Ice and snow. a Dutch weekend

A lovely week and two wonderful weekends thanks to the weather: ice, snow, long walks, crisp snow and later firm, black ice. I took three very long walks during the week, along frozen lakes and canals, and it was so peaceful and beautiful, really a bonus.

Kromme Does, Hoogmade

The second and last winter weekend for the time being (February 11-12) was absolutely glorious and Holland looked in some places like a Dutch painting from the Golden Age come to life. I had an English friend to stay and showed him that Holland still exists behind the motorways and the big cities in the West, the "Randstad". We began our tour on Saturday by driving through Hoogmade towards the Wijde Aa where there happened to be a skating match for professionals.

Wijde Aa, Hoogmade

Windmills, ice, sun and skates, what more does one want? Besides at that spot it is very clearly visible why we desperately need dikes as the water level of the lakes and canals is considerably higher than the land.

         On we went along the river Gouwe to Gouda, to see the famous medieval Town Hall and the even more famous windows of the church of St. John. A host of market stalls unfortunately spoilt the view of the free standing Town Hall. On the other hand the stalls are a truly Dutch phenomenon and as such fitted our Dutch day! 

         Of course the first thing we did when we came to Gouda was to order coffee and Dutch apple pie in a cafe with a view of the Town Hall. Gouda is well-known for its "stroopwafels', but we needed something more substantial. Thus fortified we explored some market stalls and went to the church to admire its wonderful stained glass windows, their colours very vivid and bright, depicting Biblical scenes as well as scenes from the 80-year war with the Spaniards. The church itself, the Sint Jan, is still used as a church, but also for organ recitals as the organ is indeed beautiful. We could have spent hours exploring each individual window in detail, but I had an agenda for the day. After reluctantly taking leave of the church, we made a small tour of Gouda, the library, almshouses, the fish market and the harbour with the historic ships, still in working order.

Library Gouda

Everywhere people were skating on the canals, skating couples pulling small children and babies along on sledges, shoppers cutting across the canals to get somewhere quicker. There are many historic buildings in the town. The harbour used to be very important. Ships had to go through Gouda which connected the Hollandse IJssel with the river Gouwe and ultimately with the Old River Rhine, the "Oude Rijn". It was the route to Amsterdam. Warehouses, big homes of merchants, churches, former convents and monasteries one of them now  housing the public library, almshouses, it is all there and within a limited space. It was unusual and quite a surprise to see people skating in the harbour.

Historic Harbour Gouda

The next leg was via Haastrecht towards Vlist along the small and picturesque river also called Vlist. Here too was a skating tour, and it seemed everybody, young and old, was on skates, passing windmills, cropped willow trees, reeds and big old farmhouses. Enterprising people were selling hot chocolate milk, mulled wine and pea soup in tents on the narrow and winding river. Although the sky was an intensely deep blue and there wasn't a lot of wind, the windmills were turning their sails. The echo of the skates cutting across the ice is fabulous! We stopped many times to take pictures, as it just seemed to be a tableaux vivant from a Dutch painting. It is amazing how bare the river looked at this time of year, while it is so lush and green in Spring and Summer, with horse parsley lacing the road and fruit trees in their delicate pink or white bridal outfit around the old farmhouses.

River Vlist

The Vlist ends in Schoonhoven, which is on the river Lek. Here we enjoyed Dutch pea soup with rye bread and ham in a restaurant with a view of the ferry. The water was full of ice floes and it seemed as if there was a certain sluggishness in the movement of the current. Due to the ice? Or just my imagination? Schoonhoven is a nice, old town, partly walled. It is known as the Silver City, as there is a school for silversmiths here, and a Silver Museum. Like Gouda, there are canals and gabled houses, but the town is much smaller. The canals and houses are a miniature Gouda, a real old Dutch town. The entrance to the harbour is spanned by a white wooden drawbridge on top of the city walls. From here one has a lovely view of both the river and parts of Schoonhoven. It is a pity that big industrial buildings on the south bank of the river spoil the view. It could have been so beautiful.

Sunset at Schoonhoven

When we returned to our car to cross the river by ferry, we were surprised by the most gorgeous sunset I had ever seen. The sky was a deep rosy red and orange, the sun a fiery red ball. The water of the river seemed to be of liquid gold. Of course we took pictures and more pictures. Even after crossing the river, the sun stayed a purplish pink for a long time, which we enjoyed while driving to the West along yet another narrow dike with farmhouses, windmills and late skaters on the frozen river. It did not get dark till we reached our destination, a former farmhouse, Steeckershil, now a home with a concert hall where the hayloft used to be.

Sunset in the Alblasserwaard

Here we enjoyed a piano recital, and most of all the hospitality of our host and hostess, and the company of the friends of this unique enterprise. Not a typically Dutch event, but in a typically Dutch environment: a 16^th century converted farmhouse on a narrow river in a very picturesque and rural part of Holland. In a spot where during the day there had been a skating tour, which our host could have joined by stepping on the ice at the back of his garden. The young Hungarian pianist was Eva Szalai (1987), played compositions by Schubert, Schumann, Chopin and Ravel.

On Sunday we joined the church choir in the morning  and went sightseeing in Leiden in the afternoon. Here too almshouses, bridges, skaters on the many canals, two big churches, and most surprising of all, a cafe on the ice of the Nieuwe Rijn in the very heart of Leiden, worth a photo.

"Rembrandt" Mill

One of the many almshouses in Leyden

An ice cold drink???