Welcome to the Hood

It finally quit raining after supper, so we took advantage of that and made a quick wander around the neighborhood.  Just so you know where we are,

We're the double black doors on the right and the 2 windows.  And then we go back two more rooms.  Very comfortable.  There is a canal right out in front - those cars you see are within 1 ft. of the edge of the canal - watch that first step. 

I adore the tiny streets, several too small for cars, with bikes parked in front of the houses amidst the tiniest patches of green & flowers.

Sometimes it is hard to know where a path leads - here it is leading to a tiny children's playground

Earlier this evening, we attended the service at the Nieuw (New) Church.  You must appreciate that 'new' and 'old' are highly relative.  This church dates from the 1300's (new) as opposed to the Olde (old) church which dates from 1100.  The entire service was in Dutch.  However, when we identified ourselves as American, we were give English bibles and headphones. [we had heard that some part of the service would be in English]  A young woman translated the whole service for us.  Oh such interesting experiences.

We are now living in Delft

Delft is a city we have visited a couple of times before and think it is one of the loveliest cities in the country.  You will hear much in the weeks to come.  We have a delightful, very traditional, old-fashioned Dutch apartment.  The building dates from the 1600's when it was (one of) home of the original Delft factories.  In 1907 it began life as an antique shop and continued as that until 3 years ago.  Our swapping family now uses it, normally, as an extra office for their business.  However, they have changed it back into a very comfortable abode.

And across the back, an amazing sun room

Isn't this lovely?  We are so fortunate.

The computer brought from home is working just fine - hurrah!

Let's see if photo uploading is happening today

Rob and I have consulted and it is his opinion that the problem we have been having are a function of the wi-fi in this particular house.  Let's hope that is true.  Today (Saturday) we move to our next exchange in Delft.  The family is very kindly picking us up and bringing us to their home.  And then we can have a personal tour of how things are.  You never realize just how many peculiarities there are to your particular home, until you try to think of them all and write them down.  Oh my gracious - you know that one handle you have to pull especially hard or the switch that doesn't work or or or - Luckily the first folks in our house have managed to figure things out, as have we here.  At least we will have the full tour of Delft before the family leaves, which should make it a bit easier.

So to try photos,

The walls around the top of the Burcht in Leiden.  In the center is a fascinating sculpture of a large tube of toothpaste (the paste is coming out of the right end) - would be fun in your garden!

Let's see if this one works of the view from up there

These enormous edifices - it's hard to wrap my mind around the idea that for some projects, it was 2 and 3 generations of folks who worked on a particular building.  Now it is unusual for people to work 20 years at one job, let alone me, my father and my grandfather all at the same place. 

It is often the case in Dutch cities that old bikes get "disposed"of in the canals and occasionally they are fished out.

Friday was just a day - the weather was quite dreadful in the morning, so we just did stuff around the house and in the afternoon wandered to a local store, Kruidvat (rather like a Bartell's drug store) for some cough drops for E, a Blokker store (rather like a small Fred Meyer) for some clothes pins, and of course, our favorite Albert Heijn -for the required groceries.  Shopping must be much more purposeful here as many  stores have limited hours on the week-ends.

New adventures coming along soon.

Wednesday - looks like Seattle

We awoke to some sunshine but by 9am it is grey and cloudy and very much looks like rain.  Alas!  Guess this will be a museum day.

Continuation and a teensy bit of catch-up.  Here are some interesting photos from Elaine's camera (thanks for the photo's E)
From the beach, another view of the little "houses"and a most interesting sign on the beach front indicating the time and the temperature and the water temperature and high and low tide and and and - very good

Here is a piece of sculpture, built into an office building (along the highway)

So, back to Wednesday and into Leiden.  A very interesting and old city.  And luckily it happened to be a market day, which is always fun.

Here is the fellow setting up the book store,

Short pause for a beverage, you can see the stalls in the background.  Leiden doesn't have a central square (markt) so there are barges all along the main canal and these serve as floating restaurants,

Me, too.  Nearby is the Burcht.  It is an artificial mound, build between 800 and 1100, in order to avoid flooding.  But it provides amazing views of the city, too.

[Well - there are great difficulties with the üploading"speeds"in this house, so no more photos.  Sorry, as there are some great ones.  Maybe later.]  On the Burcht was commemorated the defeat of the Spanish (with whom the Dutch had been at war for over 80 years) and they celebrate on October 3rd with a large pot of Hutspot - a stew made of beef, carrots, potatoes and onions. (Leiden's Onzet)

Thursday was a very rainy, gray day.  We eventually went into den Haag (approx. 20km south) visited the Mesdag Collectie, an art collection made by Hendrik W. Mesdag and his wife, Sientje.  It is housed in the Museum he had built next door to his house in the Hague.  He is one of my favorite 19th century Dutch painters.  We then visited one of the funniest shops around, check out: http://www.kadoomdehoek.nl/.  It translates to the ''shop on the corner".  They have some really silly, fun things.  We enjoyed dinner with Caro and Rob.  Rob is off on a fund-raising bicycle ride over the next two days of approximately 170km.  Phew!  Caro and I basted an antique quilt top I had brought her as a surprise.  No, we haven't stopped sewing or quilting.  :-)

Beautiful Tuesday

What better a way to spend a lovely and sunny Tuesday than to head to the beach.  That is exactly what we did.  We drove as we didn't know exactly how far it was to Katwijk.  A magificant and mostly empty beach

The Dutch prepare themselves for wind by erecting these little structures in which you can find a bench and some beach chairs as well as a cloth windbreak.  We presume (as I didn't understand the Dutch written inside) that they are rented for some period of time - I'll have to ask Caro.  But there are rows and rows of them a way up from the water's edge.

And the requisite children's play area (they are so good at thinking of the children who might be along) - there was another play house and slide over a ways.  In the background you can see the restaurants that line the shore

The perfect place to have some lunch, out of the wind with the plastic/glass panels.  After lunch we did wander the little seaside town for a bit - cute

We drove home by way of the next town north, on the sea, Nordwijk.  That little town has a very different feel to it - lots of posh hotels.  Finally after we got home, we needed to make the required grocery "run"so hopped on our bicycles and rode into another part of Oegstgeest.  Isn't this so fabulous - to just sit and enjoy the outlook while we enjoyed a Coke and a soft ice cream - after we did our chores.  Oh, life is hard!

Sunday and Monday

Sunday was really quite lovely weather and we took advantage of that by doing some laundry.  I know, this house does have a clothes dryer but for whatever reason it seems to take FOREVER to dry things like jeans.  So we were good Dutch ladies and in the back garden, in the sunshine, put the clothes rack and our wet jeans.  Perfect.  We also took advantage of the sun to take a lovely bike ride - just because we could.  (sorry but the photos got put on the computer without internet access - so you'll have to take my word for it)  We visited 3 windmills, fairly nearby and then rode along the water [Harlemmertrekvaart] and into the lovely little town of Warmond.

 On a sunny Sunday it seems that the "thing"to do is to go out on the water and the waterway was alive with small boats and there was even a Tour Boat taking on passengers.  Fun!  We returned home to the start of clouds but dry jeans!  Hurrah!

It stormed through most of the night and also this morning.  So our plans for another bike ride were shelved and we were happy to have a car.  Today was also a holiday, 2de Pinksterdag (second Pentecost day).  On this day, several castles are open to the public which are normally closed.  We visited Kasteel Endegeest, just a short way away.  It originally dates from the 1300's.  There have been several remodels and restorations and it is quite lovely.

The Dutch do a marvelous job of bringing exhibitions to life and particularly provide for the children.  There were "games"for them to play on the forecourt, a traveling troubador and some marvbelous costumes from the 1700's.  There were also some specially prepared quiz sheets for the older children to follow and answer - keep everyone interested and involved.

The castle is now used as the offices for the psychiatric organization that manages the psychiatric hospital located on the castle grounds.  Such fabulous offices, for sure

The Blue Room is entirely covered in tapestries.  What a conference room.

The model of the facility was made by one of the former patients.  Very well done.

On the way home we noticed this stork nest

Isn't this fun?
. .

On to Brugges

Ghent is actually a modern, active, business city, whereas Brugges is a charming trip into an older time.  The streets are narrow and cobbled.  Way more photo op's than my little camera could hold (when does it say "memory card full"?)

At the Begijnhof, the former residence of Begijns (non-catholic church-serving women, living in community) is now housing for some Benedictine nuns.  Beautiful and oh so peaceful.  You are even strongly encouraged to maintain a silent and proper attitude, while inside the grounds

We had a very fun boat tour of the city - a different view from water level

A charming atmosphere.  (am I repeating myself - it really is so special, one runs out of adjectives)

We drove home by way of Middelburg to visit Leah - the daughter of friends from Seattle, who is attending college here in the Netherlands.  A rather challenging drive, in some torrential rains, we finally arrived home exhausted about 9:30pm.

Today we have done our requisite grocery shopping.  Monday is a holiday and that means that the stores will be closed, so today we had to buy for tomorrow AND Monday.  Not the norm.  It was quite crowded in the village center, as well as the grocery.  We bought gas (benzine) to refill the car and made a quick little drive around the area.  Now we are having thunder, lightening and hail.  Ah spring - sounds like Seattle.

Much to see and do.  Ah, life is so good.