Resurrection of Amsterdam's Bicycles

So we've finished the Rijksmuseum and are heading down the street and across a bridge, toward our favorite vlaamse frites and herring joints, when Vicki looks down the canal and sees one of Amsterdam's great but rarely witnessed sights: the dredge that picks the bicycles out of the canals. Nothing evokes Amsterdam more than canals and bicycles. OK, drugs and sex certainly evoke Amsterdam more, but it's awkward to photograph them. Anyhow, a small crowd had already formed, and I was thrilled to join it and record the following...

Rijksmuseum 2015, Again, 2

And visit some of our old friends...

Cornells Wierlingens' Explosion of the Spanish Flagship During
the Battle of Gibraltar, in lurid detail

My favorite group portrait, which we somehow missed in May,
Bartholomeus van der Helst's Banquet at the Crossbowmen's
Guild in Celebration of the Treaty of Munster

Reflection in one of the silver breast plates

And in one of the glasses

Night Watch mob

Milk Maid mob

One of my favorite Hals, The Merry Drinker

And my favorite Hals, Portrait of a Couple...

Great museum

Rijksmuseum 2015, Again, 1

We continued driving the familiar ground, out of France, across Belgium, and into Netherlands, 3-4 hours, finally arriving in Amsterdam Saturday night. After a trip to BW Campers to pick up stored items, we camped at Gaspaarplas, and spent a couple days cleaning and preparing the camper for storage, and packing for our return to the US. We reserved one day for a trip into Amsterdam for some last minute shopping and for visiting some Rijksmuseum departments we'd not seen before.

Namely, the household goods, as I call them; here, some
incredible hand-painted tea sets, for two, for twelve, etc.

45 miniature silver items in a doll house kitchen

More table ware

How to do big hair in the 18th century

Hand-painted Meissen cutlery set

More Meissen...reminding us of the Green Vaults

Lots of flowery dresses and flowery head-gear

In the magic lantern collection; some were too lewd even for
me (to post)

Evolution of double-reed instruments

Traveling harpsichord

Oh yes, there is a Delft department; here, a
perpetual calendar

Breughelesque Delft

What really knocked us out was the engraved
glassware

Thus

And particularly the stippled engraved
glassware

Sort of pointillist in glass, pretty amazing

France Out-takes, 2015, II

Continuing the amazing and amusing...

Interesting house/porches near Fontaine-Henry

Meteo on the street in Caen

Lawn ornaments near Utah Beach

Message on a German gun emplacement: "Who changes the
children, changes the world"

Gun battery in Cherboug: Sic transit, Gloria

Normandie humor

One sees rather few home-built rigs in France...here's one

Your bones are being evicted from this cemetery

So you've pulled into a parking lot at a scenic overlook and are
admiring the sights when up rides a bicycliste/asshole to
exercise his male rights just outside your front windshield...

Medieval pizza maker in Vitre

French hot dog

Ingredients for Kouign Aman...Food of Satan

What happens when you fall asleep reading

Sic transit, Gloria

Clock tower in Amiens

Belt and suspenders approach