and 1930s rosewood and sliver tea service... and a 16 piece (!) set of china with more different objects than I could imagine might be used at any dinner party (certainly not Judy Chicago's).
Nothing accumulated, however, for a number of minutes the flakes were thick and furious.
After breakfast, we walked to the local synagogue. It is quite a structure: Synagoge Jacob Obrechtplein and the congregation is sweet, but tiny... Ashkenazi "Black Hat" Orthodox. A young fellow befriended me and explained that many (about half) the congregation was likely away in Austria... skiing. The size and grandeur of the building suggests that the area was filled with a very comfortable community of Jews in the late 1920s. It was built in an Art Deco style with many mosaics, wood carving, stained glass windows and stenciled paint. Franklin (our B&B host) had mentioned that, indeed there were many Jews there then, and when comfortable German Jews started emigrating many of them arrive to the neighborhood, only to be evacuated a few years later during the Sho'a.
After services we walked along the canals in the neighborhood a bit more and found the Christie's exhibit nearly where we had found the synagogue. We saw beautiful blue and white Chinese bowls
and 1930s rosewood and sliver tea service... and a 16 piece (!) set of china with more different objects than I could imagine might be used at any dinner party (certainly not Judy Chicago's).
Amsterdam seems to be an "anti-car" city. We were struck by how many people of all "rides" of life and ages travel by bike (not to mention the tram). Street parking in our neighborhood (in the third ring (just inside the Amsterdam Ring highway) costs 2 Euro for each half hour! We had paid enough to leave the van on the street until 13:30. So, as the time approached we returned, started up the GPS device, aimed it at Den Haag and set off.
The two cities are quite near each other, yet there is quite a large amount of open farm country in between.
I've often been intrigued by how it is that The Hague is the location of the international courts. I don't know the answer, but the city itself is lovely and lively.
We drove in, found a spot to park around the beautiful tree-lined rotary where the Pakistani embassy is (and other embassies) with its wall and spiked fence surrounding green lawns and a large 18th century house. We ate our lunch.
For some reason I haven't figured out, we could not program the GPS to lead us to Spinoza's house. Eventually I gave up and had it lead us to a tourist information center. It turns out the closest available was one at the Central Station. Nobody there knew where 72-74 Paviljoensgract was. I asked a cabby who was able to give me pretty good walking directions, but... without a map, which we did not have, we wouldn't get there. I asked the young woman at the desk in the hotel next door who was very helpful. As we walked, we experienced another storm of flurries.
We were about a hundred yards from Spinoza's house (I couldn't find the street signs) when I asked a young policeman (enforcing parking violations) where the street was. He paused a moment, and sent me down a street a block away (but the wrong street).
The Hague has an interesting combination of and old and new city. The "old city" has its tourist-full tiny alleyways (and all the usual commercial establishments. Then, one street over is a broad road with buildings from the 1930s and newer filled with pedestrians and cyclists and a red-paved path for emergency vehicles. This leads to/from the central station with large open spaces and tall postmodern buildings that mix commercial, office and residential space.
So, there he was, just as I'd seen him in other photographs, sitting in the middle of the street, thinking and writing.
Debbie knocked on the door to see if he was home (I didn't know he drove a Volvo).
I wonder who does live there now and what it's like.
Our pilgrimage complete we headed back at a quick clip to get to the van before the young policeman cited us for having run out the meter (at only 1.90 Euro for an hour!) and set off for our evening's destination: Renesse.
The drive was only about an hour and a half from The Hague, but a couple of misunderstandings on my part of Gertrude Prudence Sunshine ("Gerturde" for short from now on... she is very patient and forgiving) wanted of me and we arrived a few minutes after five, just at dusk. It turns out that we had misunderstood the "small print" in the book of campsites. The one we wanted does not open for another two weeks. The young woman we met there suggested another one a couple of kilometers away. We got there only to learn that the office was closed and the message on the "buzz for attendant" gizmo rang a cell phone that "is not being answered at this time". We looked around for another option (a parking lot in town that does not allow campers to park between 21:00 and 6:00 and another campsite that doesn't open until April) before we settled on awaiting someone at the attendant-less site. In the parking space in front of the office we raised ("popped") the top, had our dinner and began reading.
By 20:30 we had given up on someone arriving to let us check in. I found an outlet near the entrance, moved the van close to it, and plugged in. We made the bed and settled in to read. Snow flurries had continued off and on about every hour or so. It was cold outside, but comfortable and snug within. We must have fallen asleep by about 23:00.
Little did we imagine that the "attendant" would arrive in the form of the owner at 0:22! His wife had noticed the van while driving by. I imagine he had to get out of bed to find out what was happening. He asked for some identification as collateral. I explained what had happened and we parted knowing that the attendant would arrive by 9:00 to settle the matter. In the meantime, it's now 2:00 and we're wide awake.
Current mileage: 166484 KM (=103,448.36 miles).