Dreamy, Heady, First Days in the Netherlands

We loved our little hotel room/B&B room/apartment. It was located in an area we had never visited before, in a small town called Katwijk, Netherlands. The hotel was called Hotel Steeds aan Zee. Here is a picture of Ken in our room. From the picture you can see we are far away from Mexico’s autumn warm temperatures. The weather was cool and damp, drizzly. I was back to wearing pants, sweaters and jackets.

 

  

We drove around the area in our rented vehicle. Below is one of the characters we saw in the many fields surrounding the area.  Many more fields and animals such as, sheep, horses, cows, etc running around those open fields. Often the fields are not fenced but the perimeters are surrounded by trenches of water.

In the previous post I mentioned that we had a kitchen in our little apartment. Ken was at the apartment before he picked my up at the airport. He stocked it up with a few goodies like Dutch crackers and cheese, plus this wonderful El Burro white wine. I guess he picked this wine to remind us of Mexico.

 

The building we were in was a typical, older, Dutch home remodelled into a hotel. Below you can see the steep stairway. We were on one of the upper floors. The stairs were a classic and mostly enjoyable because of that fact. When we were taking luggage up and down the staircase it lost its charm. 

I was so surprised to see this bouquet of roses in our room when we first entered it. These beautiful flowers definitely added to the decor.

This hotel had a enticing entranceway which could be seen from the street. Here is Ken standing behind the counter as if he was the owner. We were to help ourselves to the tea and baked goods available. I am curious if they often get British tourists to the area.

For those first few days of being in the Netherlands we drove around looking at the countryside or places in the city. We went looking at thrift stores, which I must say are much more socially acceptable than in North America. On weekends the thrift stores are packed, so don’t go then if you can help it. Many thrift stores are huge, even bigger than places like Value Village. I also walked to a little computer shop close to our apartment to get a battery for my dead iPhone. It cost approximately fifty Euros. I had been using an older model phone until I arrived in Europe.

I have this weird thing happen when I fly long distances. My one ear becomes plugged. We also went to a few pharmacies (apotheek) to find a solution. It is always different when you go to another country and participate in something that is rather a mundane occurrence in your home country. There were chairs for older clients to sit in and wait for their prescriptions. They seemed to have what in Canada would be naturopathic medicines.