There is a new kid in town.... Our Fauve Puppy 'Bas'

Although we promised a long time ago that we should regularly post, nothing happened for the past few months. How bad is that!!

We had loads of things to blog about, e.g.:
- update on Dopey (who is happily flying around somewhere)
- our Spring holiday to Scotland (over 600 photo's...)
- the renovation of the Camper
- our Autumn holiday to Scandinavia (over 400 photo's)
- our daily life (which is far from boring!)
etc, etc....
Promised, we will catch up!

The arrival of our lovely Puppy 'Bas' this week, was a good and extremely valid excuse to start blogging again.

As many of you know, we do have a little Zoo at home.
Two cats, 7 chicken, a crow and a little sparrow. And of course our two dogs (breed Basset Fauve de Bretagne) 'Dée' and 'Frits'.

Dée was 'ordered' by Tjep about 3 years ago and when the breeder did not have puppy's with his own dogs, he brought Tjep one from France. A small lovely female dog who also had a brother called Frits.
Dée, not used to people, traffic and household sounds, was extremely shy. But after a few weeks she became a funny lively dog.
Her brother stayed with the breeder who phoned us after a while explaining that Frits did not socialize within the pack.
We already liked the look of Frits when we collected Dée en after good thinking and talking, we also collected Frits.
You have never seen two happy dogs like brother and sister!! Ever so happy to be re-united.

But as we say in Holland "the blood crawls where it can't go", another little Fauve came our way.
And this Fauve is 'Bas' (originally called 'Salut' but better responding to his new name).
Bas already had a lovely home but unfortunately one of his owners turned out to be extremely allergic to dog hair. This is so sad!
After a few phone calls we agreed to collect Bas on Thursday October 28, around lunchtime.

Although we looked forward to collect Bas, we were also impressed by the sadness of the owners to see Bas go. The lady of the house and her two daughters were (wisely) not at home. Her husband welcomed us and after receiving the necessary (veterinarian) paperwork and the pedigree, meeting Dée and Frits who waited in the car, we left, again leaving a very, very sad owner behind. At least Bas was muched loved for the very short time he lived with this family.

Where Dée and Frits were not familiar with people and sounds, Bas isn't impressed by anything.
He loved watching the world go by when sitting on my lap in the car.
Once at home, he finally had time to meet his new friends the dogs and cats who immediately accepted him, and explore the kitchen and living room. He loved it and felt at home immediately.

Needles to tell he fell asleep after playing and running around in the garden. Tucked away in my arms he slept like a log!

His first night alone in his new bench placed beside the bench of the other two dogs, he slept all night long without yelling or barking.
What a lovely dog this is!

Today was a wonderful day for him, he met the chicken and was told by one of the hens who really is the boss! No way he will chase them now....

Bas also discovered the bench of Dée and Frits and the three of them spent an hour sleeping together with his little head on top of Dée's back.

Isn't it wonderful that only 13 weeks young, you found friends for life?
To view the first pictures of Bas please click his photo above.

Bas first film:

Dopey the little baby starling

Dopey is our new "zoo" (or family) member, depends of how human you think a bird can be.

Wednesday June 22. The sun was shining and it was very warm. Too warm for us but we don't complain. We haven't been blessed with nice weather recently.

We have a Dutch expression for weather being too hot: "It is that hot that the sparrows drop dead from the roof" (het is zó heet dat de mussen dood van het dak vallen).
But on Wednesday it wasn't a dead sparrow but a dead baby starling.
Tjep found it on our doorstep. It was so tiny and fragile. it must have been hedged from the egg not long ago as his little tummy was round and filled with egg.
We felt so sorry for the little fellow but couldn't do anything about it anymore.
It wasn't quite clear where he came form. Did the dog bring it home?

A few hours later we could hear little starling voices when Mum or Dad arrived with worms, flies and more delightful food. We now knew the nest was in the top corner of our roof, straight above the back door. We smiled and watched Mum and Dad flying on and of.

Monday June 28. Both dogs made a different noise than usually when they were playing and I went outside to see what was going on. Between the dogs, close to the backdoor, was another baby starling but this time very much alive.

I picked it up to save it from the joyful dogs and looked down on this little naked bird that didn't understand what was going on. His little eyes and ears still closed, just one or two fluffy hair-like feathers. He was so vulnerable and little.
No way could we give it back to the parents as we could not reach the nest.
Instead we adopted him.
Unfortunately we found one of his other brothers or sisters at the roof, dead.

Being succesful in raising little birds before we were certain we could manage it again.
We bought special food and a hypodermic syringe (without the needle of course....), gave him the name Dopey and started feeding him.
Our neighbour gave us a small electric blanket to keep him warm and we installed Dopey in a nest of warm cloths in the same container where our sparrow Fluffy was brought up 10 years ago.

Dopey felt comfortable and was always hungry. Not being able to see or hear, he accepted the syringe and my hands as being his Mum and Dad.

But little birds grow; they grow very fast as well!
Within a few days he changed from a naked bird into a bit bigger bird with small feathers on top of his little head. The first 2 photo's were taken 4 days after we found him.

His eyes and ears opened 2 days after he joined the family. The eyes were very small for a while and so different from how they are now (7 days after we found him).
Able to see and hear he very quickly got familiar with the sound we make in the house.
He now recognizes voices and footsteps and knows very well who is feeding him.
He loves to sit in my hand to fall asleep after a meal. Curled up, already trying to hide his head in his back feathers, he sleeps the sleep of the innocents.
Until the next portion of food! His yelling when hungry, gets louder and louder every day.
It is amazing how they are made to open their beak as wide as possible, folding it around the syringe.

During the day his container is in the kitchen close to the stairs and as soon as we come downstairs he sits there with his beak wide open: "Mum! Food!"
I feed him during the evening until 11 o'clock and start again between 6 and 7 in the morning.
He eats enormous amounts for such a little bird but also grows like mad.
And it is not only his size that needs food and energy to grow, but also his feathers.
He is changing day by day and becomes more funny too day by day! (Third photo.)
Does he miss his real Mum and Dead? I doubt, he acts like a little happy starling.
Within a short time he will eat and fly without help and will be released to find new friends.
But first we will have the joy for a while to watch him developing from a tiny naked bird that survived a huge fall, into a healthy, shiny grown up starling.

If he decides to stay with us like sparrow Fluffy and crow Caro (which we don't hope though, it is getting to crowdy here!), we will let you know.....

Spring, Boats, Campers and good people

Spring, a beautiful time of the year where your "blood itches" as we say in Holland.
The grass is green again, the trees blossom, the fish in the pont are back (all of them survived the winter!) and the duck is sitting on top of her eggs in the basket we put up last year.
She isn't bothered by the dogs and winks at us if we take a peep to say hello.

Living in the countryside, you do not only see Spring, you also smell it in all its facets and it feels great.

Tjep moved here from Hilversum and is enjoying every minute of his Frieslian life.
I live here since 1999 and still appreciate it tremendously.
The marvelous skies, we can see for miles and miles. Beautiful sunsets. Or as today, heavy clouds spitting rain. The wind is blowing. The garden is covered in blossom.
We keep our fingers crossed; the blossom was promising a lot of pears like last year. We'll see if they produce as much chutney, marmalade, pickled pears again.

Spring is also a good time for cleaning boats and campers and planning holidays. Our holiday was planned some while ago and soon we will be off with the camper to good old Yorkshire and beautiful Scotland.
But first we took care of our boat (for boat lovers: it is an "Oranjebloesem"). For many reasons it stayed ashore for 2 years and the first year uncovered.
We never managed to visit te boat in those two years.
The state it was in was quite a shock. Although the woodwork was taken care of, the rest of the boat was covered in a black and green substance (or what ever you may call it).

The inside was even worse, no ventilation made the ceiling drip. Brown stalactites, even the paint is hanging down!
The woodwork covered in moult. We had tears in our eyes but not for long; there was work to do!
We first cleaned the outside, this took us two days. We planned waxing on Saturday but unfortunately it was raining cats and dogs. It is now planned for next Friday.

We left on Thusrday evening because our camper, in which we stayed near the harbour, had to go for a few minor repairs and modernistations to get it ready for the big trip.
The company who is going to build in the LPG bottles (the ususal gas bottles can't be exchanged in every country and from now on we can get gas at every petrol station) is called Jasicamp (Leek - Groningen). They are also going to do the minor repairs.
Because it felt we are running out of time, I called them yesterday and received the shocking news that they could not move the camper due to a broken gearbox!! What a 'great' news with the Ferry booked, an invitation for a wedding in Edinborough and hardly any time to clean the camper!
Mr. Neef of Jasciamp understood our problem and promised to talk to his mechanics, getting back to us in half an hour.
So he did and told us that two of his mechanics don't mind doing overtime to help us out, starting tonight (Wednesday evening) and working all day Friday.
If all goes well (keep everything possible crossed!) we can collect the camper on Friday afternoon/everning.
Not only with a functional gearbox but also all other repairs and features done.

Super! There are still wonderful people! Hurray for Jasicamp!

England and Scotland, here we come.........

Leilinden

Most of our Dutch readers will know these trees. For our other readers I will try to explain what Lei-Lindes are.

A Linde is a lime-tree, on proper British also called “Linden” or “Lindentree” and often used as a espalier. The branches growing the wrong way will be pruned. This way the branches stay horizontal and grow parallel with each other. Often seen in front of old farmhouses to shelter them from the sun.

Yes, we do live in old renovated farmhouse but the sun is warming the house at the back, the front is viewing the north.

When we moved in, not only the house but also the gardens at both sides were a mess.
After being empty and hardly looked after for 5 years, it definitely needed a make over.

But because you can’t do all at the same time, the house got renovated first; the heavy work before we moved in and the last nasty bits when we loved there. Therefore we are experts in battling dust, spiders, rubble and much more. An experience we will never forget!
The house is almost ready (still some paintwork to do) and the garden is getting there.

Two years ago we bought on the internet two big iron vases “in case of” De people I bought them from, Theunis and Alie van der Meer, turned out to be young, energetic, innovative and full if energy with their rather new “Garden and Landscape” company.
Of course we asked them how much it would cost to do our front garden. We must have been hard to deal with; not about the price though because it was a very fair one but because we knew exactly how it was going to look like, including Power Point presentation.
Fortunately Theunis van der Meer didn’t mind and within one day the front garden changed from a heap of grass lumps, unidentified plants and weeds, into a more appropriate one with buxus, lavender, roses and gravel!

We replaced the stone path (we used it in the back garden) for a large gravel path.
But it was not until this Spring that we removed the derelict fence between the neighbours’ and our garden. It looked awful and totally out of place.

Theunis also made an offer for three Lei-linden and arrived in March with poles, trees and beeches to replace the old fence. He and his colleague worked extremely hard, regularly distracted from their job by neighbours, passer-by’s and us with “Oooh’s” and “Aaaah’s” and compliments.
After a days work we were astonished by the transformation.

You might not like the poles to support the Linden (they are only temporary) but gosh, did it improve!

Slowly but surely the house is regaining its dignity. And being such a nice and friendly house, it truly deserves it!

Silence.........

It has been very quiet from our side lately.

Not that there is nothing happening in our household! On the contrary, too much is going on… We can write long, loooong posts but can’t unfortunately, find the time to do so.

Thus be prepared for loads of news as soon as we can fit you in for a proper upate…..

Merging two life’s into one, the past catching up with the present

You will have noticed (just a rough guess) that we haven’t posted any updates last week.
This doesn’t mean we are living a boring life, far from it! Life has been a little busy….

Apart from the usual jobs (in and around the house, work) we have been out and about like a visit to the doctor (Tjep all of sudden has a lypoma/lipoma of the size of a half golf ball on his shoulder. But lypoma’s aren’t doing any harm but they can become a nuisance) and I have “ring worm” (a harmless virus infection I once got when treating a calf with this virus, a long time ago).

My Mum passed away in November 2008, her house is still for sale. We all know this is a very difficult time to sell a house, even when it is in the very green and picturesque village of Suwâld (or Suawoude). The first village on this planet with a solar ferry for pedestrians and cyclists. It has its own little harbour at a crossing of two canals, a school but no shops. Still we think that is one of the charm of this village. I lived there for 9 years and if there would have been a house for sale at the time we were looking for a house, we would have lived there still.

Mum collected dolls, tea pots and much, much more. Her house was her little castle (not that big though!). But now it is up for sale, it needs to be cleared which is a time consuming and a sad job. Going through all the things she loved so much, often brings tears to our eyes.
Last week we spent quite some hours doing right that. On Saturday my brother and sister in law came down from Germany for a helping hand. The house is not empty but at least ready for viewing without attracting hoarders in stead of buyers!
If any of our readers is interested in Mum’s house or knows anyone who might be, please contact us!

In Friday we went to see one of Tjep’s friends who retired.
They met being members of the Kiwanis NL (more info in English). We drove all the way to Montfoort where we met a happy hero of the feast and his wife as well as many, many other friends from Tjep’s ‘past’
Some of them I met before on our wedding party or when they visited us in the North.
It was a true pleasure to meet more and to catch up with news with the others. They all smiled when they saw Tjep; handshakes, a pet on his shoulder and many happy memories of funny events,
I listened and listened. Tjep often told me about these happy times and I feel fortunate to become a part of it too.

We left around half past 7, drove straight to home to joint the birthday party of our neighbour. We did not stay too long; around half past 10 we noticed that it was a huge job to keep our eyes open. Yes, dear readers, we are no youngsters anymore…..

There is more to tell but we will do that in a separate post in the near future, keyword “chamber pot” Stay tuned………………..

Maria and Josef

Sweden, August 1999, midnight. A phone call from Holland which ended my 17 years of marriage.

Sweden, 5 days later, Hotel Erikslund near Helsingborg. Me not being the most happiest person in the world and on my way to Holland.
I sat there in the lobby with my big white dog Invandra. I wasn’t up to nice chats with other people, if I was even aware of them.

Half an hour before when I parked the car, there was another car next to me, also a Volvo but with a German number plate. Two very kind people were the owners. They looked at the dog and my packed old Volvo 245 and asked me if I was moving. “Yes” I replied but did not feel the need to explain why.

These two nice people walked by and asked me if the telephone in the corridor was working. They could not get through to their daughter. I didn’t know so advised them to contact the reception desk.
Soon they walked by again, told me they finally talked to their daughter. I nodded.
But the lady did not give up. In Swedish she said “You don’t look well. There is something wrong, isn’t it?”
This caused again tears and I couldn’t help it hearing myself telling a little bit of my story.
She sat next to me, holding my hand, showing so much sympathy.
“Please join us for dinner” she said. “That will do you more good than sitting here on your own. And please, let me introduce ourselves to you. My husbands name is Josef and I am, honestly, Maria”

This truly made me smile. I spent part of the evening with them and we met again the next morning for breakfast. They were so very nice, so compassionate. Balsam for my wounded soul. We exchanged telephone numbers and they kept in touch.

But after a while we lost contact. It took a year or so before Maria called me again.
They had moved from Germany to Sweden. Not long after that I received a lovely present per post. Maria is a sculptress and sent me 3 beautiful stone penguins for the garden. I adored them and thanked Maria for the gift.

But as it goes in life, we lost contact again until 4 years ago. Maria told me they had moved back to Germany. The occasional phone calls and than my life changed. I met Tjep, we moved house, changed address and telephone numbers and also Maria and Josef could not be contacted anymore.

Saturday evening March 20 – 2010. A call on my mobile. I hurried downstairs to answer but was too late. Though a few minutes later it rang again: “Hej Ike, hur mår du?” (Hi Ike, how are you?) I replied that I was doing well and “how are you Ann Marie? (another Swedish friend, same voice). “No, I am not Ann Marie, it is Maria!!”

Maria……… all of a sudden I was talking again to Maria!! Many memories returned and tumbled round and round. Tjep looked at me and was puzzled. His wife was all of a sudden talking in a language he doesn’t understand, full of joy with a huge, huge smile!
Maria and I talked and talked. She told me that she has been looking for me on the Internet for many, many weeks. She finally found an I. Roelfsema, called them but it turned out to be an Irene Roelfsema. Irene’s boyfriend Arend however, was extremely helpful and browsed the internet until he found contact details.
Thank you Arend, you hardly realize how happy you made me!!

After the call (and yes, we do keep in touch, mailing, calling.....) I couldn’t stop telling Tjep about Maria and Josef. How we met, what they meant to me and much more. One big smile all night long. Wonderful Tjep listened patiently.
He is now very curious to meet them and we will on our planned trip to Sweden in September. So much joy in advance!!

Miracles, our dear readers, still exist. Angles still live amongst us. Maria and Josef.

Our test weekend with the Hymer (5)

Day 5, March 9 - 2010

We woke up at 0.60 after a very quiet night. 15 Minutes later the Road Workers arrived to collect a trailer. Within no time the left again and the peaceful silence of the forest returned.
An occasional car passed by, other than that we only heard the lovely Spring songs of the birds. It was cold, still freezing but not too cold.

During the morning walk with the dogs we found out that we were only 100 metres away from the River Ems. Wouldn’t it have been dark when we arrived the night before, we would have found a lovely spot with a view to the river.
It was marvellous; the sunrise above a frosty field with a powdery layer of snow.

I went back to take some pictures while Tjep made us breakfast.
The sun guaranteed another lovely day!
Getting dressed Tjep complained about having a pair of sock of different colours.
My fault, maybe my lenses are not as good as they are supposed to be. Or was it just me…

Before we left we did the occasional household jobs while the dogs preferred to stay on their cushion. Dée dreamt and made funny noises which puzzled Frits who sniffed carefully.

We drove North and passed the border to Holland near Winschoten. From there we travelled via very small roads through Groningen and were very impressed by the huge farmhouses we saw near Finsterwolde.
Farmhouses like Estates, that big and beautiful! Size matters here though!
“Look, look!!”we said to each other. Wherever you looked, they were there.

We left Groningen near Lauwersoog and arrived home around 3 in the afternoon.
Happy cats, happy crow and sparrow. And for us: good to be at home.

We still look back at a wonderful weekend. The weather helped tremendously to test the Campervan properly. It couldn’t have turned out better!
We don’t have to explain that we are already looking forward to our next trip.
It isn’t difficult to get used to Campering….. (I bet this is a new English word).

Our test weekend with the Hymer (4)

Day 4, March 8 - 2010

We slept extremely well and only woke up at around 5 because we heard a soft tapping on the roof. When we got up at 8 it turned out it had been snowing…......... again!
Everyone knows I love snow and Tjep mentioned that it is following us because of this.

Surrounded by trees, the view was beautiful.
The dogs loved it too and pushed their noses through the snow during the morning walk. They returned with balls of snow dangling from their paws.

We had a shower but it definitely needs to be cleaned as we had just a few drops of water coming down!
Still it was nice to have a shower, very luxurious though!

After breakfast we decided to go back to Holland, to Drenthe but we changed our mind when we discovered how close we were to where our friends Loes and Arnold live. Born and bred in Holland, they moved to Germany a few years ago.
It would be a huge surprise for them to see us so unexpected.
Well……. If they would have been at home of course!
You guessed correctly, they were not at home. We left a note and drove via Nordhorn (worth wile visiting) to Lathen where my brother and his family live.
They did not expect us either but they were at home and it was a true surprise to see us.
We chatted away and they wanted to see the Camper. They loved it.

We left around 6 PM and although we decided earlier to go home, we looked for a nice place for the night. We parked the Camper near a depot for roadwork utilities. Nice and quite and again near a forest.
A nice and simple dinner, a quiet and cosy evening and again early to bed.

Will be continued!

Our test weekend with the Hymer (3)

Day 3, March 7 - 2010

5 in the morning. We both woke up because of the very low temperature but after a very quiet night.
Tjep switched on the heater, it was bitterly cold. Iced windows and, not to our surprise though, no water. Frozen taps and pipes. Luckily the water tank was not frozen.
We went back to sleep hoping the heater would also defrost everything.
False hope and we scooped water from the tank in bottles: one for the WC, one for washing, one for the tea, one for the coffee, one for the dogs, etc.
It reminded us very much of camping with a tent. But still far more cosy!

It was beautiful outside and after walking the dogs in the snow, we were fortunate to see deer passing by the Van, 7 female and 1 male. Unfortunately they were too fast to take photo’s.
Apart from a few Golfers we didn’t see any people. This was definitely our best spot for the night.

During morning tea and coffee we looked at the map and decided to go down to Essen via Ede.
It was very slippery when we tried to leave and Tjep did a great job getting the Camper back on track. Off we went!

In Ede we stopped for the lunch. From Essen we drove through impressive landscapes to Recke, looking for a place to park for the night.
We found one near a small road with two houses in the neighbourhood. There was hardly any snow here for a change.
We left the Camper for a long walk with the dogs. A big mistake as what we thought was a bus stop nearby, was a kennel with a few dogs that barked hysterically when the saw ours!
Guess what ours did. Exactly, barking back in the same hysterical way!
After the walk we decided to move on as we were not looking forward to a cacophony of barking sounds throughout the night.

Tjep drove the Camper backwards and a small red light switched on. Not too happy with unknown error messages in a Camper you still don’t know thoroughly, we looked in the manual. The brake warning light…..
Driving back and forth, braking, we didn’t feel any problems and decided to drive on but carefully.

Our new choice for the night was perfect. Close to a football field, near a small road and only a few houses nearby.

We saw on the map that we were close to the villages Beesten (Dutch for animals….) and Schapen (Dutch for sheep…..). Funny people those Germans J

We parked the Van, tried not to think about the red warning light and after a walk, a meal, relaxing reading and chatting, we called it a day.

Will be continued!

Our test weekend with the Hymer (2)

Day 2, March 6 - 2010

After a very stormy night in which the Camper was heavily shaken by the wind, we woke up at 07.00 and opened the curtains. After scratching the ice of the windows we saw a white world under a steel blue sky ! It was cold, very cold and Tjep turned on the heater. Dée and Frits, curled up as Ying and Yang, kept each other warm.
We watched the sunrise which coloured the sky purple, beautiful!
We stayed in bed until the temperature in the Camper caused a cosy feeling.

After walking the dog first we faced ice cold bathing water. It made us feel very alive.
Right after breakfast we looked on the map for the route of the day and decided to go to Wilhelmshaven for our lunch.
We took the scenic route along the dikes, not always easy due to the snow on the roads. But definitely worthwhile views! We passed beautiful little villages.

We parked the Camper in Wilhelmshaven and enjoyed a light lunch and walking the dogs. When we wanted to continue our way, as well Tjep and I did not manage to start the engine!! We tried and tried….. no sound what so ever.
We looked for the telephone number of the ADAC but it did not work with our mobiles. With a big sigh gazing at a desperate Tjep, I tried again and yes! Brroomm… We now know that we need to handle the anti theft starter with common sense!

We drove to Neuenburg where Tjep wanted to see the house he often stayed with his cousins the Von Münchhaussens. We found it without a problem and Tjep explained it looked much nicer and brighter than 45 years ago! It was than a grey painted lodge, now, as an office and family home it is white with a well kept garden. It pleased Tjep tremendously.

We drove via Westerstede and Bad Zwischenahn to a parking area near a Golf Club between Halfstede and Rostrup.
A beautiful area with a lake, forest and snow! A lot of snow……
The dogs loved it, it was quiet and we had a lovely walk.
During the walk we found out that Dée reads English...... she tried to leave a souvenir near the sign "Dropping Area" ......

Again early to bed.

Will be continued!

Our test weekend with the Hymer (1)

Day 1, March 5 - 2010

As we posted previously; we were very much looking forward testing our Hymer Camper over the weekend, starting Friday March 5.

The weather forecast for northern Holland was terrible: snow, rain, you name it. We decided to go to northern Germany. Our weather wasn’t necessarily theirs!
But to our surprise early morning, there was only a little, very little snow so we left at 11.45.

We travelled via Lauwersoog, Groningen, Delfzijl and direction Oldenburg to Norddeich. We left the main road, the A7 appr. 60 km before Oldenburg to arrive in Nordeich at 16.30. Close to Delfzijl it started snowing and at the end of the afternoon it also began storming!

We parked the Camper at a very quiet spot at the harbour (harbours are Tjep’s favourites), but had to park it the other way round because the wind blew soon straight into the heater.
Than we settled down, the dogs (Frits doesn’t enjoy a driving Camper too much) explored their new temporary home and fell asleep soon.
After our first tasty dinner on board, we did a bit of reading, crosswords and chatting, how relaxing this was!

We walked the dogs en to our surprise it was raining, all snow was gone.
Nearly soaked we arrived back “home”. The weather became truly terrible and we went to bed very early.
Overnight the storm got worse and worse and was howling around and bouncing at the Camper. What a night. We didn’t get much sleep but felt extremely comfortable ámd safe.

How different our view was the next morning………..

Will be continued!

The West visiting the North

We are back from our weekend with the Camper and had a wonderful time.
We will post our journal as soon as possible.

Once back home we had to make the house and the guesthouse ready for our visitors.
Friends from the West of Holland were coming to stay with us for a few days.
They are very good friends so extra efforts were made to make them feel welcome.

We fitted a new heater in the guesthouse; the weather was not what you call sunny and warm! Clean sheets (of course), towels, fresh fruit, wine, home backed cake. Dusting and vacuum cleaning. And on Friday morning the house was ready.

We first chatted a way with a cup of coffee and tea.
We than took them out to the old Hippolytuskerk in Olterterp, a small village in Friesland.
Apart from being a lovely church, my ancestors are buried there in the 16^th and 17^th century. You can view my personal album

After a cup of coffee / tea in the nearby restaurant “Het Witte Huis” we collected the key. A very large and heavy key!
Our guests were impressed by the church and its history.
Olterterp is in the Friesche Wouden (Friesian Forest) which differs a lot from where we live: de Klei (the Clay, good for growing potatoes!).

At home we enjoyed a lovely dinner from our cook Tjep and all tired by the wind and being outside, we called it an early night.

On Saturday we first visited Moddergat, I little fishing village with a tragic history.

In 1883 during a storm 83 fishermen aged 13 – 64, died in a storm.
A huge tragedy for all the women, old men and baby’s who lost so many fathers, sons and brothers. It was already a poor village. The women had to find work and started a shrimp factory. You can read more about this in “Museum ‘t Fiskershúske”
Moddergat is one of our favourite places to be and I took many pictures of it and it’s surroundings over the past 10 years.

From there we went to “Land en Zeezicht” in Holwerd for a solid lunch: pancakes, yummy!!
After lunch we visited another church nearby in a tiny little village called Hegebeintum. Built on Friesland highest “Terp” (an artifical dwelling hill) and with a wonderful history. Many excavations took place with interesting results, exposed in Hegebeintums visitor’s centre

Hone again we agreed we were ever so lucky, The weather forecast was rain, rain and even more rain but the few drops we saw, were not worth to be called “rain”

On Sunday our friends left for home. For us it was a wonderful weekend!

Too proper haircut….

My hair has always been fluffy. Never blessed with a beautiful head of hair.
But one learns to live with it.

During the Chemo’s back in 2004 I lost it all and felt blessed. Especially because many people grow much better hair after the treatment. So did I. It was curly, thick and easy to handle.
But…… after 6/7 months, the curls disappeared, as the thickness and I was back to my old me. Such a shame.
Again, one learns to live with it and at least I still had hair!

Since Tjep does the cooking my hair improved and where my hair was ‘short’ before, I grew it longer.
Now it is growing like mad and it cost me all my pocket money to keep it in shape with gels and hairspray. Taking much of my time too every morning!

Today, with the upcoming travels with the boat and the campervan in mind, I decided it was definitely time for a haircut and managed to book an appointment with the local hairdresser at 10 this morning.

A to me unknown hairdresser, did her very best and did cut ‘shorter’ to ‘short’, literally…. Far too short my taste let alone Tjeps’!
His face and his comment expressed every feeling when I arrived home, it was a big, very big shock to him.

We both calmed down now and happily accepted that my hair will be back to ‘reasonable’ in two weeks time and hopefully back to ‘normal’ in 4 weeks time.
Though to be honest, it saves me lot of time in the mornings!!!

Goodbye Heku, Hello Hymer

Last year we planned the first part of our Honeymoon in France.
But with two very lively dogs a hotel was not an option.
We thought hiring a campervan would be great. The freedom to travel around and not being bound to one place is very attractive.

Our wedding day was on Friday September the 4^th and on Monday we went to see a company in Friesland who still had one Van for hire.
It looked great and we were allowed to take the dogs with us. But the price!!!
At the other hand, going without the dogs and staying in Hotels was also going to cost a “sweet penny” as we say in Holland and a bit sad for the dogs.

Walking in between all those beautiful modern campervans we discovered an old (1991) but well looked after, sweet little one for sale. We looked inside, did a test-drive, discussed the price and bought this not too expensive Heku 460 (460 means 460 cm. long).
The bed above the cabin needed some athletic climbing but who cared, we are still “young”.
It needed some cleaning and checking the engine and Wednesday we collected it. On Thursday we went properly packed to France.
We had a lovely time, the dogs enjoyed the trip. The only downside was the bed.
It is OK when you can stay there all night but if you need to go to the toilet a few times at night, sliding in an out of the bed like a gymnastic monkey, down the aluminium stairs, is getting harsh.
Tjep had to admit that he was a little too old for this. Other than that it was a perfect Van.

During Winter the idea to buy a bigger Campervan matured and browsing the Internet we stumbled upon a company in Groningen, Campercentrum On the Road (amongst a view others) who had a very nice Hymer B584 for sale (584 does not mean 584 cm…… it is 610 cm. long!)
We talked, viewed, talked, discussed, viewed again and decided to put our Heku up for sale. Selling a Campervan this time of the year would be successful. But even before we got that far, friends wanted to buy the Heku. We sold it to them for a very friendly price. We sent it to the garage for the MOT and an official Camper check, cleaned it last Saturday and off they went, as happy as could be.

We collected our Hymer the same day. On forehand I have been making curtains and cushions to give it a little private touch. As soon as we arrived home with it, we installed the curtains and cushions and told each other how extremely fortunate we are with this beautiful 1993 large Campervan. We hardly can keep our eyes of it!
On Sunday we cleaned it. It now smells fresh and definitely “us”.
Our neighbours came to see it and smiled as broadly as we did. Super and very supportive neighbours we have.

On Thursday or Friday we will be off for a few days to do our test weekend before we go off to Yorkshire and Scotland in May.
Stay tuned for updates and pictures!

Animal Talk

We spent a lovely afternoon with friends.
It was their first visit to our new home and we guided them around the house, followed (except upstairs) by our two dogs.

Once in the drawing room we chatted about many things and had a good time.
The conversation seemed very interesting to our crow ‘Caro’ who replied in his own crowy way.
Like all crows he loves noise, no matter what and my voice is certainly a noise he loves very much as he always replies in his own language.

One of the conversation items with our friends was “do animals talk to each other”
Yes, they do. We all know and understand that a species of a breed recognizes the sound and signals of another species of the same breed.
Dogs understand other dogs, cats understand cats, crows other crows etc. etc.
And not only the sound but also the body language.

But for example, do birds talk, really talk, to dogs, dogs to cats, cats to birds etc? And now I am not talking about body language but with “words”. Well, they do at our home!

Caro loves visitors, they are “noisy”, they are interested in him, talk to him, laugh.

Caro lives completely voluntarily, in a big parrot cage full of toys and bells.
Or outside the cave. On top of it, to be precise. From there he flies around, sits on the windowsill and dominates the cats and dogs when they come too close. If all the animals respect Caro’s rules, everybody lives happily together.

From his cage he has a perfect view to the entrée of the garden to the house.
If any visitor, Caro spots him/her immediately and happily announces the person with a special sound. Very convenient for us because being in the kitchen at the back of the house, we are aware of visitors before they ring the doorbell.
But also the dogs learned to recognise this sound which means that they raise their ears and softly yell (if we are lucky! Especially Dée is known to be a good barker). No one can ever enter the property without being noticed!

Silly enough Caro also developed the same interest and almost…. almost the same signal for big agricultural machines! Nice when you live in an agricultural area….
But dogs and we, learn to recognize the different tone! Animal talk….