More Abandoned Places in Belgium...

In mid-October, Jimmy and Veronica set off to Antwerp with their bikes along on the train for another day of urban exploration. This time they started outside an oil port facility. There were no fences, so the entrance was easy.

There wasn’t much to see, but Veronica still enjoyed taking some photos.

The next stop was more interesting: an all-girls secondary school. Here is what Veronica wrote in her article for Going Dutch about urbex:

The walls were being eaten by graffiti, and all that was left were the blackboards. Plants forced their way up through cracks in the floors and fell through the windows. Being in empty classrooms was a first for us, and immediately questions formed in our minds. Did the students know that it was the final day for this school? Did they say goodbye to the classrooms and teachers, or did they show up the next morning or at the start of the new term to find the windows boarded up? 

It’s hard to imagine yourself being in a situation where this happens, where you have to leave your house, workplace or school. Exploring these places that once meant something to someone makes me realize how much we take for granted. I have a hard time imagining my school with smashed windows and graffiti covering all the walls.

Those Happy Kids...

Veronica started with smiles and ended with smiles.

Her time was 44:12, which was just under 9 minutes per miles.

We were all very proud of all four kids!

That Quick Girl...

Less than two minutes later, we spotted Ashlynn coming across the stadium track.

Love this series...check out the lady in orange who was originally behind Ashlynn at the corner, but quickly got ahead of her.

Here they are neck-in-neck.

And here that girl with the big stride pulls out in front.

Love this photo as Ashlynn flew into the finish line with a fantastic time of 33:15 as the 6th woman and 69th runner out of 4,335. She beat her time from last year by over four minutes!

Those Quick Boys...

Of course, I knew that David was fast, but it was still a shock to see that he was the first runner to enter the stadium. Normally I behave and don’t swear in front of Sally, but I couldn’t hold back and screamed, “Holy S**t!” Guess I’ll need to be bleeped on their video.

Was very exciting watching David come in 1st and thrilled that I managed to capture the moment that he crossed the line with a time of 26:29.

Andrew’s also getting faster and didn’t even notice all those cheerleaders cheering him on.

He came in 36th with an impressive time of 31:25.

Amsterdam 8K...

This year Veronica decided to join Ashlynn, David and Andrew and run the Amsterdam 8K, which is part of the Amsterdam Marathon. We arrived quite early with plenty of time to walk around the runner’s exhibition.

Ashlynn agreed that starting at the very back wasn’t the best strategy, but she refused to start at the very front with David and Andrew. Luckily, she was able to stretch out into a run near the start.

Since Veronica hadn’t run this race before, she had to start in the last section. This smile shows that she didn’t mind.

AWC Dinner Club...

A new activity added at the AWC this fall was a dinner club. The idea is that we’ll meet several times per year with different couples hosting each time. This first time, we were hosted by Rebecca, who’s Dutch-American, and Urvan, who’s from Aruba. Jimmy volunteered to make the appetizer, which was apple and goat cheese wrapped in phyllo dough.

We were really impressed with the lovely meal that they served and had a great time chatting with Roberta and Ernst as well. The evening would have been perfect except that we got completely soaked on the 15K cycle ride home.

Finally Went Apple Picking...

While Sally had taken the girls to Olmenhorst near Lisse to go apple picking last fall, Jimmy and I had never been. So when Jan suggested that we join her and Bob one Saturday in October, we were happy to go along. There was an organic store and an organic fair on the grounds that weekend. We picked up a bottle of wine along with some cheese and crackers for a small picnic.

It didn’t take long to fill a bag with apples. It also didn’t take long to fill our mouths with some fine samples straight from the trees. I don’t usually eat red apples, but these Elstars were delicious.