Virtual Realities

Another day. Another blogger met. Another photo hunt.
Today is my turn again at Vision & Verb, talking about when we meet blogger friends and when virtual reality becomes...well, real. In the above case, it was Petra, one of our V&V collaborators who happens to live in Tilburg just 30 km from us here in Holland. We knew we'd meet her eventually, so when we found out she was participating in a photo exhibition a week ago, we made a day of it.

The photo exhibition was in the small town of Moergestel, 7 km east of Tilburg in North Brabant province south of us. Approximately 6K residents. Astrid had already Googled the area to see what was there and found out there was a different kind of windmill we don't normally see, just outside the city. So we decided to first get the lay of the land before driving over to the exhibition. This weathervane was on the other side of the street from the windmill, so we got two for the price of one. (Click on image to see what he was shooting.)

This is a standerdmolen from 1852 and is similar to the wipmolen at Kinderdijk I have shown here. Both are post mills but this one has a round(ish) base. It was a frosty morning but the sun was shining.
Even Granny Towanda was in heaven.

From the windmill, Astrid kindly asked TomTom to take us to the Nieuwenhof Castle from the 14th century...and she did (our TomTom is a lady)! In 1840 it became a monastery named the St. Stanislaus Institution. Today it's used as a mental healthcare facility. I feel better already, don't you?!

Then into the tiny town of Moergestel to 'do' our koffie thing (no appeltaart, however, because they forgot to take it out of the freezer the night before). The town square has its ubiquitous church, the Roman Catholic St. John's Beheaded, whose tower was built in 1500. It wasn't open, but not to worry. We heard its one bell ring and we walked around it. Astrid, btw, is taking a picture of a giant bicycle air pump there on the city square.

This is the point at which we then went to meet Petra at her exhibition (photos at the top of the post). By the time we said our Good-Byes, it was time to drive the 7 km to Tilburg to find the water tower on TomTom's list of things to see. It's where we also planned to eat lunch.

But what to our wondering eyes should appear....

...the Adbij Onze Lieve Vrouw van Koningshoeven (Abbey of Our Lady of Koningshoeven) trappist monastery, right out in the middle of nowhere! Talk about changing the plans of mice and [wo]men. See the foggy image (above) of the church? We stopped dead in our tracks because the sun was shining through the windows from the other side...never knowing it was part of a monastery. As we turned the corner, there it was. We had to stop and check it out, of course.


After walking around a bit, it became crystal clear this was a monastery that made and sold its own beer! De Koningshoeven Brewery, a Dutch Trappist brewery, was founded there in 1884 and has an annual production of 145,000 hectoliters (3,830,495 gallons). Tell me someone's not having a lot of fun!


...not far from the restaurant where we decided on the spot to eat our lunch. What serendipity. It was as though the whole day was waiting to surprise us with this place. We could have taken a tour (the only way to get into the church and walk the inner grounds) but it was already crowded and we didn't really want to wait. Another day.


Clearly they do well for themselves. The business was brisk! And the beer was GREAT. Even Astrid, who generally does not drink beer, liked it. The whole experience was totally worth it.


Those monks aren't dummies, of course. They positioned their delightful Kloosterwinkel (Monastic Shop) right at the entrance, where we gladly took a look around and...of course...bought two stone bottles of the Dubbel beer (7% ABV) we had just enjoyed at lunch.
Authentic trappist product!


Astrid is always the Trooper, taking the bag to the car
and then coming back for our last photos before leaving.

Then finally, our last destination of the day....

...the Tilburg water tower, built in 1897 at 50.5 meters high.

Did you notice? We started the day with a weathervane and ended it with a water tower.
And in between, we met a wonderful blogger and then drank to it with a delightful Trappist beer.

How's that for virtual realities becoming the real thing!
More on Vision & Verb....

Roze Maandag: Pink Monday

It was exactly two weeks ago today. For months we had already heard of the Tilburg Fair (Tilburgse Kermis) coming in July...Europe's largest movable fair. 2010 was its 201st anniversary.

Astrid and I talked about seeing it, just to say we did it, as a way to see another city in The Netherlands, shooting two birds with one stone. We had also hoped to meet up with another Vision & Verb collaborator who happens to live there (alas, she was on vacation so that didn't happen). Then one of Astrid's co-workers told her about Pink Monday, the "be gay for a day" day at the fair. WhoHoo. Supposedly it's the busiest day of the fair and has been a huge success since its 1990 inception. If we had had pink shirts, we would have worn them, but it was enough for us to walk the 3.5 km walk from beginning to end holding hands. We do that anyway here in The Netherlands, where being gay is legally "accepted." Besides, there was enough pink around to make up for our omission (click to enlarge and then click again):

We were there on the early-evening end of things, leaving home after Astrid's work and arriving by 5:45...only 50 km away. After eating supper there in a sit-down cafe, we had had enough and were ready to leave by 8:00 p.m., before things got started on the entertainment scene. We knew the drag queens would be in rare form, but that's not what we were there for. We just wanted to SEE it...and not necessarily experience the whole thing. Don't you love that the kids get to see this as though it is just another ho-hum fair! I wondered how many of them had two mommies or two daddies?

What immediately astonished me, to be honest, was my first impression after entering the fair--seeing the incongruity of the main church rising in the background as a backdrop:

Now that I think about it, it's like seeing the Church's blessing on what was happening that Pink Monday.

Astrid's co-worker who told her about Pink Monday grew up with a dad who made and repaired the steam-operated, old-timey rides. So that, too, was one of our reasons for attending the fair. We didn't ride a thing, mind you, but had fun seeing what was before our very eyes:

Are there fairs in the States that operate steam rides, I wonder?
And would Nicholas want to ride one now at age 10!


As fairs go, this was as faerie as it ever gets. If we can't take a joke, I always say! Notice that even Granny Towanda butted in on the scene (even though she's still very green behind the ears).

Speaking of Nicholas...when Astrid and I fly to Atlanta in October, we will arrive in time to take him to the fair he has attended every year since age 2. We wouldn't miss it for anything. Maybe this one (though perhaps a bit too pink for then!) was a good appetite whetter, getting us in the mood. But then, how can you ever get out of the mood, right?!