Wind is the dutch hill
One of the things I was expecting to miss the most moving to the Netherlands were probably hills and the possibility to do some climbing on the bike. The landscape here indeed is very flat and in the best scenario you can head towards Harlem having a go to the Kopje Van Bloomendal, a short cobbled climb with peak at 9%. What people are not taking into account tho, is the fact that riding in Holland means, for the majority of the year, dealing with a strong wind, sometimes too even strong to be able to take one hand of from your handlebar.
That is what exactly happened to me yesterday. I meant to go for a 3 hours loop towards Amsterdam but I literally had to cut it short of a third, since the power of those gusts where too much. The water from the canal was reaching my legs and even if I averaged 40kmh on the first 15km , when suddenly I turned into the head wind, I was struggle to hold 25kmh putting down 300 Watts.
Oh well, lesson learnt I suppose, maybe I should live with the idea that when wind blows at 90kmh it is just too dangerous to go out, and rollers are the best options.