!23Holland2

I bicycled through Holland in the Summer of 1957 staying with either families or at Youth Hostels. This tiny country is so beautiful and the people exceptionally open and hospitable. Their language is virtually impossible for an American but thank goodness the Dutch are such wonderful linguists!

The first two images are of the seemingly ubiquitous windmills that pump water out of the polders (land reclaimed from the sea.) The third photo shows a group of Amsterdam row houses with their typical, lace-curtained windows. The next one is of Rembrandt's "Anatomy Lesson"...after I took this photo, I was summarily ejected from the Rijksmuseum in the Hague...but I did get the picture (and it was taken without flash!) Vincent VanGogh's painting of the tulip fields and a rising sun was done while he was in an asylum at St. Remy in 1889. The beautiful tulip fields, as well as the busy Alkmaar Cheese market, shown with a photo of a summer's day at Noordwijk aan Zee, help to keep Holland so very colorful.

Klompen in Delft

St. Servatius in Maastricht, the Netherlands' oldest Church

bicycling near Zandfoort

Anne Frank's House Canals of Amsterdam

Dutch Treat

                    Old Windmills churn; black Zuider Zee,
                    Yet Polders’ Dikes turn back the Sea;
                    Noordwijk’s white Sands, Towheads, agree,
                    Set flowered Stands of Tulips, free;
                    We rode our Bikes, Dutch Sights to see.

                    Oh Gouda's Street, rare Cheeses strung,
                    Row Houses neat, Lace Curtains hung;
                    Wood Klompen skipped or Church Bells rung,
                    I cycled there when I was young;
                    Though Scheveningen tripped my Tongue!

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