a little Dutch, I need to tell you that no matter what you think the word “Gorinchem” looks like, or how it might sound, it is actually pronounced ” Hor-kem, except that the “H” is a mixture of a “g” and an “h” sound.
I know, it’s not how it “looks” it should be pronounced, but trust me… it is.
We arrive on the banks of the Waal where there is a sign for a ferry.
A ferry, only for bicycles and pedestrians. Hmmm… this doesn’t seem right, we want to go Castle Loeverstein and certainly there is no castle on this side of the river.
All the Sat. Nav. has to say about this, is the happy announcement of ” You have reached your destination!“
We shake our heads and assume that the stupid little machine has an even worse sense of direction than we do!
Since the next part involves the now irritating little machine persistently telling us to “ Turn around when possible” we turn the Sat. Nav. off, head towards the center of Gorinchem where I stop and ask a very friendly lady in a curtain shop for directions.
I tell her that we would like to go to Slot Loevestein Castle , that we are travelling by car and that the GPS is taking us to a ferry that doesn’t take cars.
She tells me that the Castle is a bit further up river, and first thing we need to do is to get across the Waal.
We have three options… Option One: we can backtrack though town, down-river, take the small roads out to the motorway that eventually leads to a very large bridge.
Option Two: we can go up-river, via a small nearby street and when the road bears left away from the river, we follow it and that also eventually leads to a motorway and a large bridge some 15 kms or so up river.
Option Three, we take the same road as option Two, but when the road swings off to the left, we take the tiny road on the right, it hugs the river for the most part and is the scenic route. It goes past some charming little houses, dikes and a small fort and then ends abruptly at the river’s edge… where a little car ferry (Veerpont) goes back and forth across the river.
If we take the ferry we will only be a very short distance from Slot Loevestein Castle.
Motorway bridges or scenic route and a little car ferry: Tough choice no? One that took a nano-second, after all, we were on a family outing, somewhere we didn’t know, and it was a little adventure, so naturally the Car ferry option won hands down.
Just as the lady said, we found the curve where the road veered to the left, could easily have missed the minuscule lane to the right if we hadn’t been armed with our local directions and began the wonderful meaner down the little road…
Suddenly we saw a sign, with a little boat on it, and a few corners further, the road ended at the waters edge. On the far side of the river the ferry was discharging it’s bicycle and car passengers and within minutes was heading back in our direction.
The river is busy with barges, small recreational craft, the sun is sparkling on the water… as the ferry nears, the rear edge, raised as it traverses the water, starts to lower, and within seconds has become a ramp for the vehicles to drive on and off on.
We wait for cars to come off and then drive on… I have barely enough time to get out of the car and put the camera onto video setting before a rumble of the motors tells we that we are about to move.
The back edge that was the ramp, now raises and we pull away from the shore. I’m filming and there appears a narrow strip of water between us and the land, and at the last second a car turns the corner… too late for this one as we are getting further out by the second, but it’s a very quick turn around and so at least they won’t have to wait long.
We chug firmly through the waters of the big river… and a few minutes later I’m back in the car, the barrier is being raised as the ramp on the other end is being lowered and we drive off with a small bump as we get back onto dry land.
Slot Loevestein Castle is on a spit of land just a few kilometres further. We leave the car in the car park and walk down a small lane to the Castle itself, just outside the walls everything becomes suddenly clear… a short distance away there is a large boat… the ramp is lowered to the jetty and a few foot passengers and cyclists are disembarking.
Needless to say this must be the end point of the ferry that the Sat. Nav. was trying so hard to take us to. What a pity that neither it or the helpful lady actually bothered to tell us where that other ferry actually went!
Oh well, now you know, if you want to get to Slot Loevestein Castle, I can recommend the options of two large motorway bridges or a sweet little car ferry … or just believe the Sat. Nav., park the car in Gorinchem and it will almost literally take you across the water to the Castle door.
