Campanile Den Bosch

... 10 to 6 Tuesday to Thursday, 12 to 9 Friday, closed Saturday and 1 to 4 Sunday. The place right next door is closed Monday and Tuesday, 8 to 4 Wed and Thursday, 11 to 9 on Friday, etc. You get the picture. Do people here just know what is open when or do they just show up and take a chance? I would have to keep a little notebook handy and just refer to it. Hey, now that's an idea for an untapped market. Instead of a phone book, an opening hours book.

Can you ...

I went to Utrecht last weekend. Utrecht is a city in the Netherlands that takes about 30 minutes by train from Leiden. (btw, I'm loving the train system here - why doesn't california and every else in the US have such great public transportation??). Utrecht reminded me of a larger Leiden. They have a University & canals & more people than Leiden. We, for the most part, just walked around. It was a beautiful day. I also a got a sandwich ...

... the operation went oke and all seems well with mother and child! Which means I am now the proud Aunt of ALEX, who is of course is the most beautiful Dutch-Asian baby-boy I have ever seen ;-)))))))) See the photos and judge for yourself. Only positive feedback on this blog though, father and mother dó read this website as well hahaha Will write you soon about other happenings in my life!

... all bare ! Breony especially loved walking through the fallen leaves that were knee deep out the front of our house ! It sounds really simple but it was truely beautiful -somthing that none of us have ever experienced before , the colours were amazing - and the netherlands constantly cloudy sky adds to it (in a strange way ). While Breony was here we went for a sunday drive down to Brugge in Belgium - which well add photos and a few details of later ...

... freed us from the swamp. Plan B was to find a hotel. The first one we tried was easy to find, but unfortunately closed. A quick check in the guidebook confirmed that the Hotel Euro was the only other option, so we attempted to drive to it. After spending around 2 hours fruitlessly searching for an address that turned out to be a shop on a pedestrianised street, we eventually discovered the hotel some distance ...

... There were also precious few primary english speakers, our hostel and the town seemingly chocked with Swedes, Belgians, French and Portugesey people so it felt a little off the beaten track. We did have the good fortune to find possibly the coolest cafe/coffee shop on the planet. There was nice leather sofas, more upright chairs, and indoor balcony and deckchair seating outside. Coupled with some pretty awesome ...

... which was to visit the locations of wartime refugee camps in old Prussia and Lithuania did not come to fruition either.] A few kilometres further down the autostrasse from Abcoude saw us exiting the A2 into the outer suburbs of Utrecht heading for the centrum and a carpark which as usual was under a shopping mall. It was spitting rain and we donned our useless amaraks. Useless because like tents they let ...

... that all these buildings were new. Apparently this is where Rotterdam was bombed during the war. No old buildings any more within about a two mile area - well, maybe the vestiges of one or two. I was looking for a bank which would change traveler's cheques for me. Well, they don't. I went to about 5 banks and they all referred me to another bank. Finally I was directed to the post office where they do change traveler's cheques - albeit, as they told me, the US dollar (which ...

... of buildings. De Naber owes its built form to Anton Pieckhofje in Haarlem (see yesterdays posting) but without the gung-ho 'do what you like' philosophy. Some of the detailing is still institutional - vinyl floor everywhere, big green 'uitgang' (fire exit) signs and sliding doors, but overall very nice schemes. I was given a book of photographs, taken by a local photographer of residents in De Naber, as a chronicle of their life there. I'm acquiring quite a library now!

My apologies for not keeping up as I should...I have lots to tell! The long** I spent in Amst**dam the more I enjoyed it. I was th**e a week and I got lost a ton which really helped me to get to know the place. I met so many great people who made my days and nights so exciting. I really enjoyed Boom Chicago, Anne Frank, Huis Marselles photo gall**y, the coffeeshops, the canals, the cat that lived in the library, even the deal**s ...