So…

…here I am and here you are. And they say coincidence doesn’t exist .

I promised some of you a story about a concert we went to, which was about the only blogworthy thing that happened in the past few months. Apart from me breaking my wrist that is of course. Perhaps I’ll tell you all the fun things surrounding that event later.

First the story about the concert. Not an exciting story mind you. I just want to share that wonderful evening with you.

One Friday evening a friend telephoned: ‘we’re going to a concert on the lake tomorrow. We’re sailing the boat to the lake tomorrow morning, will moor it in the harbour near the yacht club and then at around 6 in the evening we’re sailing towards the podium they’ve built on the other side of the lake. Like to join us?’

‘Yeaheah, of course we’re joining you. Thanks for inviting us. Who else is coming?’ She mentioned a couple of people we (hubs and I) knew too. It promised to be an evening to remember.

So well before 6 o’clock that Saturday evening we were at the harbour, found the boat and were greeted by our friends. Everybody had brought a couple of bottles of wine, except for one guy who had brought 4 cases of 6 bottles; 2 cases of red and 2 cases of white wine. He must have been thirsty. It promised to be an evening we wouldn’t remember.

So we set off to the other side of the lake, where a floating podium had been built on the lake and where the Haydn Youth Orchestra would give a concert with guest appearances of students of the local conservatory and singer Izaline Calister (she sings a jazzy kind of South American style of music).

Can’t tell you how lovely that evening was. We drank wine (not the entire shipload mind you), ate quiches, French cheeses and bread, Turkish bread and hummus, salads…

I hadn’t brought my camera because of my physical incapability to shoot photos anyway, but fortunately hubs has an i-Phone (research has been done to find out what people use their phones for and amazingly actually phoning someone was only 5th on the list) and he took some photos I can show you. 

The podium was built on a part of the lake that is surrounded on three sides by apartment buildings and some of the balconies had small groups of conservatory students on them who gave their own mini-concerts, woven into the main musical event.

 

All kinds of small boats (big ones don’t have access to this lake) were still arriving…

The concert was wonderful, the youth orchestra played some really beautiful classical pieces, Izaline sang and had everyone dancing (who knew Dutch hips could swing like that), a really fat bloke who had one drink too many fell from the boat next to us (not in one of the photos sadly) into the fortunately shallow water and kept swinging, hands in the air, up to his armpits in the lake, as if nothing had happened.

It was such a pleasant evening and when the concert ended late that night it was still exceptionally warm and we sailed back to the harbour, looking back to where the concert was…

Picturesque pictures

Yesterday hubs and I went to Groningen city to try and shoot some photos of people ice skating on the canals. The all-knowing weather people had forecasted that thaw would set in later that day (they were right for once), so it was probably the last chance to catch some of the special atmosphere of those wintery days  on camera.
Just last summer we went with friends on their boat through this same canal. The weather then couldn’t have been more different compared to the weather yesterday. As soon as we parked the car it started snowing. I wrapped my camera in plastic and we walked to the A-bridge to take some shots of the people on the ice, the boats in the ice and the beautiful houses along the canal.

Funnily enough there weren’t only people on skates on the ice, but also people simply walking. It’s not like this is a short-cut to somewhere. At least I don’t think so. But perhaps they just wanted to see Groningen from the canals and have no friends who own a boat (like us, the smart ones who choose their friends more carefully.)
Doesn’t it look picturesque? Just like in ‘the olden days’, when winters still were winters and they could have an Elfstedentocht. We won’t mention the Elfstedentocht again. It is a sensitive subject… *sigh*


So Junior can see that winters really were winters when he was just a baby and this was the year that we nearly had an Elfste…. You know.


You have to take off your shoes and put on your skates somewhere.


This poor little boy had a sled, but no one to pull (him).
Aww…
We then decided to take a longer route back to the car, to shoot some more photos of Groningen. The town was very quiet, even for a Sunday. I wonder why…






Pretty little street.

Very thoughtful of the girl to have the colour of her hair and Uggs coordinated with the building.

I love it when people work with me and think about what they are going to wear and where they will be when I take a photo of them. This guy did a good job!

A late summer’s evening on the water near Zoutkamp

Here’s some great advice. Again. For free. You can thank me in the comments section.

So, here it is:

If you don’t own a boat, make sure you have friends who do.

As you perhaps know (I’ve posted photos of boat trips before) we have friends who do. And on one of the last beautiful summer’s evenings (although technically it was already autumn, but it felt like summer) in September, we were invited to join them again on said boat. You’ll realize how great my advice was if you see the photos of that trip:

 

Check out some other great shots of this trip on my photoblog.

Milk?

Years ago we went camping in the Lake District, Great Britain. Hubs and me and our tent. We found a campsite near Lake Windermere that took tents.We put up our tent in the pouring rain. We cooked something unbelievably tasteful on our small Campingaz stove and crawled into our sleeping bag. The sheep on the hill above the campsite were complaining loudly about whatever it was, probably the weather, all night long. Baaaaaaaa. Baaahaaaahaaaahaaaaahaaaa. Since then, every time we hear sheep, we think of camping out in the rain in the Lake District. That’s how memories work.

The next day we visited the Steam Boat Museum in Windermere and were given the opportunity to take a cruise on a beautiful steam launcher called Osprey. “We have to bring her up to steam first”, the two elderly man who volunteered in the museum said, lovingly referring to their gorgeous lady friend Osprey . “It will take a while, we have to treat her carefully. But it’s worth waiting for.”

While we were waiting until ‘she’ was ready, a British man and an elderly British couple joined us. We were all looking forward to our cruise on Lake Windermere with dotted around its beautiful shoreline many grand mansions, built by wealthy businessmen in the late 19th century.  It wasn’t raining anymore, the sun had come out and the weather was actually quite nice. About 15 or 20 minutes later, Osprey was ready to take us out on the lake. If you follow the link to steam launcher Osprey, you’ll see that she is beautiful and has a cabin, but we all sat in the front of the boat, enjoying the sun and the stunning views.

When we were in the middle of the lake, one of the gentlemen came out of the cabin, holding a tray with a teapot, mugs, sugar, milk and a tin of biscuits. And using a cunning device (I’ve forgotten what it was, but I remember that hubs was impressed) and the steam of the engine to heat the water, he made us a real British cup of tea. So there we were, in the middle of Lake Windermere, on a gorgeous wooden steam launcher lady called Osprey, enjoying a cup of tea. Could it be more idyllic?

“Milk?”, the tea-maker asked hubs. Hubs shook his head. “No milk for me, thank you.” The gentleman looked shocked. “Milk?”, he asked me. I shook my head too. “No, thank you. No milk for me either.” He nearly fell overboard from sheer shock. No milk in your tea??? How utterly barbaric. “You must be from the continent”, his conclusion was. “If you were British, you’d have taken milk in your tea!”

So, if you aren’t British, but if you, at some point in your life, have to pretend that you are, take this little tip from me; take milk in your tea.

Cruising the Reitdiep

Coincidentally the Reitdiep is right deep too.

This follows the previous post about the ‘cruise’ through Groningen city on a boat (full) of friends. The boat had to be sailed back to its original harbour in the north of the province Groningen. Most of the people chose not to stay on board for the whole journey and picked a spot to be dropped off (they really weren’t thrown overboard), but I was persuaded to stay on board. And I’m glad I did. We sailed through beautiful countryside and even though at some point it looked like the weather was turning (we wondered if that was the reason we didn’t see any other ship, apart from the Latvians who were following us, and if perhaps they all knew something we didn’t), it stayed dry and warm and lovely.

 

this friendly bunch were going towards Groningen city

 

the captain

 

this mill in Garnwerd featured in my first post (I think) about the 100 Things I Love About The Netherlands

 

could have Photoshopped this into a straight horizon, but who cares…

 

 

 

couldn’t be more Dutch

 

 

very picturesque

 

apparently the owl is still there, weeks later, which makes me think it might not be a real owl

(duh)

 

what’s left of the on-board-picnic (hiccup… burp)

 

okay…WHO put the horizon on this weird angle?!?!? (hiccup)

 

ahh, that’s better

 

and that’s it for this post

 

I’m trying to keep the jungle surrounding our house under control,
so I’m not as much in Blogworld as I’d like to be. I need a clone. Or a gardener.

This is your captain speaking;

I hope you’ll enjoy this mini-cruise through part of the historic city of Groningen.

The inner city of Groningen is surrounded by a circle of interlinking canals, also known as the ‘Diepenring’. I’m taking you on a cruise through the west- and southside of the Diepenring.

Groningen is a University city, famous for the Martini Tower, a church tower from the 15th century and lovingly known in Groningen as the Old Grey One (or ‘d’Oale Grieze), and for the Groninger Museum, opened in 1994 and designed by Alessandro Mendini.

We’ll start our cruise at part of the Diepenring that’s called the A. I’ve always found A the best place to start things.

If you look to your left you will see the ‘Hoge der A’ (high side of the A – the canal is called A). If you look to your right (shown below) you’ll see the ‘Lage der A’ (low side of the A). You can see that Groningen used to be (and still is) a thriving city. Trade over water used to be an important part of life here. In the fourteenth century, Groningen became a member of the Hanseatic League (1282-1669), a collaboration of merchants primarily from Germany, Scandinavia, England, Poland, the Baltic States, Russia and the Netherlands.

A lot of these buildings date from the latter part of that period. The warehouses are now transformed into apartments. Most of the ships are enjoying their pension and are used as homes.

 

 

 

 

Just above the houses on the ‘Hoge der A’ you can see part of the tower of the ‘der Aa-kerk’, a church that dates from around 1200.

Looking back: the Hoge der A on the right side and the Lage der A on the left side.

But we’re turning our heads (and bodies, unless you’re an owl) around again and will continue our cruise. We’re heading for the A-brug (or A-bridge).

The building that seems to be on the bridge is called Heykenshuys and houses a cookery shop on the ground floor and offices above.

On our way back we’ll see the other side of the Heykenshuys and the novel way in which this bridge opens.

But we’ll continue our tour, heading South toward the train station with the white statue of ‘t Peerd van Ome Loeks’ in front of it. A world famous statue, well: world famous in Groningen at least.

It is a statue of a horse (paard or ‘peerd’ in local dialect) and its owner, uncle Loeks (or Lukas). It is positioned with its backside towards the town and its head towards the train stations, so the first thing the unsuspecting traveller sees when leaving the station isn’t the huge backside of a horse. The NS (the national railways) thought that it would be more welcoming to see the front of the horse first. They may well be right. Although, as many of you loyal readers know, I have a thing for a nice bum.

The train station is a beautiful building, dating from 1896 and completely restored in 1999. It has a beautiful ceiling. Well worth a visit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The other thing, and possibly even more shocking than the bum of ‘t peerd van ome Loeks could ever be - but who am I to judge - the unsuspecting traveller sees when leaving the train station is the Groninger Museum. A very modern building, built as an island in the Diepenring.

 

 

We are now sailing towards the eastside of town, to the Oosterhaven (East Harbour).

We turn the boat and return the way we came.  Now we can see the ‘d’Olle Grieze’ or the Martini Tower.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the other side of the Heykenshuys, the building with the cookery shop. Looks like a totally different building from this angle. And the bridge opens in an interesting way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were followed by a sailing yacht with three guys on board. One of them wearing the tiniest of swimming trunks and he didn’t really have the figure for it. Slightly disturbing and the less said about that, the better. I didn’t take a photo (collective sigh of relief). They were all the way from Latvia (I asked them when we were negotiating a lock on our way to the northern part of the province of Groningen. We didn’t recognize their flag and couldn’t make out which language they were speaking.). 

Another historic building on the Hoge der A and a last look on the Noorderhaven (North Harbour)….

…..and we are on our way to the north of the province of Groningen to bring the boat back to its original harbour. A beautiful journey through the countryside. As I said, I’ll post some photos of that on a later date. You’ve seen enough for now I guess.

You know, Groningen is complaining about the lack of tourist visiting. Most tourists go to Amsterdam and leave the rest of the country for what it is. Even the Dutch people who live in other parts of the country think Groningen isn’t worth visiting, or they think it’s too far away. HA! Would you come to Groningen if you were to visit the Netherlands? Be honest.

 

Click on the link to the tourist information board and find out everything you always wanted to know about the city of Groningen.