A Giessen River Boat Ride

Do you ever feel that sometimes you have way too much fun?!  HA!

Well, this is one of those times, almost 3 weeks ago, when Astrid and I joined our friends, Margreeth (mother) and Natascha (daughter), for a Saturday's boat ride on our nearby Giessen river, just 7.5 km from home.

It so happens that Margreeth's brother, who lives in Giessenburg, owns an electric-motor boat.

Out of the goodness and generosity of his heart, along with his wife, we had access to it for the day. 

(Notice that I have a photo of them and their house...but not the boat!)

Here's the collage I put up on Facebook of Natascha's iPhone images.

(Did I mention it was a hot day and I had to keep myself covered from the blistering sun?)

Think about 4.5 hours of lazily cruising the Giessen river...the operative word being lazily.

Just ogling the real estate along the way was worth the trip.

Location.  Location.  Location.  (right?)

We watched mamas and papas along the way feeding their babies. 

It was educational.

(Have you ever seen a great crested grebe that wasn't soaked to the skin?)

Speaking of eating, we did our own thing right there on the boat.

A picnic on a boat!

Everything else was frosting on the cake.

What you see is what you get when you are lazily passing by.

We especially enjoyed seeing the Ons Museum from the river, which we had visited in 2014.

But to be honest, it was the cows who made my day, there at the water's edge.

By now, back away from the water, our earth is parched for lack of rain and the heat.

The cows teach us about how to deal with this extreme weather, right?

And then it was the windmill at the far end before we turned back.

It's the Oudendijkse Molen from 1683.

What is it about windmills!

I put this collage on Facebook today and someone said Astrid looked like a little girl!

I think all 4 of us (each with our turn at the helm) were little girls that day.

I even got my "fix" of weathervanes, all from the boat.
(Most of these I've shown before.)

Let's just say we had the Life of Riley that day...

thanks to the generosity of dear friends.

The Museum in Giessenburg, NL

Two posts in one day, one right after the other, seemed to make sense this time around so as to keep two things separate...and yet somehow connected.

We were in nearby Giessenburg in March to have high tea with Margreeth and Natasha.  That was my first post here.  During the afternoon, we walked into town and, among other things, visited the museum, down the street from De Graanbuurt.  It deserved it's own post, I decided.

First of all, it's huge and a bit of a...well...an intriguing look of the former old grain mill.

It belongs to the extended Boer family, some of whom live there and keep the place running.

It's a privately-run museum with all the contents on display collected by the family over 50+ years!

They call it Ons Museum:  Our Museum.
And yes, that's Gorinchem's Grote Kerk 6 km away, captured from the top floor!

I don't know where or how to begin.  HELP!

No sooner do you call for Help and the 80-year-young matriarch, Mrs. Boer Sr., appears.

She can tell you anything and everything you'd ever want to know.

Like, for instance, how these phonographs work!

How about vintage toys?  To your heart's delight!

Did I mention that we first climbed to the top floor of the building from the outside staircase 

because that's where the museum is.  So after we finished sailed through the museum part, 

we turned a corner and  found a set of steps to start our trip downstairs.

Don't ask; don't tell.

Enough doors to sink a ship...and yours to buy, if you brought your right measurements.

Do you like junk?  Someone's trash, your treasure?

It was hard to know where the museum left off and the "for sale" started.  HA!

See what I mean?

To tell you the truth, I had no clue what was museum and what was store at that point.

I do know that some of this was for sale, as we got closer to the ground entrance.

Welcome to Ons Museum...Our Museum.

I 'spect it's one of Giessenburg's best-kept secrets because I hadn't heard of it in my 4+ years here,

and it's only 6 km from home.

Guess where we'll now take all our photographer friends when they visit!  HA!