UNTOUR TO THE NETHERLANDS, AUGUST 10-25, 1999
by Pat Barnes, Vacaville, CA
Three generations...Pat Barnes, daughter Carolyn, and Mom/Grandma Nadine Litman
Second Idyll trip for Mom and me. First one was to Switzerland.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 10 WHICH TURNS INTO WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 11
We caught the 3:55PM flight, British Air, to London. Got on the plane, had reserved some nice legroom seats, but that particular row of seats had been removed! Everyone was very kind and helpful. Mom and I sat together and Carolyn sat “alone” in front...She had some little children friends to amuse her. We arrived in London in time to rush to our gate, but on the way looked at the solar eclipse out the airport windows. Someone loaned us a viewer. It was more spectacular than it would have been here.We were met in Amsterdam, a very busy airport, at “The Meeting Point” a giant red and white checked cubical place, apparently where folks always meet. Marike Pluis was friendly and welcoming and took us to our train and escorted us in a taxi to our apartment in Leiden.
The apartment is on a side street of Leiden, 144 Hogewoerd, a canal at our back door and a narrow street in front with lots of bicycles and motorbikes. There is a living room with an efficiency kitchen in one corner and a sofabed, a bedroom and a bathroom. Some small shops and residences were nearby. Marike gave us a little tour, and we arranged our stuff and walked up the street to find some dinner. We ate at the New Egypt, and had soarma, a very common barbecued lamb dish that seemed to be offered everywhere. Also chicken satay and several hot sauces. Mom went to bed and Carolyn and I went to the grocery store, to supplement what Marike had provided, and bought enough Diet Coke and produce and cheese and sandwich stuff to last a couple of days. Not on this trip to the store but at another time, Carolyn had the weighing-of-the-produce experience, but got busted because she had the price for the wrong kind of banana!
THURSDAY, AUGUST 12
Cooked breakfast, scrambled eggs and toast for Mom and me. We were due to be at Marike’s orientation meeting with the other Idyllers. We met in a big building that is part of the university. We learned about buses and trains and places to go and looked at Dutch money. We were a small group of 7. After we had absorbed as much as we could, we went to the Leiden train station, grabbed a sandwich and got on the train for the trip to Amsterdam, where we were to spend the afternoon.We walked through the streets and alleys and by the canals. I missed the scenery of the red light district, I think I was too busy looking at buildings and I don’t know what all. We stopped several times to hear talks about the city, and had a nice sit-down break in a plaza near one of the many museums where we bought a Museum Card. We got on a tram to the Rijksmuseum, and spent some time there looking at several works of art, explained by Marike, who knew lots. On the way to the tram, we walked through several gorgeous buildings, where groups of street musicians played their music.
Amsterdam attracts many different types of people...young and old, pierced and unpierced! We got the right tram to the station and invited Marike to join us for dinner along with Ann and Bob, who were in the apartment in back. We ate in the “First Class” restaurant, which was located in what used to be the first class waiting room for the trains. Mom had salmon, I had chicken and Carolyn had a club sandwich. Nice time. Trained back to Leiden, about 25 minutes away. And then took the bus to our apartment. Mom went to bed...it was a long day of lots of walking. Carolyn and I hadn’t had enough, and set off to explore Leiden. We felt perfectly safe walking the streets at night. We had fun talking to some guys at the “Anno 1870” antique shop up the street. We looked at many of the closed stores, in areas that would become familiar to us in the days to follow.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 13
Since we couldn’t get to sleep very easily, we woke up late, 9:00, and didn’t really get moving until 10:30. Made sandwiches, took the bus to the VVV, (the information center,) got some money, bought a few postcards, took some pictures, looked at some ducks by the Leiden windmill and had lunch in the main square. It was an uncrowded place, and we weren’t in a hurry. We took the 1:30 canal boat tour through the lovely canals of Leiden. Every town seems to have canal boat tours, which are leisurely and scenic.We headed up to the Valk Windmill and spent an hour or so there, our first windmill experience, and one of many. (Mom and I didn’t subscribe to Carolyn’s theory that “if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all”...all in jest of course...Mom’s ancestors came from Holland, and this trip was her lifetime dream.) Carolyn and I went way to the top, up some very narrow ladders, and took videos so mom could see what she had to miss. It was quite a view from the platform. We were just catching on to how to use the video camera. It almost rained, but didn’t. We walked to a shopping area, went in the “guilder store”, like the 98 cent store, and bought some stuff...magnets and candy. We were advised to go to the Minerva Hotel for dinner, and we found it pretty easily, after almost passing it by. We had a really nice dinner...herring salad (a Leiden dish) pot roast, potatoes and carrots mixed, cheese and bread and fruit and cookies and coffee for Mom and me. Carolyn had pork in a cherry sauce, salad, strawberries and whipped cream with a chocolate sailboat on top. It was a nice old hotel, with authentic furniture and nice service.
We walked back home, passed a big historic church that we couldn’t go in because they were having a private party. We were tired by the time we got back, Mom crashed and Carolyn and I worked on planning the next day. I think we kept Mom awake with our giggling. It is tricky trying to figure out the various boat and bus and train and tour schedules. And there is so much to do, we had to make choices. Carolyn was in charge of buses and “strippen”...the bus tickets... and I did the train schedules.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 14
It was lightly raining. But we were not to be deterred from our exploring. We packed up our backpacks and headed for the open-air market down the canal, between our apt and the station. There were many stalls of food...bread, fish, cheese, fruit, clothes,...Mom bought a tote bag. It rained pretty hard off and on, but it cleared, and we wanted to go to take a boat ride at Nordwijk. We thought every bus went to the station, so we waited in vain for a little while, but someone told us we had to go to another stop, and we did. We found the right bus to where we got another bus, and headed out through the countryside..It was the first time away from the city and very beautiful. Past lots of fields and canals, and finally we ended up at the loneliest bus stop in the world, where the driver let us off. We were nowhere. Walked up to the Panorama Hotel. As it turned out we had missed the boat, wherever it was, and so we headed back to Leiden.The day was young...we wanted to go to Utrecht to see Panorama 2000, a major art event that I had heard about from their web site. It was another train ride to Utrecht, where the station and city were very busy, since it was Saturday and they had a big market. We found the DomToren, a very tall tower, with a temporary elevator built on the outside. I bought tickets, even though we had to wait two hours to go up.
To pass the time, we had dinner in a Greek place that Carolyn found (that had real Dutch food...ha ha) and had a good dinner. The place had much faux fruit and vines and other bits of Greek ambience. Nice waiter. Good time.
We went up the Dom elevator, and it was pretty fantastic from the top. It took a while to figure out the various artwork on the rooftops and sides of buildings and streets...even a car ferris wheel. We all got a little bell necklace as a gift from one of the artists. We stayed our 20 minutes at the top...It was very clear and fun to look at the city below. We took a bus to the station, train to Den Haag to check out the bus we were to take the next day to see the fireworks at Sheveningen. We came home, watched our videos to check out the new camera and planned the next day.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 15
One off Marike’s suggested activities was an International Fireworks Competition, and today was the last day. So off to Sheveningen we went, to check the hotel situation. Took the train and tram...It was a beautiful ride...took far too many videos again. Got off at the busy beach resort, big hotels, a strand and the beautiful North Sea. We decided to spend the big bucks at the Kurhaus Hotel, made reservations for a wonderful seaside room, the North Sea view, so we could see the fireworks. The concierge was born in Maastricht, where Mom’s family was from, which made her happy. We had lunch at an Italian place on the plaza in front...pizza, good tomato soup and we got a big sundae dish of ice, served on a saucer with a doily and a silver spoon. But the highlight of lunch was going to the WC, and watching the amazing self-cleaning toilet seat contraption. Good for lots of giggling. We checked into our room. Boy was it fancy!We had to get our overnight stuff, so back to Leiden...tram, train, bus, bus, train, tram. We were getting good by now. We settled in our room, marveled at the view, changed clothes and went down to dinner in an amazing room that used to be a concert hall. (We were told that the Rolling Stones had a concert there once, and the crowd really tore up the place) It was a fabulous buffet...lots of herring and salmon and everything else. Nice desserts. My diet was gone. Mom rested and Carolyn and I wanted to go to the Holland Casino across the street, since we had free tickets. They let Carolyn in, even though she had “beach shoes” but we had to have our passports, so back to the room we went. By then mom was rested and was eager to go with us. In a typical casino, we lost our 15 guilders.
Back to our room, where we arranged our beds and chairs and selves. What a view from our little balcony to the beautiful beach below and the North Sea beyond. The fireworks began on time, and we think Holland won over the competition of Portugal, Austria and Switzerland, because of the loud cheers at the end. The whole event was spectacular, but it was topped off by the room service ice that Carolyn called for, that came in a 5 gallon silver ice bucket on a doily on a silver tray, with silver tongs. We certainly had enough for our little 6 ounce bottles of Diet Coke that we imported from the Dekamart in Leiden! We had a great night’s sleep to the sound of the North Sea waves and some thunder and lightening. It was a terrific room. What a view.
MONDAY, AUGUST 16
We had breakfast in the huge dining room. Another fabulous buffet and we all ate a lot. More salmon and herring and some really sweet cantaloupe. This was a 5 star splurge, but worth every guilder. I was even a little embarrassed to tell other Idyllers where we had stayed!We were so close to Delft that we decided to go there on the way back. Even though we had some luggage to haul around... we put stuff in a locker in the Delft train station, and walked to the main square. We took the 12:00 canal boat trip. Nice 45 minute canal ride, past bridges and row houses and historic things. Nice touch: they stopped in the middle of the Delft Harbor, where they passed around a Vermeer painting of right where we were.
Today we had said was to be another windmill day, so we headed back to Amsterdam and then the train to Zaanse Schans, a reconstructed old Dutch village, with some very pretty windmills. From the train stop we had to walk a ways, and saw a neat drawbridge and then in the distance were the windmills. We also ran into our Idyll friends, Bob and Ann.
We visited The Cat windmill where they make paint pigments out of rock they import and chop up. Very interesting. Walked through the shoe shop, the cheese shop and the souvenir shop. The record for little Dutch shoe souvenirs! We looked at cows and birds and the beautiful river. We caught a fast train to Amsterdam, and then to Leiden, where we had dinner in the station restaurant. Nasi Goreng..real good.. Carolyn and I later did a little photo safari of the red light district a few streets over.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 17
Today we planned to go to Giethorn, a village up north where we were eager to rent a “whisper boat.” in a quiet little village. We had to make several train connections, always an interesting thing to do. And we tried to find the shortest routes. We ended up going to Utrecht, and it took longer than we thought, because it was a “stoptrein.” We passed through Zwolle, and Meppel, and got off in Steenwijk. No bus in sight, but we found Klaus the taxi driver who took us the 6K to Giethorn . We were on limited time, because we had to be back in Amsterdam for our group’s Ristafel dinner. It was pretty rainy, and we could only spend an hour there, but we vowed to come back. We walked among the bridges, canals, and pretty houses, met Klaus for the taxi ride to the train station, and got the 3:15 train back to Amsterdam.We arrived on time, got the right tram to the restaurant, and even had time for a little walk around what turned out to be a very long block. We met Francie and Cary from Idyll, Marike, and Bob and Anne and had a delicious dinner. There were lots of things to try. I liked it all. It was a little spicy for some. After dinner we walked to the beautiful Concertgebouw, a truly awesome building, recently repainted. Nice string ensemble and soprano soloist, tour of the building, and just an all round nice experience, one that we wouldn’t have had without Marike. We got the tram and train back with our friends. Sat across from a young man we later nicknamed “Tattoo Boy.” He was a wine broker with a lot of stories to tell! We were a captive audience. It is such great fun to meet people on the trains and busses.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 18
We were on the bus and train early cuz today was Maastricht day to visit Mom’s family’s “hometown.” We went to Haarlem to catch the direct train. We had good seats and met a cute family who loved practicing their English with us. They let us video their children and what a nice memory that was. It was a fairly long ride, with the usual scenery, but it was new territory...even a few hills. We had lunch in the station.We crossed over the big bridge to the old part of Maastricht and saw a fun gypsy band and gave them a few coins and shopped all the streets and bought some dishtowels and sox and they sure weighted down our backpacks! Walked through the typically European narrow streets but then it started to rain very hard so we caught a bus to the station and then the train. We sat right next to the door since we thought we wanted to get off at the next stop, but we didn’t. A helpful conductor gave us a tip for getting off in Dordrecht to catch a direct train back to Leiden, so we did. It worked fine. We ate dinner at the Chinese restaurant across from the Leiden station. It was delicious. We even had leftovers which I think we ate the next night.
THURSDAY. AUGUST 19
Today we headed north to Hoorn, as Ann and Bob said it was a great trip. We tried to make the 8:23 bus, but we missed it and had to wait for the 8:44 to the station. Carolyn raced ahead to check the schedule, and we ended up making a good connection to Amsterdam and then another train to Hoorn. Hoorn was cute...we had big steps to climb up and then down on the other side of the tracks to get to the steam train at its own little station. We met a couple of train docents, I’d call them, in the station. This is a historical train, and they have people dressed in traditional costumes to talk to folks on the train. It was really a fun trip...We sat in First Class, with real seat cushions, bright red! (that’s the only kind of cars they had...) We met some nice people, one from Canada who was visiting her Dutch uncle, and they were fun to talk to and compare notes. The woman guide had ten pounds of clothes...all handmade and she had quite a story. The only problem with her was that she had her very noisy and talkative little granddaughter with her. She was loud, but finally went to another car.At the front and back of each car were open platforms, very cool and great to take pictures from. We again took far too many of cabbages and cows and horses and sheep and trees and actually a flower field, even this late in the summer. We stopped twice, once to take a little break while they loaded more coal and then the second time was a song and dance fest. We all got out and there was a guy with his accordion, and another guy passed out words to Dutch songs and led us in singing. I joined in a fun kinder-dance to the embarrassment of my daughter! It was all very festive and Dutch. Back on the train. The conductor had a basket with snacks and postcards and a thermos of hot coffee. I bought some stuff. We took more pictures. We had a little adventure getting on a side track so another train going the other way could pass.
We got off in Medemblick, where we were later to take a boat. We had a couple of hours to spend, and headed through the cute little town. I bought fruit and I can’t remember what else. We had a really nice lunch, very relaxed. We had good soup and Carolyn and I had a pizzagehamenkaas. (Honestly...that’s how they spelled it!) Kinda like a grilled cheese sandwich with ham. Mom had a tostie. It started to rain pretty hard, and we headed for the boat where we sat at a table and had our fruit etc. Our Canadian friends from the train were there, and as we sailed past a little town she showed us the church where she was baptized and where her father donated a chandelier. Again, it is really fun to meet friendly people.
It was pouring rain in Enkhuizen, and places were closing, so we got right on the train. This might be the beginning of our several taxi experiences. We decided to go to a bigger store than the Dekamart, and took a taxi to a store where we never did know where it was. Bought some stuff...some chicken and fruit and salad and of course more Diet Coke, and decided to call a taxi to take us home, same taxi driver. Had a very nice dinner of leftover Chinese food and our new supplies and then had popcorn with the day’s movies.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 20
Delta Project Day. We had heard that this was very interesting. I made breakfast and lunch while Carolyn went to the Dekamart to buy a few things like eggs, watermelon and paper towels. We had gotten into the roast-beef-sandwich-for-lunch routine by now. It saved time and we all liked them, and the rolls were fantastic. Bus to train, train to Dordrecht, and change for Middleburg and went to the end of the line where we were to get Bus 104 for the Deltaworks. It was raining. We had our sandwiches on a bench in the station. We were the only ones on the very deluxe bus, and our driver was friendly and explained about where we were with the North Sea on our left and the polders and land much lower on our right. By now it had stopped raining. It was quite a long, lot-of-strippen ride, through a couple of towns with nice houses and gardens.He let us off and we walked to the visitor center, called the Expo, and looked at the exhibits. They had a lift, which was handy to get from floor to floor. It is a tremendous project, and we were fascinated. There was lots to see and read and a good demo of the whole storm surge suppression gates. There was lots of walking, so we got Mom a chair so we could walk to the other section across and under the freeway, a water theme park, with all kinds of water things to play with. We took the hour boat ride. It was pleasant and sunny and warm and no rain.
What an interesting place, uncrowded and just fascinating to see what the Dutch people have done in taming the sea. Got the train easily, and decided to stop in Dordrecht to eat dinner at the Flintstones restaurant across from the station. Another session of suppressed giggles at the décor! Carolyn had a huge pile of ribs and Mom and I shared a steak. Have I said yet that we had a lot of French fries??? Back to Leiden, and we took a taxi to our apartment.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 21
Today was Keukenhof Gardens day. We got a fairly early start and took a bus, not an express as is usual in the regular season, but scenic. Several others were going there too. We had no idea where it was. As it turned out we had to walk quite a ways through the town of Lisse, but we took our time. We decided to get Mom a chair. It was a wonderful place that you have to experience. They had a special exhibit this year because it is the 50th anniversary. Usually it is closed in May...They have only bulbs. We walked many paths, had our lunch on a bench with beautiful flowers and grass and trees and fountains all around us. The cut flowers in arrangements were fantastic. We went through a big maze, and came out near a wonderful windmill that had steps with rails,..lots easier to climb. Mom made it up to the top. It was very thrilling that she got to do it.We had already decided that we wanted to go back to Giethorn, but since it was a long ways, would do some of the train travel today, and spend the night somewhere north. While Mom had a little rest, we went in search of a hotel further north, but alas the VVV was closed. And the train station was very crowded. So we decided to wing it. We got takeout salads from a newly discovered supermarket close to the station, and came home and ate them. We packed our very few overnight things and headed up toward Zwolle.
We got off in Zwolle, asked a bunch of taxi drivers where a nice hotel was, and headed off down the street. We found a 4 star, and they gave us the honeymoon suite. Little did we know what that meant! We were escorted by the colleague of the desk clerk to Room 120. As we walked in the door we saw a huge bathtub in the center of the room, round and very clean and shiny. We settled in after looking at all the art work, geared toward honeymooners!. Carolyn was in charge of bubbles and we had plenty. Good thing she didn’t use all three bottles. We all went skinny dipping and the water jets were fun. It was a giggly and bubbly time.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 22
We woke up at 8:15, made a little snack for lunch from the stuff we had brought along. We got the train for Steenwijk, a couple of stops away, and close to Giethorn. We decided to eat our lunch sandwiches for breakfast. Sunday morning...there was no one at the station and the town was really quiet. Luckily there was a little taxi phone place, and I pressed a button and called a taxi. A nice young woman driver came and drove us to Giethorn.It was quiet there too, and we got on the first “whisper boat” we came to. They are very quiet, battery powered. We had a map, and at the last minute the guy gave us a pole. See later...We boated a couple of hours...past houses, under bridges, some we had to duck for, and stopped and photographed cows and their special bridges and boats. We saw lots of thatch growing for roofs. Klaus the taxi driver had told us about them on our last trip. There were lots of water lilies. Some boats passed us, until we learned that we had to clean the propeller once in a while. It was a very fun trip through canals and across a couple of lakes. We never got lost, even though we took a shortcut.
Just as we rounded the last turn near where we had started, our motor stopped and wouldn’t start. Luckily we had the pole. Unluckily for a few minutes, as Carolyn was poling she let go and it got stuck. Another hysterical moment. Somehow she retrieved it...I can’t quite remember how. Poling was too slow and hard, but we also had a rope, and Carolyn hopped out to the side of the canal and pulled, which was lots easier! I got some great videos, instead of helping with the rope! Many people were cheering for us on the side of the canal. We tried to be cool! We made it, and the boat man said it was a battery cable or something. Luckily we weren’t in the middle of the lake. We had lunch at their little restaurant. Mom had mushrooms on toast, I had a fricadellen and Carolyn had some other kind of sandwich. We shared a Dutch pancake for dessert.
Then we shopped for a while...Mom got a ring and some candles, and I got some keychains and Carolyn got some music boxes and a Santa and I don’t know what else. It was suddenly 6:00 and we were about to call our taxi driver. ( No bus on Sundays, and it was too far for us to walk back to the train.) Mom saw a chair, sat down, and the chair owner, also a boat man, who had watched us poling, offered to drive us to the station for the same price as the taxi. And his car was right there. I had to run to stop Carolyn from calling the taxi. Another case of getting in a car with a complete stranger. His name was Mike. Got a cute video of him. Train back to Leiden. We watched our hilarious videos and looked at maps to plan the next day.
MONDAY, AUGUST 23
We had been pretty busy, so this was a sleep-in day for Mom. And Carolyn and I wanted to check out a couple of Leiden museums. We said we’d be back by lunch. We tried going to the Pilgrim museum, but it had moved. So we walked all over, bought some postcards and t-shirts and mugs etc. and had a good time shopping. We went to a sausage shop and got some great sausage for lunch. We searched around for some art to buy, and glasses for Carolyn, but stores were closed until 1:00. Went home and had lunch with Mom and she was all ready to go shopping.!So we headed out for the canal in back of our apartment that leads to all the shops and has the open-air markets. We went to “The Painting Lady” and I found a picture that I loved, and so did Carolyn, and Mom too. Mine needed to be framed, and they said they could do it by the next day. We visited many shops, and galleries, and went to the big department store. Carolyn got some spoons and I got a teakettle and we looked for watches etc. Mom got Carolyn some eyeglass frames at a Pearle Vision shop. A very nice man helped her. Mom had a good chair to sit in and I got some McDonald’s drinks while Carolyn made up her mind. It was a nice day of shopping, and I probably left something out. We ate at the “New China” and had another rice table. Nice food, very inexpensive. Went home, admired our purchases and started packing, cuz we had places to go and things to do on the next day, our last.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 24
Got up at 6:45, a day with the promise of looking at the grand-daddy of all windmill sites, the Kinderdijk. There were some slightly complicated directions for taking a bus from the train, but we were getting real taxi savvy, so chose that! A good choice for our last day. We had to buy train tickets to Rotterdam, as our passes were used up. We got there easily, and found a nice taxi driver who explained things to us on the 20 minute ride. We invited him to join us on our half hour canal ride to view the 19 windmills. It was a peaceful ride looking at windmills and surrounding fields. This is strictly for the tourists, as they are mostly using electric mills now. Several bicyclists were on the path next to the canal. There was also a small gift shop, where I found a book I had been wanting to get for Mom.Then, even though we had to be back in Leiden by 3:30 to pick up our art, we decided to go to Delft again. There was a toy that Carolyn wanted. Delft was practically on the way back. So we got off there, walked to the square, ate lunch on a bench with some bees, shopped in a china store, watched an artist paint on the porcelain, and a toy store (but the original toy desire was too expensive...but we found others...) and then zipped back to Leiden. Carolyn and I just had to go to one more museum, the Boerhaave. and had to see it in 20 minutes because they were closing. They had some interesting medical stuff and hearts and brains in bottles. The museum was on a tiny street that we almost missed. We went to get some sausage, and checked out a nice restaurant for our last dinner in Holland. Mom was rested by then and we ended up eating at an Italian place at the end of our street. We did our final packing, and hoped we’d be ready for the 8:15 taxi on Wednesday morning.