Entries about holland

We returned from Grenada in December 2015

Bed of red tulips - Keukenhof

I had my eye on a river cruise in the Holland to see the tulips for some time. I had many discussions with my travel agent Cal Ford about the best company to do this cruise with. Viking seemed to have good itineraries and some of their boats had elevators which went up to the top deck, but they are apparently difficult to deal with for bookings. So Cal was promoting AmaWaterways, and that was the one that we went with.

I wanted to revisit some of the places in the Netherlands where I had been in 1950 when I was 12. Of course we were in Amsterdam, but I have been in Amsterdam since 1950. I remembered going to Marken and Volendam, and the Ama cruise had Volendam as one of the ports. The cruise also went to Antwerp in Belgium and Antwerp was a place that we visited in 1950. I went to Kinderdjik in 2009 with my granddaughter and the cruise was also scheduled to stop there. I thought Bob would enjoy seeing that.

And I also remember the cheese market in Alkmaar. So I made hotel reservations in Alkmaar at the end of the cruise on a Friday when the cheese market would be in operation. I ordered some prints of my dad's pictures of Holland and Belgium and this proved to be a great idea.

Goals for the trip

• Do a canal tour of Amsterdam with Bob who has not been to the Netherlands since about 1962

Best way to see Amsterdam- 2009

• Revisit Volendam

• Revisit Antwerp (railroad station, Rubens house and the zoo). Possibly also see Brussels although the recent bombing made me a little apprehensive about going there

Our family outside the museum in the zoo in 1950

• Show Kinderdjik to Bob

Windmill at Kinderkjik in 2009

• See the tulips in Keukenhof

• Revisit the Alkmaar cheese market

It was cheaper to fly British Airways booking directly with them, then with AA as a code share. We are flying first class to Heathrow and we will not check the scooter this time - just ask them to put it in the closet. We will see how that works.

Folded scooter

Bob can't find his checkbook which annoys him. I ordered some prints of Daddy's pictures of Holland and Belgium and they were supposed to be delivered today and they were not. I hope I get them before we leave tomorrow. (We did) Bob has got the lawn mowed, front and back although he had to get a new battery for the lawn tractor.

Scaffolding behind the house

He has the scaffolding on the back of the house, and has caulked and painted the windows back there.

Scaffolding on the back of the house

While he was doing that I had a call from a Beasley in Georgia who wanted to get information from me on the Beasley family tree. Talked my ear off. I don't really think he's a relative as the Thomas Beasley that he descends from may not be a son of Jeames Beasley. I also found that when I tried to sync my tree with my tree on Ancestry that somehow I uploaded 10,000 people and made a duplicate tree. So I deleted it off Ancestry. It was too confusing having two of them there.

The modem that I got from Mother in 2006 began refusing to stay connected yesterday, so I finally got out the new one that I ordered and installed it. It had a password, and after a great deal of effort, I got my computer logged onto it, and then I had to call the Geek squad to get the printer to work on it. But then when Bob came to bed, he could not get his iPad and I could not get my iPhone logged on to the network. My phone said the password was incorrect but it was the same one I used before. So I called the Geek Squad again and they said they couldn't do any network stuff.

When I started to have trouble, I had called Verizon, but they are on strike and I couldn't get anything except an automated help. But after the Geek Squad guy could not help, I called Verizon again and this time I did not say what it was I wanted, so I got to talk to a person. I asked him if I could take the password off, and he told me how to do that. Then my phone and Bob's iPad worked on the network and I could get my computer to work too, but I knew when I wanted to print something else out, that the printer would have a problem. I decided to wait to address that until today. And this time the Geek Squad guy was able to help.

We have printed out our boarding passes for the flight tomorrow. The BA website had a countdown timer but at the last minute it disappeared and then I got an email that I could check in. I don't quite understand the baggage check for the second flight, but I guess it will be OK At least the boarding passes are printed out. I think when I come back home again I'll put a different password on the modem so that there is one, but it is a little simpler. Lynde packed my bags on Wednesday and she came again this morning to finish up, but there really wasn't that much to do. I think we have about 4 grapefruit left and Bob may eat one tomorrow. We left home about 3:15

Leaving home - road into town

and got to the Country Inn and Suites about 5:30 and without much problem they gave us our parking pass to put in the car and had us loaded into the van and to the airport asap. There was no one there to curb check the bags so I went in while Bob was unloading and there was a wheelchair person there.

Next problem was the scooter. They had a fit over the battery.

Scooter battery

Scooter without battery

Took it out and measured it and weighed it and the scooter separately, and photographed the scooter. Took us about half an hour to check in.

Folded scooter

Security wasn't so much of a problem - apparently if you are over 75, you don't have to get out of a wheelchair to go through security. We were in the Lounge eating sandwiches and cookies (and there was also French Onion soup) by 6:35.

Sandwich choices

Cookie jar

Sandwiches in the airport lounge

Got on the plane before 8:30 and they put the scooter in the closet for us. We were at a bulkhead which meant I couldn't have any bags with me, but I figured out that I could hang stuff from the arm of the TV. They gave us dinner - Tomato and mozzarella as a starter (it was good),

Tomato and mozzarella as a starter

beef with roasted root vegetables (I liked the beef but hated the veggies), and

Chocolate and caramel fondant for dessert

I think both of us slept some.