Day 13: Dwingeldervelde National Park

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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The Smid folks had plans to visit friends some distance away and since we’re sharing a car, Dick and I made plans to do some biking nearby. There are a bunch of bike routes in and around the National Park. The park is mostly forest, but there’s also a large field of heather. We chose one of the shorter routes that went mostly through the heather. It was very cloudy, but no rain developed. The routes are marked in different ways and we also had a guide book with directions. We stopped to look at some angora goats that were pastured near the trail and then again to have a lunch that we packed. There were a lot of little areas with picnic tables where bikers could make a stop. We passed many people out on the bike paths today and we noticed that most of them were likely retirees. The route we took hooked up with the route into town.

In town, we stopped at the library, which had a visitor’s center. I expected there to be wifi, but nee. We tried a couple of other spots in town, but didn’t find any open wifi. We browsed a nice pottery shop for awhile and picked out a couple of pieces that we liked. We’ll hopefully go back and buy one of them. We also stopped at Albert Hein for a few food items and then the bakery for some pastries.

The rest of the afternoon was spent at the bungalow reading, eating and watching TV. We tried to FaceTime with Kathryn, but with limited success. We saw her face and she eventually smiled at us!

Today’s curious sighting: there were a lot of other bicyclists out on the bike paths and they were all senior citizens/retirees.

Day 12: Drachten, Groningen, Oldeholtpade

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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Our agenda today was to squeeze a trip to Groningen in between family visits. The first family visit was to see Dick’s Tante Gre (his father’s sister) who lives in Drachten. She doesn’t speak English, but we enjoyed our short stay for some coffee and ontbijkoek. Dick’s parents continued their visit with her while we drove into Groningen.

Groningen is a fairly large city that has an interesting mix of old and new architecture. The only must-do for this stop was to see and climb the Martini Tower. We also needed to connect to wifi! We walked around the square and checked out the visitor’s center before taking on the tower. It was over 270 steps up to the top and the stairs were small in a spiral. There were a couple of stops along the way to look out a small window or see the bells inside. Near the top, there was a walkway around the outside where we got some nice views. The weather was dry and at times sunny.

After we accomplished our climb up and back, we planted ourselves at a café at the base of the tower for some lunch and wifi access. We were able to FaceTime with Jenna and sort of see her off to college remotely. She had to drop Sadie off at the kennel on Sunday, which was rough. I still wasn’t able to upload photos to facebook, but was able to post a message and download the newsfeed. It’s frustrating me that I can’t share any photos right now! We made a stop at a Kruidvat to get a few things and walked by some shops on our way back to the car.

We picked up the Smid folks in Drachten and then headed to Oldeholtpade to have dinner with Dick’s cousin Els and her husband Franz. They have a cute, cozy house and we had a nice relaxed dinner there. Els and Franz were also married last year and it’s also a second marriage for both. I found that Franz took a little getting used to, but I especially warmed up to him when we talked about faith and the state of the Christian church in Holland and the US. He and Els are both involved in world missions.

Curious sighting: Why is there an ugly VVV building right on the square?!

Day 11: Dwingeloo Bungalow

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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It was a little strange to be absent from church worship again today, but we found an interesting program on TV that included a lot of worship music. It was all in Dutch, though. We had a relaxing morning with a late breakfast. Dick and I planned a bike ride in the Dwingeldervelde National Park and we stopped by the reception desk to ask some questions and look for a map. While we were there, we saw a flash of lightning quickly followed by a loud rumble of thunder. I could see that a downpour was coming and made a mad dash back to the bungalow on the bike. We got inside just in time! It rained the rest of the day with only short breaks.

Since our wifi connection sucks, I wrote blog entries in Word and uploaded some of my photos to Dick’s laptop. We all did some reading and some of us napped. All the stores are closed on Sunday and we didn’t plan ahead for Sunday dinner, so Dick found a Chinese restaurant nearby. It looked like a reasonably priced buffet. It turned out to be a little pricier than expected, but we all had our fill of some good food. The waitress was interesting to watch – since I can’t understand most of the language, I’m concentrate more on facial expressions and hand movements. It was clear that this girl was very nervous and stressed to remember everything that she was supposed to say!

It was a very quiet and kind of bleak day, but it was nice to lay low and relax.

Curious sighting: There’s always something curiously unidentifiable on a Chinese buffet. 🙂

Day 10: Beilen and Leeuwarden

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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This morning we drove to Beilen to take care of a couple of errands such as activating Papa’s cell phone. Mama and I did a little shopping at Hema, looking for a photo album and tea towels. Free wifi was available and I was able to download email and send a couple of messages on facebook. The wifi at the campground is 1.60 euro an hour and the signal is a bit weak. We paid for an hour, but have been rationing it as much as possible.

After a late lunch and a late start, Dick and I traveled to Leeuwarden. The drive was longer than we expected with a downpour and one detour. We found parking easily and walked to the Fries Museum, which is in a nice modern building on the square. The museum is new and the exhibits are nicely curated. Since it was already after 3pm and the museum closed at 5, our time was limited. We spent most of the time in the gallery devoted to the history of Friesland. We also went through an exhibit about the history of the dike system. There was an interesting exhibit on the Resistance during WWII, but we only got a glimpse before we ran out of time. Bummer! An opening reception for a new exhibit was in swing when we left. We walked around the square a little and then had to get back for dinner. Our trip back took a couple of detours.

Dick and I cooked pork chops and added them to the curried rice that Mama had already prepared for dinner. We watched an American TV show that we hadn’t seen before and that was the day.

Curious sighting: There were a lot of curious items in the Fries Museum! The oddest item to me was the oorijizer; an ear adornment that was part of the traditional Fries women’s costume. They were gold and went around the head and over the ears.

Day 9: Travel Day

09 Tuesday Sep 2014

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We left Pax Tibi in Reeuwijk this morning and so ended this phase of our trip. With a packed breakfast, we headed to Schiphol to pick up Dick’s parents. There was some confusion over the arrival time because the time that Dick checked online was almost two hours earlier than the time on their itinerary. We thought we were going to be very late and we had so way to contact them to verify. When we arrived at the airport, we didn’t really know where to find them either. We found out what arrival area there were supposed to come out of and waited there. After some time had passed, Dick looked in the next arrival area and found his dad. So we finally got all together and packed up the car. Getting luggage for four and four people in a VW Golf station wagon was a challenge, but we squeezed in.

After abandoning an attempt to get a parking thingy from the rental car place, we started our trek to Dwingeloo in Drenthe. We made one stop along the way and had lunch in Urk. We walked around the village for a bit and then decided on a restaurant with outside seating near the harbor. Dick’s parents were very tired from their flight and not up for a lot of walking. The sun shone us while we ate and it felt good. I had an ouitsmijter for the first time — fried eggs and cheese on top of a large slice of bread – a very large slice of bread! It was yummy. Papa Smid also had one. Mama Smid and Dick had croquettes.

The clouds rolled in pretty quickly after lunch and our views of the water weren’t that great. The water was very gray. We went to the top of a nearby building and also to a lookout area next to a lighthouse. On the way to the lighthouse, Dick drove down a narrow street that was blocked off (it looked like a through way on the map). He had to back down the street and squeeze between two cars to get out. It was a little tense, but he did it without scraping up our rental car!

We finally arrived at the campground in Dwingeloo just before 3pm. The bungalow has two bedrooms, toilet, shower, and kitchen/dining/living area. It’s snug, but comfortable enough. After we got settled, Dick and I went to the reception area to do some laundry and rent bikes. The laundry fee was 5 euros, which was excessive for the small amount of wash we had. We got the bikes and they’re easier to handle than the big bikes we rode on Thursday. While the folks napped, we took a ride through the park and then around the village.

Later we went by car to Albert Hein to pick up some groceries and then came back to make some dinner.

Curious sightings: A door of a house in Urk was painted to look like Queen Beatrix is looking out of the house. A statue of a girl on a horse in front of a church in Dwingeloo commemorates a local romance saga that ensued as the church was being built.

Day 8: Gouda and Kinderdijk

28 Thursday Aug 2014

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We rented bikes and rode into Gouda this morning. The bikes are a little different and bigger than what we ride back home and have racks to carry stuff. It was a nice ride along canals and pretty houses. We navigated the roads and bike paths pretty well and found parking near the Markt. Thursday is market day in Gouda. The cheese market takes place in back of town hall and there’s also an open market all around the square. The cheese market isn’t as big or showy as the Kaasmarkt in Alkmaar, but it still plays to the tourist crowd.

We walked around the market for awhile and stopped at a vendor to get some herring. I tried it for the first time and though, I won’t be eager to have it again, it wasn’t half bad! We found a walking tour about Erasmus at the visitors center and started off to follow it. He was born in Gouda and lived much of his life there in a monastery. We decided to bike ride around the city before lunch. That was a great idea until we made a wrong turn, ended up just outside the city and had to navigate our way back to the center. We had lunch at a sandwich shop that served some tasty paninis. Side note: the Cokes here are served in really small bottles that cost about twice as much as they do in the US.

We got back on the bikes and took the LONG way back to the B&B. It was nice at first — through the marshland, around a small lake, past some pretty houses. Then when my butt started to hurt and we were pedaling against the wind, it was taking too long to get to where we were going. I’m pretty sure Dick chose the longest route. He, by the way, refused to use the GPS voice navigation and stopped a bazillion times to check the map!

We crashed in our room for awhile to recoup, then drove to Kinderdijk to see the windmills. The route to the best view is not well marked, but we figured it out. Some nice ladies told us where to park. There are 19 windmills here and it’s an impressive sight to see. We could see that the mills we passed were occupied and I discovered later that 18 of the mills are residences. Can you imagine living in a windmill?

As we walked in, we could see rain clouds rolling in behind us. I commented that we should be quick with our sightseeing. When I saw all of the mills and got some nice pics, I started heading back. Dick is always slower than me and takes a lot of pictures (I told him he was like a Japanese tourist). I asked him for the car keys, but he wanted to walk back together. “Give me just a couple of minutes.” After a couple of minutes passed, I asked for the car keys again and started walking as fast as I could back to the car. Keep in mind, we had biked over 12 miles earlier in the day! The rain drops started to fall and I started to run with stiff legs. Ugh! I was nicely wet when I got to the car and so was Dick, of course. I couldn’t resist an “I told you so.” He remembered that towels we picked up at Nel’s for his mother were in the car and we dried off a little with them. The car fan did the rest as we drove back.

Snacks were acquired at Albert Hein (grocery store) on the way home. Dick got some of his childhood favorite treats. I discovered Rooibus tea on our canal cruise and I’m stocking up on some to bring home. We’re also making mental notes of other items we want to buy before we leave.

Tomorrow we pick up the Smid folks and transition to a bungalow in Friesland.

Day 6: Den Haag/The Hague

26 Tuesday Aug 2014

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We said good bye to the folks at De Oude Tuinderij B&B this morning. Rob and Jette gave us some travel tips for the area we’ll be in next week. It rained a lot overnight and we expected a rainy day ahead of us, but it was just overcast.

It took about 50 minutes to get to Den Haag with the GPS routing us through a pretty residential area at first. We found parking easily and it was a short walk to the central area of Den Haag. The MC Escher museum (Escher in het Paleis) is housed in the former winter palace of Queen Emma and was used for a time by Queen Wilhelmina. Dick has been an admirer of Escher and his graphic art. I love some of his wood cuts and lithos that depict scenes or people. One of my favorites is the Tower of Babel. The optical illusions can be interesting and the museum played this up with some fun exhibits. I don’t have much patience or appreciation for his mind bending stuff, though. It literally gave me a headache! The intermingled historical photographs of the palace and the royal family throughout the museum was kind of a weird juxtaposition to Escher’s art, but I’m glad it was there.

After we left this museum, we looked for some visitor information and had an on-the-go snack. We decided to do a tour at the Medieval Prison to take a break from art and do something we wouldn’t normally gravitate towards. The tours had to be scheduled in advance so we booked one for later in the day and walked to the Peace Palace instead. I’ve seen several job ads for the archives of the International Court and have daydreamed about working there for a couple of years and living in The Netherlands as an expat. Dick and I have talked about living abroad for a short period sometime in the future. We’ll have to see if that plan ever takes shape! Anyway, it was cool to see the Peace Palace up close even though we couldn’t get a tour reservation to see the inside today. The building, which is a pretty impressive piece of architecture, was funded by the Carnegie Foundation. In fact, the building and land still belong to the Carnegie Foundation.

Back at the Medieval Prison or Museum de Gevangenpoort, we joined our tour. I guess it’s just like an American to expect that English will be the language of choice. Nay! The entire tour was in Dutch. It turns out this may have been a good thing for me, since I was spared the gory details! Dick filled me in on some of the story highlights afterwards.

We looked around for a dinner restaurant in the vicinity of the museums and realized it was a pricey neighborhood. I get a little impatient when lunch has been skipped and dinner gets delayed! Fortunately, we found a Dennys-like place near the parking garage that provided an adequate meal at an affordable price.

The next accommodation for us is the Pax Tibi B&B in Reeuwijk near Gouda. It’s an old farm with a pig barn (or piggery) turned into guest rooms. Each room has a door painted with a different farm animal. Ours is a chicken. It sounds kinda rustic, but this place is really nice! We have a lovely view of green foliage out our side window. It’s a level above our first B&B. The owner was very welcoming and served us tea/coffee with a warm stropelwaffle as soon as we arrived. They have some farm pets — a few chickens, pigs, rabbits and at least one cat. We love it!

Today’s curious sighting: funky chandeliers at the Escher Museum. Each room had a chandelier in a unique shape: guitar, wine bottle, bird, skull & crossbones, etc. The center spiral staircase had a long chandelier with several different shapes. The chandeliers didn’t seem to have any association to Escher or the palace and we didn’t see any posted explanation about them. Curious.

Day 5: Haarlem & Zandvoort

25 Monday Aug 2014

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There was not even hint of sun this morning and we knew we were in for a rainy day. But we headed to Haarlem with lots of anticipation. When we got to our parking spot and tried to pay at the machine, Dick got a message that the balance was low. This didn’t seem right at all and sent us in search of the closest bank to see what was up. Our attempt to use Google maps to get there didn’t work out so well, but we finally made it to a Rabobank and got enough information to figure out the problem.

Up until this little trip around Haarlem, we had been using the car’s GPS which has a British voice that usually gets the Dutch pronunciation correct. Google maps has an American voice that slaughtered the Dutch language. I thought it was amusing; Dick thought it was disgraceful!

Our itinerary for today included: Frans Hals Museum, Corrie ten Boom House, St. Bavo, Grote Markt and Mama Smid’s childhood home. When we arrived at the Frans Hals Museum, we realized that it was closed on Mondays. Dang, we never thought to check the hours for a Monday! The Corrie ten Boom house was also closed. We had to come up with a plan B. We headed to Grote Markt where there were a few vendors, but nothing much of interest. We decided to have some coffee at the Grand Cafe and catch up on social media.

We happy to find out that St. Bavokerk was open. Yay! The interior is quite impressive — especially the organ which is really a piece of art as well as music. The middle ceiling decoration includes a clock, which I thought was interesting and perhaps practical.

We grabbed some Dutch pastries on our way back to the car had a quick snack. We then pointed the GPS to Zandvoort. On the way there, we made a swing by Dick’s cousins former residence in a lovely neighborhood. So it wasn’t exactly a beach day with rain and temps in the low 60s, but this was our best chance of seeing the North Sea. There were hardly any people around on a day like today, which was a plus I guess. We walked a bit and stopped for kibbeling and frites from vendors along the way. We saw the European champion sand sculptures further up the beach near the shops. They were kind of modern art sand sculpture.

We decided to drive back into Haarlem to find a nice cafe for a light dinner and open wifi for internet access. We drove around a bit and then just happened upon a cafe near the train station (we didn’t even use Google or Yelp!). Het Wachtlocaal van Haarlem was the perfect spot. It was inviting, cozy and had great food. Dick had leek soup and I had a ham & parm salad with pine nuts and pesto on top. Yum! The service was slow because they were short-staffed, but I won’t nick them in my review for that.

This is our last night at De Oude Tuinderij Bed & Breakfast. Ans was a wonderful hostess and we will definitely recommend this place. Dick tried out the sauna, but we didn’t get to use the other amenities because of the rainy weather. Bummer.

Today’s curious sighting: at the cafe I order tea, which came to me as a hot glass of water and a wooden tea box shaped like a book. Inside the box, were teas of many kinds in cute little boxes. I LOVED this and I want one!

Day 4: Amsterdam Part 2

25 Monday Aug 2014

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Today we celebrated our 1st Anniversary! I awoke thinking about our wedding day and all the happy memories that were made. I also reflected on the year past and though there were tough times of transition and difficult learning experiences, there has been so much joy and a deep satisfying love.

We traveled the same route to Amsterdam to complete our itinerary. I had seen an advertisement for a historic tram tour while we were on the tram on Saturday, but when we asked about it today no one knew what it was — not the visitor’s center or the tram drivers. We were redirected several times, but ended up no where! So, that was a bust. We were in Dam Square and decided to make a quick stop at the Nieuwe Kerk, where the monarchs are married and the King or Queen is crowned.

From there we walked to Museumplein and then to the Van Gogh museum. We had to wait in a long line, but I found open wifi and caught up on my email and facebook while we waited. Yay! We got in just before 2pm and spent about two hours getting a Van Gogh education. Good stuff!

We thought we’d take a nice stroll through Vondel Park since we didn’t need to be at our next destination until 5:15. It was a beautiful day and there was a concert in the park, so it was packed with pedestrians and bicyclists! We had to wend through the crowd quickly to get the tram.

Dick made reservations for a candlelight dinner cruise on a canal boat for our anniversary celebration. The captain and his mate (the waitress) were great hosts and the captain obliged our request for some commentary during the ride. He pointed out lots of landmarks and gave us some facts about the city. It was a five course meal made at a fine restaurant and picked up enroute. The food was beautifully presented and delicious! We were able to see a lot of the city by canal and got more of the flavors of Amsterdam. It was a very special and memorable evening.

There may have been a little disagreement on the way home, but I don’t want to remember that or let it mar a day that was otherwise wonderful. Besides, we kissed and made up later. 😉

Today’s curious sightings: a two meter wide house and a cat houseboat both seen from the canal boat. There’s a “one meter” wide house, but as we learned, it’s only one meter wide at the front and then gets bigger. The two meter wide house is two meters all the way through! The cat houseboat is a home for rescued cats.

Day 3: Amsterdam Part 1

23 Saturday Aug 2014

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We drove by car to the Ij River and took the ferry across to Central Station in Amsterdam. From there we decided to take the Tram to the Albert Cuyp Market. It’s a big open air market with anything and everything from clothes to trinkets to food of all kinds. We bought some huge blackberries that were nicely sweet. We stopped at a cafe for coffee and were enjoying it at a table outside when it started to rain hard, forcing us inside.

Our next stop was the Rijks Museum, where we spent the entire afternoon. There was more Dutch art than I could properly digest, but it was impressive to see. Rembrandt’s Night Watch and Van Gogh’s Self Portrait attracted the biggest crowds. One of my favorite Rembrandt paintings in this collection was “Isaac and Rebecca”. There was a very wise quote on the wall near the painting that I thought captured the emotion of the piece very well. I wish I had taken a picture of the quote — dang! Another painting that impressed me was the massive depiction of the end of Battle of Waterloo. The Duke of Wellington is looking very smug up on his horse and William II, who is supposed to injured, is on a stretcher reclining as if he still has some control over the situation. Fascinating.

We hadn’t eaten since breakfast and as 6pm approached, we were anxious to get a nice, satisfying dinner. D decided to head in a direction in the Tram and wing it from there. After we got off the Tram, we walked to Dam Square. There was a Palestinian protest just ending as we got there. A large guard of mounted Police stood in front of the Royal Palace. I guess they were there to keep order and not to protect the King who was undoubtedly absent.

After a lot of walking and little idea of what restaurant we wanted, we ended up at a Thai place. The food was good enough and filled our empty bellies! The prices were good, too.

I wanted to see the Central Library or the Openbare Bibliotheek Amsterdam, which is world famous for it’s ecological architectural design. It did not disappoint! It’s doesn’t have the old library feel of NYPL or BPL, but it’s easily one of the most amazing libraries that I’ve seen. It’s incredibly well organized in a way that is aesthetically pleasing and practical. The arrangement by floor (distinct collections), shelving, and signage work really well. It’s very easy to navigate and use the material. It’s hard to believe that many libraries fail at this, when it’s their mission to connect users to information.

We met our B&B guest neighbors this morning and had breakfast with them. They are Rob and Jette and they have a 5 month old baby girl named Babette (love her name!). They’re a very nice Dutch couple and the baby is soooo adorable! They live near Arnhem — an area that we will visit next week.

Today’s curious sighting: Dude dressed up as a gold Rembrandt outside the Riks.

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