The Road Goes Ever On

Sunday, August 16, 2015

Brussels' Grand Place

Our itinerary back to the US involved a train trip from Amsterdam to Brussels. We got into our hotel in Brussels sufficiently early to hop another train from the airport to downtown. There certainly are larger squares in Europe, but, especially at night, none of them comes close to the beauty and vitality of Brussells' late Medieval/Renaissance Grand Place. A beautiful warm evening there, drinks at one of the many cafes on the square, was an irresistible end to our 2015 European tour.

City hall; 15th century Gothic

Panning around; mostly guild houses originally

The usual renovation at the far end; which turned out to be the
perfect place for drinks and for viewing the bits not being renovated

More panning around

Ditto, as the sun goes down and the lights go up

Thus

More panning

At the cafe

Photograph by a stranger

Vicki mixes her own citrone presse

While I sample the Belgian beers

Admiring the surroundings

Thus, an attempted panorama

And thus

A last look

And a final ussie

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.