River Cruise 2015 - Day 2, part 2 - Utrecht

After visiting Keukenhof Gardens in the morning, we went on to spend the afternoon in the city of Utrecht. It is a very old and interesting city, dating back to the Romans , and even beyond.

We started our tour with a boat ride around the old canal system, getting a good overview of the city. 

 
 This is the oldest of the bridges, built in the 1300's. 

There was a system of wharves built along the canals, with storage facilities at canal level, then the main street was built on top of these, with houses.  The one with the cross was once a church.

 


The carving shows what was traded in this area by the canal.  This area would have been for cattle....... 

 ......and the horse traders....... 

 


......and the milk maids........etc. 

This fellow was enjoying the canals as well. 

 

If you are feeling energetic, you can rent one of these pedal boats built for 4. 

After the boat ride, we had a walking tour of the main area of the town.  The streets were narrow, with cars, pedestrians, and bikers.

The buildings at canal level are now mostly restaurants, boutiques, but some are homes as well. 

The "Tour de France" (I think I got that right) will take place in Utrecht this summer.   

The Dom Tower, a part of the Cathedral of St. Martin, was built in the 11th and 12th century.                                     

This lovely entryway goes to the garden area of the Dom Tower.  

When we were left to tour on our own for a while, we decided to have a coffee, and tried this cafe on the right.  When inside, we discovered that it was not so much for drinking coffee as it was for having "a smoke".  There was a menu on the wall such as I have never seen before!!! 

So we went on down the street and had the best hot chocolate I have ever had!  

Just a really fun and lovely town.

.....until next time..... 

River Cruise, 2015 Day 2 - Keukenhof Gardens

Day 2 in the Netherlands was a very wonderful , but busy day, so I am dividing the blog into 2 parts.  We left the boat in Gouda at 8:30 a.m., and went by coaches to the famous Keukenhof Gardens, which has more than 7 million tulips,hyacinths and daffodils in over 32 hectaresof gardens.  On the way, we saw great fields full of tulips and other flowers, and on arriving at the gardens, were given a lovely picnic lunch to eat where and when we wished.  We were so busy wandering and taking pictures, we didn't eat it til we were back on the coach! 

One of the beautiful fields of flowers we saw on the way to the gardens.  

I took 100's of pictures (I know you find that hard to believe!), and it was so hard to choose which ones to include.  Here is one of my favorites.

Here is Paul, trying hard to fill these wooden shoes, faithfully carrying our large lunch, which he had put into one bag.

There were lovely, gracious swans swimming in  one of the water features that were scattered throughout the park.

So pretty!

So many colours and varieties!

Don't know what this is, but it sure is lovely!

There is an orchid house in the park, with every variety of orchid you could imagine!  There were places in this building where I'm sure wedding parties came for photos.

There were paths - and people - everywhere through the park!  It is open for only 8 weeks of the year, so you can imagine how many people would be there.  There were a kazillion buses!

Although tulips are predominant, there were lots of other flowers as well, including this lovely daffodil.
While the tulip is native to Turkey, it is now the prized possession of the Netherlands.  They have the largest variety of tulips, and their bulbs are considered to be the best available. 

 

Now that's a "really big shoe"!             There is a windmill that you can climb up into to see the tulip fields.  We did!

 

 I would have liked to do this, but settled for taking a picture of someone else doing it. 

Like many places these days, there was a bit of a petting zoo.......

.....and you can't have a petting zoo without some goats! 

This proud peacock had 3 peahens to impress, and it was very nice of him to do this when we were standing right there!

This made for a very colourful display!

These are Linden trees, which are trimmed way back, then trained to make a shady hedge.  We saw them everywhere in Netherlands and Belgium!

One of my favorites! 

Coot on a nest. 

A young lady in a royal Dutch costume of bygone days. 

Another of my favorite type of tulip.  I bought a box of 24 bulbs at the airport on the way home, and they are some that could be planted now, to bloom in 4-5 weeks!

"Just" a mallard, but oh so beautiful!

We found that more people do this with their wooden shoes than wear them, although we did see a farmer working in his field one day wearing them, and Jeremy assured us that they are very comfortable.

Til next time.......

River Cruise 2015 - Day One

We have been so blessed to be able to do a river cruise with Gerry Van Dyke travel company in Netherlands and Belgium!  It was a wonderful experience, full of new things to learn and discover. 

After flying from Toronto to Amsterdam overnight, we were taken by buses to our home for 15 nights, the Da Vinci.  This was her first trip since the fire we experienced on the first night of our cruise last fall.  What a beautiful boat! 

 

The Da Vinci was moored and waiting for us in the small town of Wijk bij Duurstede, and after a light lunch in the lounge, we had time to explore before sailing away at 2:00.  I love these old windmills, which seem to be in most of the small towns in the Netherlands -  restored, but not usually in use. 

These were some unusual-looking sheep and lambs near the windmill and the houses.

 

This fellow was fishing for catfish, but so far with no success.

So long to this pretty little town, and on to Gouda, where we stayed overnight.

Do you suppose these folks had beef sandwiches in that bag?  We saw a LOT of cows in the Netherlands!

There are walking/biking trails on both sides of most of the rivers we traveled on, and they were well used! 

 
I love the time spent cruising on the waterways, where you often see various water birds.  This unusual looking goose is called a Barnacle Goose - so pretty and unusual!  

 


The beautiful Barnacle Goose flying.

 

We saw LOTS of these geese, and assume they are wild - possibly Graylags? 

 

The first of many locks throughout the 2 weeks.

 

We also saw a lot of sheep along the way.

Though it was a lovely sunny day, it was cool, and I was surprised to see these kids playing in the cold water. 

 

Every little town had a church spire or two.  The tree on the left is a knobby willow, and every couple of years, they get trimmed way back like this.  Then they grow out into a lovely shady tree. 

The rivers are like our highways - lots of cargo ships instead of transports.  And most of them have a family living on them.  Note the car and the boat, which will be lifted off by the crane on the boat.  Some have what looks like large play pens (cages!) for the children to play in outside.  And some have regular gardens on the back  The kids go to boarding schools, and stay on the boat for the weekends and vacations.  It's an unusual lifestyle, but one that is followed a lot in Europe.



That's it for now.....more to follow!