Diemen near Amsterdam

Diemen near Amsterdam.

Our next stay is in Diemen, a satellite town of A'dam. In the meantime we are in possession of an OV kaart, which can be automatically uploaded, so we can use it for travel by bus, train and tram. The bus stop is next to the apartment, which we will call home for the next 7 weeks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First we went to explore our surroundings, we have a great natural park on our doorstep, the Diemen polder, which is great for walking, and we used our OV kaart to hire bikes near the train station and went bike riding in the area.

 

 

BIKES!!!! They are the most used mode of transport and I must say a very healthy way to move around. You can "park" them any where, provided you can lock them securely, and there are lots of facilities to do so.

 

Because Diemen and A'dam are so centrally located we used the opportunity as well to catch up with friends and relatives. We went for a ride in the nature reserve " Park de Hoge Veluwe " with my niece Simone. Fantastic, you park your car, grab one of the "white" bikes and start pedaling, park the bike when you want a rest and pay a visit to the museum, pick up another bike and be on your merry way. All for free!!! Great fun especially when the weather is just glorious.

 

 

 

 

 

It was great to catch up with my niece Jeltsje, sister of Simone, and especially for her birthday, she turned 65. Again, beautiful weather, so we celebrated outside with a BBQ and enjoyed the company of her son and partner with their 2 adopted children. She has a beautiful "backyard ".... with a view to envy, it reminded me of one of the paintings of Renoir.

 

 

 

 

 

We were able to help Mirjam (daughter of my brother Piet) out with babysitting. She was not allowed to do heavy lifting after the birth of Femke. Lourens enjoyed reading to Hanna, 2 years old.

Amsterdam, well what can I say........... Wonderful history, ambience, multicultural , really a great city, and I am not biased here !!!

Central Station, almost always the starting point of our adventures in Amsterdam.

 

 

With Anneke, a friend from high school days, we went to the new Eye Film Institute, een new film museum, opened not so long ago. Very interesting architecture .

 

 

Of course we did the touristy thing , visited the Begijnhof, the Rijksmuseum, with it's wonderful paintings by Rembrandt, the famous Night Watch, and others and Van Gogh museum.

 

 

 

 

We took a little peak in the Red Light district and went throug the smallest little street (100 cm ) in town.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And just enjoyed the street scenes, having a drink at the various terraces and watch the world go by......

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We enjoyed the boat trip on the canals, and visited "het Scheepvaart museum" one of Lourens' great interests.

 

 

 

 

Last but not least, we went for a wonderful walk through "het Vondel park", named after Vondel, a famous dutch writer, comparable to Sheakspeare.

A beautiful park, we very much enjoyed it, although they need to pay a little bit more attention to the roses in the rose garden........

 

 

 

 

 

On our return we enjoyed a well earned beer/wine with the famous Dutch " bitter ballen ".

 

 

We have another week here in Diemen and hope to visit het Anne Frank huis and the Westerkerk and the Palace on the Dam.

By the way, the school year has about finished and when the student has completed the exams, he/she raises the Dutch flag and hangs the school bag under it.....Hooray, holidays.....!

Well that's it so far, I hope this epistle has not been too long so it won't get too boring.....

Greetings from us, Lourens & Simone.