September 19; another sweet Low Countries escape🧡
From sunny Amsterdam canals, to shipspotting in Vlissingen, and partying the night away at a lake... this was my week 🇳🇱
Happy Sunday,
Those who know me well, know how incessantly I used to travel before the pandemic hit last year. Coincidentally, by early 2020 Ellie and I both started getting tired of the routine we had built up, spending anywhere between thirty to fifty percent of our time in Sofia, and the rest on the road, often together but also a lot separately.
And then Covid came. Despite the fantastic 50,000km we clocked driving and sightseeing around Bulgaria between March 2020 and July 2021, after the pandemic ground foreign trips to a halt, it definitely feels good now to be able to go abroad again, at least within Europe.
I noticed an interesting change in my feelings about travel in this period: I am now much less interested in going to new or random places, and much more excited about spending meaningful time in countries that I consider home. Which for me, as far as Europe is concerned, are Bulgaria and the Netherlands.
Since I moved out of Amsterdam ten years ago, I never felt strongly about coming back home to Holland. Not that I didn’t enjoy the average two or three annual visits of a few days each, but it just seemed that the Netherlands are always there, and I can come back whenever I want on a whim, which I regularly did.
One thing we all learned in the past year and a half, is that you can never take mobility for granted anymore. And for me, somehow, it coincided with an unexpected longing to return to the Netherlands more often.
And so, when my dear friend Mike Reiner pinged us a month ago that he’s throwing a birthday party at his family lake house outside Amsterdam in September, Ellie and I didn’t have to think long before booking flights for a few gorgeous Indian summer days in Holland.
And gorgeous it was. I’ve established a curious lucky streak with my countless trips to London and the Netherlands over the years; the weather always happens to be great when I’m around. This week was no exception.
Amsterdam is obviously fantastic any time of the year, but this summer is the best I’ve ever experienced it. With museums and restaurants back in business, and the tourist crowds absent, the city feels intimate yet vibrant. Ellie and I finally paid a visit to the Stedelijk Museum of modern art, my first since its reopening nine years ago, and had a good two days of walking the canals and meeting friends over coffees.
On Friday, we took out a UFODrive Tesla Model 3 and drove to Zeeland, stopping to see the Delta Works at the Oosterschelde storm surge barrier, after which we spent a night at an amazingly cool place in Vlissingen. The harbor town is located at the estuary of the Scheldt river, which connects the major European port of Antwerp with the North Sea.
The Belgian government maintains a pilotage base in Vlissingen, where marine pilots board incoming ships and navigate them safely and orderly up the river and across the border to Antwerp. In recent years, they transformed one of the base buildings to a hotel and restaurant, where you can book rooms overlooking the Western Scheldt navigation channel, with huge ships passing by right outside your window. A very special, one-of-a-kind experience, which together with the beautiful beach, dunes, and old town of Vlissingen make it totally worth a day trip.
However, best of all was to celebrate Mike’s birthday on Braassemermeer lake yesterday and today. It was the first time since the pandemic for me and Ellie to travel abroad for a multi-day “event”, and it being a loving birthday celebration made it all the more special. Lots of good vibes with friends old and new, lots of food and dancing, and somehow, as always, really good weather 😛
All I can wish is for all of us to have plenty opportunities to enjoy the places we love with the people we enjoy spending time with, like Ellie and I had in the Netherlands last week. It’s far from a given fact, as we all know by now…
Thanks for checking in today and talk to you next Sunday! 😇
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