Daughter Amy in the Netherlands, 2024

 

You may recall that daughter Amy has visited us in the Netherlands twice now (in 2019 and in 2022), both times in conjunction with business trips to the Mercedes-Benz worldwide headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany.  Lucky for her, it was mostly a trip on her company's dime!

THIS time, however, she came totally on her own...and just for her/because of us!  And guess what:  It was a week's visit, from Monday to Monday (March 25-April 1), ending with the Easter weekend.

Tuesday, March 26, her first full day after arrival from Atlanta, was our fullest, longest day out, mainly because it was the only day when rain wasn't predicted.  It was the day we drove to the North Sea, which Amy hadn't yet "experienced."  It's only 81 km from Gorinchem, where we live, to The Hague/Scheveningen, our goal for the day. 

But we decided to stop first in Gouda, halfway, for a koffie break

and a chance to show Amy a famous Dutch city, known for its cheese and city hall.

I was caught off-guard by the memorial to Alexei Navalny in this remote place,

but thankful for such a worldwide event having an impact here, nearby.

It was also a chance for Amy to observe a "more Dutch you cannot get" moment,

when the 2 gentlemen at a nearby table shared bitterballen with their beer.

Amy treated us to a delightful lunch in the world-renown 1818 Kurhaus Hotel on the beach,

over-looking the Scheveningen Pier, near The Hague.  And, yes, the North Sea!

The next day, Wednesday, March 27, was the perfect day for Astrid and me to babysit both Hailey and Sem, who are always out of school Wednesday afternoon.  We spent the time at son Jeroen's house and neighborhood to give the kids plenty of time to be with Amy again, and vice versa....

[collage credit:  Astrid]

first picking Hailey up from school,

[collage credit:  Astrid]

and then watching the kids play at the playground across the street after lunch.

[collage credit:  Astrid]

From there we took a wee walk through the neighborhood, giving us all a nice workout.

As you can see by our coats, it was still quite cold on March 27.

[collage credit:  Astrid]

Once back home, Jeroen joined us to start preparing supper.

(Remember that Jeroen (age 35) and Amy (age 51) are half-siblings!)

[collage credit:  Astrid]

That's when Marissa (Jeroen's wife) and Jaap (Astrid's ex) joined us for Jeroen's poke bowl.

[collage credit:  Astrid]

And guess what pjs the kids wore for bed:  the ones Amy had bought for them at Christmas,

which were colored by the kids and Astrid and me.  They may even fit another year!?!

Thursday, March 28, was lunch on De Stroming barge in Woudrichem, across the Merwede river from us:

Lucky for us, there was a window of about 2 sunny hours afterwards for a nice walk there.

Friday, March 29, was a stay-at-home day for our community's Easter lunch, for which both Astrid and I helped to prepare:

Even Amy helped out with setting the tables, and, once again, like last year,

Astrid prepared the soft-boiled eggs and I knit the mutsjes (little hats) to cover them.

I was so glad Amy could experience a communal event like this with us.

Saturday, March 30, was another stay-at-home day except for a surprise late-afternoon outing we made for Amy at a place we knew she'd love:

La Caponniere is a wee café in a war bunker just a wee walk from our apartment.

We hadn't been there for years, since changing management, but wanted to try it again.

We were not disappointed.  In fact, Amy said it was one of her favorite memories of this trip.

Definitely something to make a tradition out of!

Easter Sunday, March 31, was a true stay-at-home day, when we relaxed and just went with the flow, before Amy's departure home from Amsterdam early the next morning.

Astrid makes this white-asparagus meal for me every Easter,

which I was glad to share with Amy!

Most of the fill-in-the-blanks throughout the week were playing our favorite Five Crowns card game (thanks to Lis from England who got us hooked a few years back).  Lots of talking in between, of course, and just BEING together.

Thank you, Amy, for making it happen.

Let's keep doing it as often as we can!

[Addendum: this was a post meant for a week ago to be more current with the event, but didn't happen because of an unexpected world-wide unavailability to Blogspot for a week.]

Visiting Philine in Bad Rothenfelde, Germany

 

A day after daughter Amy flew back to Atlanta from visiting us the week before Easter (which I'll get to later), Astrid and I drove to Bad Rothenfelde in Germany to visit dear Philine, from our Shutterchance photoblog, who is in rehab following a right-knee replacement on March 1.

Actually, we made it a 3-day, 2-night trip (Tuesday-Thursday this week), spending 2 nights at a Fletcher Hotel in Denekamp, NL, close to the German border, making our trip to Philine on Wednesday easier--only a one-hour drive each way.  

Bad Rothenfelde is a health resort in Lower Saxony, known for its wellness spas from salty water and air.  Philine's medical clinic is smack-dab in the middle of all that goodness:

It's a huge complex of everything anyone needs for rehab after surgery.

And it's a stone's throw from the gradation towers that remove water

from the saline solution to produce salt for the salt baths:

Because we were a couple hours early for our meet-up time with Philine at 2 p.m.,

we first walked around this largest of 2 towers...in the rain...

and got our education.  This was totally new for me!

And it's all situated in the context of a lovely park

which residents from the clinic can enjoy while in rehab.

We even had time to enjoy some German goulash soup before heading to the clinic.

Exactly what the doctor ordered for a rainy day!

Once with Philine, we spent all of 45 minutes with her!

This is the collage I posted on Shutterchance the next day, for all our friends there

who have been very concerned about how she's doing.

In those 45 minutes, Philine met us at the reception desk, showed us her room,

walked the halls past all the important places (blood labs, exercise equipment, dining room, etc.),

and then back to her room for her to take a nap.  We did her in!

Believe it or not, her knee replacement gives her no pain.  THAT part is a huge success for her.

However, at age 82 (on April 10), the operation did a number on her blood hemoglobin,

making her dangerously anemic--tired, weak and short of breath.

In those 45 minutes, she had to take several sitting breaks.

And by the end, regardless of how tired she was (even though the exercise was important),

she became the Philine we all know at Shutterchance:  our "professor" and mentor.

By the time we left her back in her room, she had her tell-tale smile and twinkle in her eye. 

On the way back to our car, we passed the second, shorter  gradation tower,

sans windmill and rain.

This was a very important trip for Astrid and me, to check up on our dear friend who is very special to our SC community.  Many of us have met her in real life and were concerned about her need for rehab because of her severe anemia.  It so happens that we were her first/only visitors thus far because of sickness among her German friends.  So all the more we are glad we could make this trip.  It was for US as much as it was for her.

Best wishes from all of us, dear Philine, as you continue your recovery....

Texel Island, NL, 2024: Renovations

 

To be honest, I thought I had already posted about our January trip to start some renovations in Jaap's bungalow, as a gift from Astrid's deceased brother, Sander.  

But no, I didn't.  So this is the gist:

After years of surviving on a dorm-sized fridge, we all agreed it was time for something larger

that would still fit in the space.  Astrid did the prep, while Jaap "supervised."

The same thing for a new stand-alone freezer, which needed a cabinet to protect it.

We were gone when the appliances arrived, but the photos from Jaap 

proved that all Astrid's hard work paid off!

So, that was why we were there in January.

Segue now to early March when Astrid and I returned but without Jaap.  Astrid didn't like the back of the freezer cabinet because it wasn't adequately stabilized.  So here at home she prepared a new back which she was able to install this trip.

And, yes, it did the trick!

And with that done, we spent the rest of our time (6 days total) traipsing all over the island, "practicing" with our new "Sanders" (iPhone 15 Pro Maxes).  

All the photos following, from this March trip, are with my iPhone 15 Pro Max:

Let's start with eating out!

A café in Oudeschild.

Outside that café in living color.

A café in Oosterend and, yup...I'm still on that penchant for the NOIR option.

The same café in Oosterend in living color outside, of course.

Before and after eating, as you'd guess, we were taking photos everywhere, whether at the beach (North Sea) or in the vicinity:

Again, always "practicing" with the new iPhone 15 Pro Max.

And, yes, we even visited a couple of wee churches:

This one is the Reformed Church in De Waal.

And of course, a windmill:

This one is Het Noorden near Oosterend (yes, near that café).

But the crowning success of the Texel trip this time, hands down, was my first visit to the The Slufter salt marsh, nature area.  OMG.  Where have I been all my life!

From L to R:  The Netherlands, then Texel island, zooming in to where The Slufter is.

Using the pano option, we're looking out to the sea from the inland entrance to the salt marsh.

It totally made my day, the trip, and my new "Sander."

Enough for now to say we're both totally thrilled with our new iPhones and wonder how often we'll use our Canon PowerShot cameras going forward.  Will we always want to carry BOTH cameras with us, for the rare times the Canon might actually get a better zoomed-in shot??  I guess time will tell....

Clarification:  all non-collage images have been tweaked in PhotoShop,

which means they are not SOOC (straight out of camera).

Den Bosch, NL, With Our New iPhone 15 Pro Maxes

 

Believe it or not, it was a month ago that I posted about our new iPhone 15 Pro Maxes, the gifts Astrid and I received from Sander's inheritance.  But it was 6 days later, on February 17, that we drove to Den Bosch (53 km/34 mi from home) to "practice" in earnest with them in the St. John's cathedral there.

Which is to say I need to quickly catch up...since we just returned from 6 days on Texel again, where we really "practiced."  But first, Den Bosch.

I've already made 2 posts on Den Bosch, first in 2010 and then in 2019.  So this isn't a post about Den Bosch, per se, but about the abilities and power of the iPhone 15 Pro Max camera, about which we're still learning and loving.

As we left the parking garage to enter the city, Jheronimus Bosch welcomed us.

This was new for me, so, of course, out popped the iPhone for the first photo of the day.

On our way into the city, I checked the camera's zoom.

I can't bend down like Astrid (fake knee hurts when I do), so would the 5x zoom be good enough?

So far so good but you'll see it better later, inside the church. 

As we're wont to do, just outside the church we whetted our appetite with a latte macchiato.

See me practicing on the photo-blur focus (bottom-left)?

Then it was all about using the B&W options...in this case, the NOIR:

All 3 of these images were further tweaked in PhotoShop to make them warmer.

But it was clear to me that day that I had a penchant for the 16:9 size ratio and the noir option.

However, once inside the cathedral, I first started with "normal" photos,

How would the camera handle the low-light ?

The nave.

The organ.

The pulpit.

All of my COLLAGE photos in this post are SOOC (straight out of camera)

with tweaks inside the PicMonkey software.

But would the zoom be strong enough to capture details I could get with my Canon camera???

This was my answer:  see those 4 pillars near the "seeing-eye" cupola (top-left)?

Yes, the zoom works!

As you see, I then reverted back to my penchant for the 16:9 size ratio and the noir option,

further tweaked in PhotoShop.

After the church, we had a delightful lunch where I practiced again with depth of field/blur.

It takes getting used to but is actually very user-friendly.

Den Bosch, February 17, 2024:  our first photo hunt with our iPhone 15 Pro Maxes (our Sanders, as our Dutch friend, Marjolein, calls them!).  It was a great start on the learning curve....

But wait till you see Texel again, this time through our Sanders.  In both photo hunts, I never once used my Canon PowerShot camera.  That doesn't mean I'll never use it again, of course, but one does wonder what the advantages will be for taking it along on every trip?

As a BTW, we both had iPhone lanyards around our necks holding our phones the entire photo hunt,

which we highly recommend for those fearing loss, dropping or grabbing.

They're also nice for those hand-free times you need.