The Hague with Glenn...

The next day, I showed Glenn and his girlfriend Nicola (they’ve since broken up) around The Hague, including a visit to the Mauritshuis...

...and around the Binnenhof.

While Nicola went for a massage, Glenn and I visited the Panorama Mesdag. This tent, on temporary display, was used by Mesdag while painting on location on the dunes of Scheveningen.

After some shopping, we headed to the beach to meet Jimmy for dinner.

Oktoberfest...

Jimmy might not have a drop of German DNA, but that didn’t stop him from planning the agency’s first Oktoberfest. He recruited Veronica to be a beer wench. He was thrilled that his old Navy buddy Glenn was visiting from DC.

Jan loaned me her vintage dirndl, a traditional German dress. I looked like the poor country girl next to the fancy city girl, but I was happy to be dressed up.

Bob got into the act with a traditional shirt.

German Turston wore his lederhosen proudly and convinced me that the tables would hold our weight for dancing. Sadly, we never did get many other folks to dance, but we had fun.

A Market Boat...

On our way to meet Michael and Catharina in Voorburg for lunch, we spotted this unusual boat in the Vliet. At first we thought there was a full market on board, but it turned out that the crates were empty and the fruits and vegs were plastic. However, the boat was used as a floating market until just recently and is now part of the Maritime Museum.

We had a nice chat with these gentlemen and they insisted that we take a traditional dessert from their village of Belfeld near Venlo.

More Trains...

While Catharina (aka Playtex) and Michael (aka Dead o’Fart) have only been married for about two years, they’ve been together over 15 years. Ironically, it took our visit for her to finally see NedTrain for herself. Here they are about to sneak through the big rear doors where the trains enter the building and the general public isn’t allowed.

Visiting NedTrain...

Over the years we’d talked to Michael, from The Hague Hash, about taking a tour of where he works: NedTrain, one of the large maintenance yards for trains in the Netherlands. During an open house in October, he gave us a personal tour, which was actually a lot more interesting than I’d expected.

We started in this beautiful old train, which housed a conference room for the chairman of the national trains.

Michael, originally from Ireland, moved to the Netherlands to work as a carpenter for a shipbuilder. He then transitioned to working at NedTrain, where he specializes in upholstery. Here are replacement seat parts for the sprinter, which is the trains that we ride from our local station.

Jimmy was amazed by how streamlined the undercarriages of the trains were.

Leiden Liberation Parade...

October 3 was a beautiful day with ideal weather for watching the Leiden Liberation Parade, celebrating the liberation from the Spanish in 1574. This year Jenny came along with me. We watched from my usual spot near the end of the route. The theme was On Tour. Very impressed that this lady might have walked on top of this globe along the entire route.

Guess it’s always important to take toothpaste along when touring.

Loved this six-man cycling band.

Only in Holland!

This wooden couple were quite unusual...

...so were these Venus fly traps.

Strangest of all were these odd, but cool entries.

Of course, seeing the Flintstones and their prehistoric car made me smile. That night, Jimmy and I cycled into Leiden with Kent and Carlin to check out the music; Ashlynn and Veronica felt very grown up going into town on their own. We were especially impressed with the large platform floated on the main canal as a giant dance floor.

A Sunday in The Hague...

Jimmy and I spent an afternoon in The Hague in late September. We saw these cool sand sculptures in the city center. This depicted the landing of Prince Willem on the beach in Scheveningen 200 years ago, which led to independence for the Netherlands.

Here’s The Hague’s skyline.

Then we headed to the beach. When we stopped for a beer, we came across some folks doing some team building games on the sand. Seeing adults playing football while inside giant inflatable balls was pretty hilarious.

Eventually we made it down to the pier where we found the remnants of the Kite Festival, which was very small this year. Other than having an interesting conversation with some of the kite makers and seeing this cute owl, it was pretty disappointing.