Amsterdam Day II Keukenhof part deux

And we continue our tour of the Keukenhof- and I've taken these flower shots out of order. I could give the play by play of the day, but in truth it isn't going to make any difference to you, and to me... well- its already a little foggy. I will say that this particular exhibit below, which sort of had a "bridal" theme was seen just prior to our blood sugar dropping to dangerously low levels. Well... my blood sugar at least.Ready to see more flowers?? Well... at this point I needed a drink, Kate kind of looks like she had to much to drink, I caught her mid blink I think.... (ooh a rhyme). We had our first Dutch/Belgium style fries with mayo here, and they lived up to our expectations despite the fact that we bought them from a park's cafeteria. The Heineken, in full disclosure not much better than what it tastes like in the U.S., contrary to popular belief. I really found it to be the same sub-par, cheap beer... marginally better than Budweiser, worse than pretty much everything else I'd drink, Miller High Life, Schlitz, and PBR included. (I've been known to get the latter when ever I see a good deal.. or Schlitz in a bottle... there's just something about it).

Beginning the showcase of out-of-order photographs is Kate standing in the giant wooden shoes. Yes, Kate took some lovely shots of me in the spacious clogs as well... and some strange woman even photo bombs, albeit unintentionally. (I actually just became aware of the term "photo bomb" today and decided to make use of it. Pretty frickin out of it and square huh? Lets face it, the "rube" force has always been strong with me). Lovely masonry by the way.

This is Kate looking depressed near the harvested tulip fields. Sadness. The park was still beautiful. It could have been MORE beautiful, but alas, it was what it was.

Kate sitting in the middle of three purple flower pots.

Disclaimer: the remainder of the photos in this entry were taken by Kate M. Fazio on May 14th, 2011. I can not take any creative licence for these, other than for my strange desire to be photographed next to this clearly AWESOME pained fiberglass elephant.

CUBES!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There was an obnoxious family photographing themselves by the cubes- ignoring signs that said don't walk on grass or touch the cubes. The mom was instructing her little boys to pose looking like big strong men holding the cubes up. The boys seemed more interested in kicking them or trying to scale the cubes, which moved violently (I think they were paper mache on a wire frame, made from magazine clippings). We spent some more time regrouping while Kate waited 15 minutes to get this excellent shot. I plan to hang it up next to a great picture of some spray-painted hay bails we saw several years ago in a sculpture garden in Queens ;) .

At this point, we are very much of the mind---- what haven't we seen? Is it time to go? Are we getting tulip gardened out? I think we are. But alas we find this cool maze which was incredibly easy to maneuver- I'm not even sure we took one wrong turn. But don't forget these photos are out of order--- so while this story would soon be ending for me, you are only 3 quarters of the way through, or something like that.

I really like this shot Kate took of the stream. A simple unexceptional scene, yet somehow it stands out to me. I think I just really like how the flowing water is captured amidst the greenery.

WINDMILL! First one we saw, and we even got to climb up to the deck, very cool. We listened to a little abbreviated "history of the windmill" delivered by one of the park employees. Apparently this one was moved here and used to be a grain mill. They give the illusion that it is a mill to pump water, as so many in the Netherlands are, but today it is actually non functional- or it spins, but does not serve a purpose other to look pretty and educate.

These weird flowers are super cool. Kate took a lot of time getting great photos of these. There are several I could have picked from, and I have no idea which shot was the best to use. I used my best judgement.

More harvested fields. I think this is the photo that actually shows one small patch where purple flowers remain, but you can't really tell by looking at it here. We barely could tell in person in all honesty.

Note the canal. While chilling out looking at it we saw a massive 3-4 foot long fish leap out of the water. Probably some sort of invasive carp. It was awesome. Lets hear it for mutant gold fish helping make our day that much more interesting.

Some dweeb smiling in front of azaleas or some sort of pink flowery shrubbery.

I could keep posting pictures of flowers... we certainly took enough, but I think next chapter in this documentation of our 2011 European jaunt will move back to the city.

My moving in stuff is winding down a bit now, really it is. I'll try to get a few posts in the next couple of days. On July 10th I have a work related trip to Japan- so I'll slip into obscurity for a week. But if I get the chance while I'm there, I'll document some of it and try to share.

Till next time,

Amsterdam, Day II Keukenhof

Kate and I awoke Sunday morning and headed to Centraal Station to get a train out to Schiphol (The Airport) where we picked up a bus to Lisse, home of the Keukenhof, a large garden of tulips and other flowers that operates only in the spring. http://www.keukenhof.nl/

We wolfed down croissants and split what was without a doubt the thickest chocolate milk I've ever consumed. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't what I'm used to, and I can't say I thought it was as good as what comes from adding a little Hershey's syrup into some 1% lowfat milk.

The pictures attached should be self explanatory. This is a taste to start- I have many more pictures that I'll try to apply a narrative in some entries yet to come. I'm still very busy settling into my new house so the progress here has suffered.

I will continue!!!

I apologize for the interruption in the blog postings on the trip (to all two of you readers... who ever you are). I will continue probably next week. I'm moving, and every night I'm toting dishes, etc over in the back of my car. It is time consuming.

I enjoy the blogging, it is as much for me as a way to document my trip, as it is for anyone who is interested in reading it. So... stay tuned!

Conclusion of the first day in Amsterdam

After the Vincent Van Gogh Museum Kate and I took in Vondelpark, a large city park in the center of the city. Interestingly the pictures of Amsterdam make it look so much more sleepy than it actually is. The Vondelpark much like the rest of the city was filled with aggressive cyclists. Here we saw children sitting precariously on the handlebars of their parents bicycles, or more commonly we would see trailers for bikes towing small children. None of whom were strapped in or wearing helmets. The beauty of a less regulated society.Kate next to a weird looking sculpture, I guess its some sort of bird? Photographing some abstract and insignificant public art piece tends to be something that Kate and I do routinely on our trips. Kate and I appreciated watching the families frolic on the playground. One thing we really did not capture is how the lack of law suits probably contributes to playgrounds that are much more fun than their American equivalents. High up rope jungle gyms, aggressive looking swings, and teeter totters abound, where these sorts of things have all long been ripped out in states because kids would almost certainly misuse them and of course this would have nothing to do with negligent parenting or a lack of supervision, and would all be a result of the city, the playground designers, and the manufacturers, who would all be promptly sued.We liked this wading pool- or at least watching the kids play here. It was probably only in the mid 50s Fahrenheit, and here are these kids playing in the water. I think some bystander would have suggested child services take away these children from their families, had this scene unfolded in the United States. The contraption below was a sort of water based toy, you poured water into it and it flowed around the contraption. It was not captured very well here.One of the main pedestrian shopping streets above, and Dam Square below. While Dam Square is one of the more notable locations in Amsterdam it was not my favorite. It had a mix of the sort of street performers you might find at Fanieul Hall (actually they were pretty much a more PG-13 version of the same tired acts), protesters (some social or monetary cause typically), it was loud, dirty, chaotic, and had sort of a dark undertone to it that I thought made it stand apart from other equivalent areas such as the major squares/ plazas in other cities I've been to. We cross this area routinely over the remainder of our time in Amsterdam due to its central location.The Royal Palace of the Netherlands is situated on Dam square.Kate walks through a bank of bikes not far from Centraal Station the main train station and our original arrival point in the city. Below is Sint Nicolaaskerk, a large Catholic Church that we pretty much walked by daily (multiple times) due to its location en route to the Plantage. Here I am with my good friend Rusty the Monkey. Rusty lives near a canal not to far from the Plantage where Kate and I were staying.

It was time to eat and we decided upon an Italian place called Palorma which was almost across the street from our hotel, abutting the Zoo. We were seated upstairs near the back of the restaurant in a nook overlooking some gardens where a cat was up to no good. Hunting for Tweety no doubt.
The food was excellent, really a great stumbled upon place, affordable, great atmosphere. The waitress didn't speak English, I got the feeling she was actually Italian and that Dutch may have been her second language. She was very pleasant and one of her colleagues came up and talked to us briefly. He helped us attract Sylvester's attention long enough to snap a photo of it (I think he thought he was going to get a slice of pizza, perhaps an anchovy?).

See the cat off at the corner of the roof. The cat would frequently jump off, scale fences and bounce around attempting to catch some noisy birds that I'm sure were making a game of taunting it.

It was a long but productive first day in the Netherlands. Kate and I were becoming more zombie like by the minute given our jet-lag, so before we began attacking fellow pedestrians out of a desire to eat their brains we locked ourselves in our hotel room and prepared for the next day.