19th October 2022.
 |
| Sunrise in Surrey |
 |
| Off to Europe ! |
On June 29th we set off to Europe for 3 months. Janet's brother Peter and his wife Celia came up from cold and wet Melbourne to babysit the house, and to enjoy some Queensland warmth ! They drove us up to Brisbane airport and we caught the evening Singapore Airlines flight to London, via Singapore. Cattle class - But actually Singapore Airlines were very good - I have been on a lot worse flights over the years. But post Covid, travelling really is beginning to be rather tiresome - queues seem longer, crowds seem bigger, and then many facilities (restaurants, shops etc) in the airports seem to be closed - "Lack of personnel" !! Even the Duty Free places were closed 😡. Hmmmmm. Anyway, we eventually arrived safely, if tired, at Heathrow, where John and Di were there to meet us and take us back to their lovely home in Surrey and a welcome meal and Gin & Tonic - or two !
 |
| Polesden Lacey |
Just 4 days with them while we got over our jet lag (my imagination, or does jl seem worse now we have a few additional years on us ? !), and we were very lazy, although we did visit the nearby Edwardian house and estate Polesden Lacey, which is not only excellent, but also a good morning walk from Skid's house !! Then on 4th July we flew on EasyJet out of Gatwick to Schiphol. Quite impressed by EasyJet - on time, and all quite efficient. Can't say the same for Schiphol - Now that the UK has left the EU, everyone who is non EU is lumped together and passport control took at least a couple of hours. British passports are of no help at all anymore ! Once through immigration, son Nick was there to meet us and drive the 30 minutes or so to Almere where he lives. We have rented an Air BnB flat in Almere so that we are not under Nick and Tanja's feet in their relatively small house, so Nick took us directly there so we could get some sleep. The flat is only about a 10 minute bus ride, or 45 minute walk, from Nick's, and we can walk or bus into central Almere in 5 minutes. Perfect.
 |
| Jumping castles everywhere |
 |
| Funny angles of our flat |
Wed and Sat are market days in the main square of Almere, so we stocked up on food and cheese and everything else we needed in our flat. The flat was a funny angled design, but was just perfect for what we needed. As might be expected, the twins, Sophie and Emily, who are now 2 1/2 years old and have never met us before, were somewhat shy of these two strange old people who suddenly arrived on their doorstep ! And since they speak Dutch most of the time, communication was also quite difficult with them. But we had fun - Our first outing was to a park where there were dozen's of jumping castles set up, and both they and their 5 year old sister Hayley had a great time there. Never seen so many jumping castles in one place before !!
Then 2 days later, Janet tested positive for Covid ! I was still negative, so I slept on the living room in
 |
| Double stripe ! |
an effort to avoid the lurgy, and was walking over to Nick's place, but keeping away from any close contact with them or the girls, although we did go over to an indoor play area with them all while Janet stayed home. Then after 3 days, Janet recovered fully........and I tested positive ! So we swapped roles, and after one day of aching everywhere, and one day of sleeping, I felt much better on the 3rd day, and that really was it. (Being fully vaccinated and boosted may have had something to do
 |
| Our holiday cottage |
with it) The following weekend we drove up country to a kind of holiday camp run by Landal company where you stay in beautiful thatched cottages all hidden in the trees, and on site there are all sorts activities for the kids - horse riding, swimming, water slides, cartoon characters - Basically all you need to keep children happy. An excellent weekend as well as a good insight into an activity that is very popular in The Netherlands - in winter as well as summer.
 |
| Swimming off the boat |
One evening soon after we got home, Nick took me out to meet some of his friends who had invited us out on their boat for the evening and a few beers. There are some lovely canals around Almere, and we had a very pleasant evening on the water. Janet was babysitting the twins, and eventually we had to go home to rescue her as she was having some problems due to not being able to understand what the twins needed when they woke up crying. Very difficult.
 |
| Nick with an Alpine |
On the 21st July I had a wonderful surprise - for my birthday present Nick had booked me on a track day at Zandvoort Formula 1 circuit - And he came too ! It was really great - we went out in Porsche 911's, and later in Renault Alpine sports cars, doing 6 laps following an instructor round. He would slowly build up speed, and if you stayed with him, he kept going faster ! It really was excellent, and the damp weather really did not detract from the experience at all, although I put admit that for the second session in the Alpines, Nick did ask to go in front of me, as he felt I was too slow !! 😂. Last activity was for each of us to be taken out for 3 laps in a Renault Clio race car with a professional driver at the wheel, and that was quite an eye opener - They really do get going a lot faster than we were in the other cars !! Altogether a GREAT day out with my son, at a track that I grew up reading about in the old Formula 1 days of Jim Clark and Graham Hill etc. A fantastic birthday present - THANK YOU.
 | | Nijmegen |
The next day we set off for a day in Nijmegen - There was a walking event happening there which is well attended locally, and it was fun to see all the crowds, as well as to explore some of the beautiful old town. Excellent lunch in a square near the old church of St Stephen before heading home. 3 days after that Nick, Hayley, Janet and I caught the small ferry from Almere across to the Florida Expo - An international display of plants and flowers - This year was Almere's opportunity. Some of the displays were absolutely stunning - Like the orchids. A lot of walking and exploring, as well as a ride in a cable car which Hayley loved, and generally a very pleasant day, made even better by ice creams at the end !! |
 |
| Zuider Zee Museum |
The very next day Nick took Janet & I (the girls were at school) to the Zuider Zee museum. Basically this is the history of the Zuider Zee and how it used to flood all the time, and eventually how, after preliminary work between 1920 and 1924, they finally completed the main dam which separated the North Sea from the Zuider Zee in 1932. The rest, as they say, is history, and a lot of additional farming land has since been reclaimed. But the most fascinating part of the museum is a village of original houses and buildings that have been moved here from other areas, accurately depicting early life around the Guider Zee - A truly fascinating day and a great insight into earlier life in the country.
A couple of days later we caught the train into Amsterdam with Nick, and went to visit Tanja's father
 |
| Inside Church in Attic |
Jos who volunteers one day a week at an amazing church/house museum called "Our Lord in the Attic". In the 17th and 18th centuries, Catholics were prohibited from worshipping in public, and some 23 houses were turned into churches which were invisible from the outside - They just looked like regular houses. But inside were all the fineries of a Catholic Church, together with altars, pulpits, organs, galleries for the congregation - everything. Amazing to see all this inside a long narrow Dutch 5 story canal-side house ! This is the last one left as the others have been turned back into regular houses, so this is an amazing museum of early life in Amsterdam. An excellent day out, and we came home on the train with Jos, and got into trouble for talking on the train - We were in a "Silent" carriage, and silent means SILENT !! Whoopsadaisy !!
 |
| Nick & girls at home |
On the next day, 29th July, Janet and Nick set off to Maastricht to spend an evening with Andre Rieu - And while I was putting Hayley's new flat pack bed together, I felt a familiar sensation like indigestion in my chest, and realised I was having another heart attack - The last one was 2 1/2 years earlier !! Tanja took me down to Almere hospital where they tested me and found I was correct, and was then whisked off across to another hospital 40 minutes away in an Ambulance with siren blaring to have an Angiogram - Where they found no problem with my heart at all !! It seems that whatever blockage there had been initially had been resolved by the blood thinners etc that they had given me initially. Nevertheless my blood pressure was still very high so they kept me in hospital for another day until that came down to normal levels. Janet and Nick meantime enjoyed the Andre Rieu concert and came home the next day to pick up the pieces !!
On the 2nd August, my birthday, we went out to a great Mexican restaurant in Almere, Rosita's) and had
 |
| Girls enjoying the fountains |
a very "festive" evening, along with Mexican sombreros and the staff singing Happy Birthday to me !! A fun evening. A day later and the weather was pretty warm, so we went down for lunch in town and sat right beside some decorative fountains in the square so the girls could enjoy running around in the water and keeping cool. They had a great time ! Next day, 4th August, we were back on EasyJet and heading back to the UK for the next part of our holiday. A GREAT time in Almere that gave us the opportunity to not only get to know the girls better (and vice versa !), to spend time with Nick and Tanja, and also to start to understand more about the Dutch way of life. We really had a great time.
 |
| A great time in The Netherlands |
Rest of the photos can be found here :-
No comments:
Post a Comment