Looking for Bison in the Netherlands
We never saw any bison, so we’ll have to try again another weekend. You can read about them at https://www.dutchnews.nl/features/2018/02/the-bison-are-back-rewilding-the-dutch-dunes-brings-back-a-mega-beast/
Saturday Hike Around The Amsterdamse Waterleiding Dunes
We had sunshine, humidity, and a few big downpours.
Swimming in the North Sea
Today in Zandvoort, a friend and I went for a swim in the North Sea. This was after a relaxing lunch of sangria, pizza and salad.
We skipped the opportunity to enjoy the mobile fishstand pictured being driven around by a tractor.
For reference, I remember the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Oregon and Washington as being colder than what I experienced today in the North Sea. I’ll have to check it out at different times of the year though.
Garbage & Recycling in Amsterdam
Hiking The Dunes of NL
We met up with friends for a hike today and saw the wild deer that live there and the large black carp in a canal. But we also came across the village for gnomes. Apparently, when someone in the surrounding are dies, the family walk to this one spot and put a gnome there in their honor. But apparently the gnomes do move around, or maybe they get moved by someone.
At the end of the hike, where we met up and started, was a pub for a nice cold beer. Inside the pub were quite a few gnomes too.
Country Walk Near Harlem, NL
We met up with friends in the Ikea parking lot, because there is a train stop there and it’s near the trails we walked. Most of the trails are for bikes too and sometimes we were on small country roads.
Lunch was on the waterfront of Spaarnekade:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/Y8U8dVstqqdnmgEDA
Weekend in Dusseldorf
Four of us took a short weekend break in Dusseldorf, which is about a 2 1/2 hour drive from Amsterdam. A few things we saw were a crooked church steeple, Canadian geese walking down the sidewalk, things to encourage bee hives, not many old/interesting buildings since the city was almost flattened in WWII, and a unique green roof on a new building.
Human-Powered Cargo Movers
There are quite a few ways to move stuff across Amsterdam with a bicycle and these are a few examples I’ve seen in the last few weeks.
Clearly, some are meant to put kids in them, some for random cargo, but my favorite is the one carrying 2 other bicycles. I had never seen it before, but on either side of the front wheel is a bike rack.
One is just a guy’s tricycle that he carries his fishing gear in. And another is a photo of an older photo showing a milkman’s delivery bike.
The Adventures of Lorie and Brian Groth 