MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
I hadn't realized the castle had been destroyed. They did an incredible job reconstructing it.
-
Welcome to the WDWMAGIC.COM Forums!
Please take a look around, and feel free to sign up and join the community.
The Chit Chat Chit Chat Thread
- Thread starter The Mom
- Start date
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
Yeah, this was so weird, because the high tea we did 2 years ago was great! Full-sized scones, with real jam and clotted cream, and real pastries and such....you got a full slice of quiche, not just one bite, and a whole muffin, not just a mini one. And the price was cheaper than this one was for the minis. It was just bizarre...I guess it wasn't meant to be a whole meal, even for lunch? But for that price, you expect a lot more. And the one we did back on that other trip, everyone got to choose their own tea and I got milk instead and it was no problem. Some of the menus even included milk or OJ for everyone along with the tea. I don't know why they made such a big deal out of me wanting something else to drink...and to charge for milk to put in tea?? That's very English from my understanding, so why that's not standard, I don't know. It's supposed to be a traditional English high tea. Oh well...we know to look elsewhere next time. And we enjoyed sitting and chatting, so it was nice, even if the food wasn't great.So sorry your High Tea stunk. I had high tea in the Uk on a family trip back in the early 90's and loved it! I loved the little sandwiches and pastries. I especially loved the clotted cream for the scones. I didn't drink tea, but hot chocolate was offered. It wasn't American hot chocolate, but a richer chocolate. I got used to it quite quickly. It was delicious!
The castle is so beautiful! It reminds me of castles I had seen in France. I love the one where you got the shot of the castle through the trees.
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
Yes, it was completely in ruins. The told the story, but I don't remember how it all came about....I think the baron's family ran out of money and he couldn't afford to restore it, and then he married the baroness who was incredibly rich, and she paid for the renovation. Our tourguide told us that every room in the castle is numbered, and normally the Baron would have room number 1, because he would have been the most important, but since it was the Baroness whose money paid for everything, her room is number one and the baron got like, 2 or 3. The family actually still owned it and spent September there every year, so tours didn't go in September up until a couple years ago when the historical society bought it or the last of the family passed or something.
MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
So very interesting! Thanks for sharing.
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
After the castle, we went to Utrecht for some dinner. We ate at this place one of the girls goes to when she has to work in Utrecht....she's sent all over the place. Something @21stamps might be interested in...this girl was telling a story, that she had to work in Spain for a while and one of the people she was working with there had a connection to one of the soccer stadiums. So this gal's boyfriend was a huge soccer fan and they were planning a vacation in Spain when she got done with her work there. So she asked this connection about how to get tickets to a game at the big stadium there. He said he'd look into it and get back to her. A few days later, she gets to her desk and there are 2 VIP tickets....seats like....right next to the team owner. Best seats in the whole stadium, for a game.....I think she said Real Madrid and someone else. Anyway, when she got home she looked up how much those tickets would have cost and they were 700 euros a piece and she had gotten them for free. Amazing.
Anyway, so when she gets sent to Utrecht, she eats at this lunchroom, and while she had never been there for dinner, she said it was really cute and the only place you could be seated in a garden within the city, and it was covered...it's like a solarium. So we got there and there was a 30 minute wait for a table. We had a drink at the bar...the stools were the highest stools I have EVER sat on at a bar, and all of us had trouble just to climb up on them, and at 5'6" I was the SHORTEST of the girls. It took me literally 3 minutes to get situated on this stoll.
They came to get us when our table was ready and it was PACKED, so we go to the table, and at the table behind us, the people had their chairs pulled out like 2 feet from the table. I pulled my chair out as far as it could go and there was only about 2 inches between the leg of the chair and the table leg, so I couldn't get in. I'm bumping into the chair behind mine and kind of smiled at the people sitting there (it was REALLY loud and I didn't want to yell) and kind of looked at the chairs so they could see I couldn't get in so they would scoot in and the lady just turned around and glared at me. Like, the AUDACITY of me to expect to be able to SIT in my chair. Obviously, she wasn't moving an inch, so we figured out if we angled my chair, I could at least get the one leg in and sit. I still had one leg out into the aisle, but I was sitting.
The menu was limited. There wasn't an appetizer I would eat...it was all either fish, or beets, or mustard soup, or salads with stuff I didn't like, so I was the only one who didn't order one.
I ordered steak as my main, one of the girls got fish, one got pork loin, and the other lamb: (not my picture....one of the other girls took it)
For dessert, I had a raspberry creme brulé and the others had a meringue with fruit and mango sorbet (I don't like mango): (Also not my picture)
It was good food, but having not had an appetizer, and you can see the veggies they gave us were not a full portion or anywhere close, so I was still pretty hungry when we left. We went and checked into our hotel and went down to the restuarant and had some snacks, which I didn't take pictures of because it wasn't anything special. Just some chicken strips and bitterballen (fried balls of meat paste) They were good, just nothing out of the ordinary.
The next day I didn't take any pictures because all we did was go shopping because one of the girls had a wedding to go to this past Friday and she needed a dress. So we helped her find an appropriate outfit and then we all went home.
Anyway, so when she gets sent to Utrecht, she eats at this lunchroom, and while she had never been there for dinner, she said it was really cute and the only place you could be seated in a garden within the city, and it was covered...it's like a solarium. So we got there and there was a 30 minute wait for a table. We had a drink at the bar...the stools were the highest stools I have EVER sat on at a bar, and all of us had trouble just to climb up on them, and at 5'6" I was the SHORTEST of the girls. It took me literally 3 minutes to get situated on this stoll.
They came to get us when our table was ready and it was PACKED, so we go to the table, and at the table behind us, the people had their chairs pulled out like 2 feet from the table. I pulled my chair out as far as it could go and there was only about 2 inches between the leg of the chair and the table leg, so I couldn't get in. I'm bumping into the chair behind mine and kind of smiled at the people sitting there (it was REALLY loud and I didn't want to yell) and kind of looked at the chairs so they could see I couldn't get in so they would scoot in and the lady just turned around and glared at me. Like, the AUDACITY of me to expect to be able to SIT in my chair. Obviously, she wasn't moving an inch, so we figured out if we angled my chair, I could at least get the one leg in and sit. I still had one leg out into the aisle, but I was sitting.
The menu was limited. There wasn't an appetizer I would eat...it was all either fish, or beets, or mustard soup, or salads with stuff I didn't like, so I was the only one who didn't order one.
I ordered steak as my main, one of the girls got fish, one got pork loin, and the other lamb: (not my picture....one of the other girls took it)
For dessert, I had a raspberry creme brulé and the others had a meringue with fruit and mango sorbet (I don't like mango): (Also not my picture)
It was good food, but having not had an appetizer, and you can see the veggies they gave us were not a full portion or anywhere close, so I was still pretty hungry when we left. We went and checked into our hotel and went down to the restuarant and had some snacks, which I didn't take pictures of because it wasn't anything special. Just some chicken strips and bitterballen (fried balls of meat paste) They were good, just nothing out of the ordinary.
The next day I didn't take any pictures because all we did was go shopping because one of the girls had a wedding to go to this past Friday and she needed a dress. So we helped her find an appropriate outfit and then we all went home.
MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
Sounds like you had a bad dining weekend, but at least your company was good.After the castle, we went to Utrecht for some dinner. We ate at this place one of the girls goes to when she has to work in Utrecht....she's sent all over the place. Something @21stamps might be interested in...this girl was telling a story, that she had to work in Spain for a while and one of the people she was working with there had a connection to one of the soccer stadiums. So this gal's boyfriend was a huge soccer fan and they were planning a vacation in Spain when she got done with her work there. So she asked this connection about how to get tickets to a game at the big stadium there. He said he'd look into it and get back to her. A few days later, she gets to her desk and there are 2 VIP tickets....seats like....right next to the team owner. Best seats in the whole stadium, for a game.....I think she said Real Madrid and someone else. Anyway, when she got home she looked up how much those tickets would have cost and they were 700 euros a piece and she had gotten them for free. Amazing.
Anyway, so when she gets sent to Utrecht, she eats at this lunchroom, and while she had never been there for dinner, she said it was really cute and the only place you could be seated in a garden within the city, and it was covered...it's like a solarium. So we got there and there was a 30 minute wait for a table. We had a drink at the bar...the stools were the highest stools I have EVER sat on at a bar, and all of us had trouble just to climb up on them, and at 5'6" I was the SHORTEST of the girls. It took me literally 3 minutes to get situated on this stoll.
They came to get us when our table was ready and it was PACKED, so we go to the table, and at the table behind us, the people had their chairs pulled out like 2 feet from the table. I pulled my chair out as far as it could go and there was only about 2 inches between the leg of the chair and the table leg, so I couldn't get in. I'm bumping into the chair behind mine and kind of smiled at the people sitting there (it was REALLY loud and I didn't want to yell) and kind of looked at the chairs so they could see I couldn't get in so they would scoot in and the lady just turned around and glared at me. Like, the AUDACITY of me to expect to be able to SIT in my chair. Obviously, she wasn't moving an inch, so we figured out if we angled my chair, I could at least get the one leg in and sit. I still had one leg out into the aisle, but I was sitting.
The menu was limited. There wasn't an appetizer I would eat...it was all either fish, or beets, or mustard soup, or salads with stuff I didn't like, so I was the only one who didn't order one.
I ordered steak as my main, one of the girls got fish, one got pork loin, and the other lamb: (not my picture....one of the other girls took it)
View attachment 318880
For dessert, I had a raspberry creme brulé and the others had a meringue with fruit and mango sorbet (I don't like mango): (Also not my picture)
View attachment 318881
It was good food, but having not had an appetizer, and you can see the veggies they gave us were not a full portion or anywhere close, so I was still pretty hungry when we left. We went and checked into our hotel and went down to the restuarant and had some snacks, which I didn't take pictures of because it wasn't anything special. Just some chicken strips and bitterballen (fried balls of meat paste) They were good, just nothing out of the ordinary.
The next day I didn't take any pictures because all we did was go shopping because one of the girls had a wedding to go to this past Friday and she needed a dress. So we helped her find an appropriate outfit and then we all went home.
MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
It is going to be a lovely 85 degrees here today. Unfortunately I don't think the sun will make an appearance. Seems to be quite typical of this year. But, I will take the clouds over cold.
Goofyernmost
Well-Known Member
I live two miles away from a Sonic and I have been once (before they started using the stupid ads). I like to think that I have a pretty good sense of humor, but, I cannot find anything funny or anything other then annoying. I might even be able to tolerate it if they ran one ad and not immediately follow it up with the same ad, two in a row. If the purpose is to make me remember the name, well that worked, if it was to entice me to go there and spend money... that failed miserably. I hear the word Sonic now and cringe.
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
So that was last weekend. This weekend I don't have many pictures...it wasn't stuff that was easily photographable. The company my husband works for is now 40 years old, so they took all the employees plus spouses to Leeuwarden, which was named cultural capital of Europe for 2018. Lots of interesting historical information, not so much to take pictures of.
We went by bus and we stayed at the Post Plaza hotel, which used to be the post office and also housed the telephone operators until the end of WWII. It's on this narrow street and man I have to say, our bus driver was GOOD....there was a work truck parked right where we needed to go through and he got the guy to move the truck as far on the curb as he could and he managed to squeaze that bus in between that truck and a car parked on the other side.
Interesting story about the hotel....in April of 1945, the Germans had taken over everything, but they heard they were losing the war. They decided to blow up the post office because it also housed the telephone switchboards....people would have a hard time communicating if they blew up the building. Two of the workers there discovered the dynamite and had only a couple of days to make a plan. They smuggled out a single stick of dynamite in the postal bags. They got the resistence to reproduce the 27 sticks of dynamite without explosives....they had to look like the originals, be the same weight, etc, but not have any charge in them. They smuggled the empty dynamite back into the building, then they had to find an opportunity when the Germans weren't looking to replace the dynamite with the empties. Divine intervention, a German officer happened to be driving past when his car broke down and all the Germans were ordered to go to his aid. While they were out, the 2 postal employees switched the dynamite in a matter of minutes, hid the real dynamite, and at the end of the day, smuggled the real dynamite back out of the building, which of course was very dangerous. The next day, when the germans went to push the button to blow it up, nothing happened. They were furious. They never had time to replan because 2 days later, the Canadians arrived to liberate Leeuwarden, and the post office was saved. It is now a very nice hotel with a shower I wish I had and a VERY comfortable bed that felt like a cloud to sleep on.
We went for lunch at the cafe that is in the old prison. Red bell pepper soup and a selection of sandwiches. I don't like peppers, but the soup was edible, if a bit tangy for my taste. Others said it was too sweet, but mine made me pucker...I also seem to have gotten the last bit from the pan because everyone else got a full bowl and mine was only 2/3. There were 3 sorts of sandwhiches....one was goat cheese, tomato and beets....none of which I will eat. One was Salami with fennel....a possibility, but didn't sound great, and DH confirmed I wouldn't have liked it. He said it had a very spicy sauce on it, and I don't do sauces or spicy. The 3rd was ham with...I'm not sure what it was supposed to be. It tasted kind of like celery, but was definitely not the green stalks we have in the US....it was white and had a carroty texture. I didn't notice at first that there was also a sauce on it...so it was kind of like coleslaw, which I also don't like. I ended up scraping off most of that and just eating the ham and bread and tried to ignore how wet and soggy the sauce had made the bread. Blech. But it was that or nothing.
Then we played a city game which was kind of like living Clue. We were divided into teams and had to solve a murder. We had to walk through the city to get clues where we could cross off things that didn't match up, and we had to find the first and last name of the murderer and the weapon he used. DH's team won...they were smart. The playing field was divided into squares...100 squares, and as you walked into a square, that "square" would open up and you could see if there were witnesses, clues, etc in that square. So DH's team walked down the line between two squares, so 2 squares would open up at a time, so they got a LOT of info without having to walk. My team, one of the bosses had our tablet and he's super tall, like...6'8 or something and he took off and we were all basically running behind him, but we kept having to go back and forth, so we walked way more than any other team, but had unlocked the fewest squares. But it was a fun game.
Then we went and toured the prison, part of which has now been converted into a hostel. It was incredibly interesting. Our guide was a former gaurd there, and it was the strictest prison in the Netherlands, for the toughest criminals. There were rules like...visits had to be naked and the prisoners had to be searched when a visit was over because visitors would try to slip things to the prisoners. It was really hard to understand the guide though....being from leeuwarden, he had a bit of an accent, but he also talked with his lips pursed, so it was hard to folllow his mouth and even the native Dutch speakers had to listen intently to catch everything....I kept having to have DH translate the things I missed. But it was really fascinating and the guy obviously had taken his work very seriously and he still talked like it was in the present, even though the prison closed 10 years ago. He talked like he was still a guard there today. Really great guide. There was one isolation cell where he talked about how it was just a concrete bed that was made crooked so it would give the prisoners back pain so they'd think twice before doing something to get sent back there, and how it had rats and bugs and such, and it was dark all the time...no lights. He wouldn't let us go IN there, just look inside with a flashlight. He said that wasn't allowed in Europe anymore, but they still have such cells in the US and in Russia. He also brought us to a sort of cage area where the prisoners who were in isolation were brought for up to an hour a day to get their daily fresh air. They had a right to an hour a day, but because they were in isolation, they were taken to a cage rather than the inner courtyard where the other prisoners got their hour. And he said there was a pathway that went past the cage and there were 12 women's cells for a while until a law was passed that a facility had to be exclusively one gender or the other, not both. And that pathway was where the women walked to get to their airing place and they had to make sure no prisoners were in the cage at that time because otherwise they could mate through the bars.
Then we went back to the hotel for dinner. They had made up a special 3 course menu for us:
First course, choice of:
Mozzerella, beet salad, watercress, pistachio, and fermented beet
Carpaccio made with a special dried beef from a regional butcher
Blinis with salmon, carrot cream, apples, and capers.
Main course, choice of:
Some sort of fish with a sauce of things I've never heard of, a twil of rice, radish, hazelnut, and hangop, which is a yogurt thing.
Steak with parsnip puree, and some root vegetables and miso sauce
Pastry filled with parsnip puree, root veggies, chiccory, and watercress
Dessert, choice of:
Chocolate chessnut pastry with blood orange sorbet
Alcohol soaked pineapple, with caramel, moscavado sugar, and hangop
Now, I don't like cheese unless it is melted, I'm not a fan of nuts, I don't do seafood/fish, I don't like pineapple, and beets taste like dirty feet. So....there was nothing on the first course that I would eat. DH ordered the salmon blinis, and I ordered the carpaccio for him to eat, so he got both.
I had never had parsnip, or miso sauce, and I don't usually like sauces, so I ordered the steak with the sauce on the side. Generally, for dinner, you will also be served fries and a salad with your main course....that was not the case here. I didn't mind the parsnip, but I didn't like the texture...very pasty...gummy, I guess. But it was all I had, so I ate it. The sauce was decent as long as I didn't eat to much of it. It was pretty salty.
The dessert, I love chocolate, but not nuts, so I tasted it, and the whole thing had a strong coffee taste to it, and I hate coffee. The sorbet was good, but it was a tiny scoop that rested on a bed of chessnut crumble, and I couldn't get the sorbet without the crumble sticking to it, so I ended up giving my dessert to DH. Normally he likes pineapple in yogurt, so I was surpised he ordered the chocolate pastry, but it was good he did, because those who had the pineapple said the hangop was REALLY salty, and most didn't eat it. They told the server and she said it was SUPPOSED to be salty, but our group wasn't the only one to complain about it.
The food LOOKED beautiful:
Salmon blinis
Carpaccio:
My steak with sauce on the side, and DH's with the sauce on it:
I should clarify, DH said it was parsnip, but having never had it, I don't even know what it looks like, and I can't be sure of that translation....same with chiccory. I'm trusting him.
And chocolate chessnut pastry:
After dinner, DH and I went in search of a grocery store so I could get more food. Dinner was one of those take your time things.....we were seated just after 6pm and at 7:30 I still hadn't had any food. And it was already 9:40 when we got out of there and walked to the nearest grocery store, which closed at 10. Needless to say, I was still quite hungry. So I got a muffin and some doritos and called it good. I hate to do that, especially since I usually go to bed before 10 and I don't like to eat after 7 pm, but there was no way I'd get to sleep with my tummy growling. Disappointing food day!! The steak was great, except for it having fraternized with the gummy parsnip puree, which gave it an odd texture, but that was literally the only food I had halfway enjoyed that day. The rest was just eat enough of it to make sure I wasn't starving before we were fed again.
We went by bus and we stayed at the Post Plaza hotel, which used to be the post office and also housed the telephone operators until the end of WWII. It's on this narrow street and man I have to say, our bus driver was GOOD....there was a work truck parked right where we needed to go through and he got the guy to move the truck as far on the curb as he could and he managed to squeaze that bus in between that truck and a car parked on the other side.
Interesting story about the hotel....in April of 1945, the Germans had taken over everything, but they heard they were losing the war. They decided to blow up the post office because it also housed the telephone switchboards....people would have a hard time communicating if they blew up the building. Two of the workers there discovered the dynamite and had only a couple of days to make a plan. They smuggled out a single stick of dynamite in the postal bags. They got the resistence to reproduce the 27 sticks of dynamite without explosives....they had to look like the originals, be the same weight, etc, but not have any charge in them. They smuggled the empty dynamite back into the building, then they had to find an opportunity when the Germans weren't looking to replace the dynamite with the empties. Divine intervention, a German officer happened to be driving past when his car broke down and all the Germans were ordered to go to his aid. While they were out, the 2 postal employees switched the dynamite in a matter of minutes, hid the real dynamite, and at the end of the day, smuggled the real dynamite back out of the building, which of course was very dangerous. The next day, when the germans went to push the button to blow it up, nothing happened. They were furious. They never had time to replan because 2 days later, the Canadians arrived to liberate Leeuwarden, and the post office was saved. It is now a very nice hotel with a shower I wish I had and a VERY comfortable bed that felt like a cloud to sleep on.
We went for lunch at the cafe that is in the old prison. Red bell pepper soup and a selection of sandwiches. I don't like peppers, but the soup was edible, if a bit tangy for my taste. Others said it was too sweet, but mine made me pucker...I also seem to have gotten the last bit from the pan because everyone else got a full bowl and mine was only 2/3. There were 3 sorts of sandwhiches....one was goat cheese, tomato and beets....none of which I will eat. One was Salami with fennel....a possibility, but didn't sound great, and DH confirmed I wouldn't have liked it. He said it had a very spicy sauce on it, and I don't do sauces or spicy. The 3rd was ham with...I'm not sure what it was supposed to be. It tasted kind of like celery, but was definitely not the green stalks we have in the US....it was white and had a carroty texture. I didn't notice at first that there was also a sauce on it...so it was kind of like coleslaw, which I also don't like. I ended up scraping off most of that and just eating the ham and bread and tried to ignore how wet and soggy the sauce had made the bread. Blech. But it was that or nothing.
Then we played a city game which was kind of like living Clue. We were divided into teams and had to solve a murder. We had to walk through the city to get clues where we could cross off things that didn't match up, and we had to find the first and last name of the murderer and the weapon he used. DH's team won...they were smart. The playing field was divided into squares...100 squares, and as you walked into a square, that "square" would open up and you could see if there were witnesses, clues, etc in that square. So DH's team walked down the line between two squares, so 2 squares would open up at a time, so they got a LOT of info without having to walk. My team, one of the bosses had our tablet and he's super tall, like...6'8 or something and he took off and we were all basically running behind him, but we kept having to go back and forth, so we walked way more than any other team, but had unlocked the fewest squares. But it was a fun game.
Then we went and toured the prison, part of which has now been converted into a hostel. It was incredibly interesting. Our guide was a former gaurd there, and it was the strictest prison in the Netherlands, for the toughest criminals. There were rules like...visits had to be naked and the prisoners had to be searched when a visit was over because visitors would try to slip things to the prisoners. It was really hard to understand the guide though....being from leeuwarden, he had a bit of an accent, but he also talked with his lips pursed, so it was hard to folllow his mouth and even the native Dutch speakers had to listen intently to catch everything....I kept having to have DH translate the things I missed. But it was really fascinating and the guy obviously had taken his work very seriously and he still talked like it was in the present, even though the prison closed 10 years ago. He talked like he was still a guard there today. Really great guide. There was one isolation cell where he talked about how it was just a concrete bed that was made crooked so it would give the prisoners back pain so they'd think twice before doing something to get sent back there, and how it had rats and bugs and such, and it was dark all the time...no lights. He wouldn't let us go IN there, just look inside with a flashlight. He said that wasn't allowed in Europe anymore, but they still have such cells in the US and in Russia. He also brought us to a sort of cage area where the prisoners who were in isolation were brought for up to an hour a day to get their daily fresh air. They had a right to an hour a day, but because they were in isolation, they were taken to a cage rather than the inner courtyard where the other prisoners got their hour. And he said there was a pathway that went past the cage and there were 12 women's cells for a while until a law was passed that a facility had to be exclusively one gender or the other, not both. And that pathway was where the women walked to get to their airing place and they had to make sure no prisoners were in the cage at that time because otherwise they could mate through the bars.
Then we went back to the hotel for dinner. They had made up a special 3 course menu for us:
First course, choice of:
Mozzerella, beet salad, watercress, pistachio, and fermented beet
Carpaccio made with a special dried beef from a regional butcher
Blinis with salmon, carrot cream, apples, and capers.
Main course, choice of:
Some sort of fish with a sauce of things I've never heard of, a twil of rice, radish, hazelnut, and hangop, which is a yogurt thing.
Steak with parsnip puree, and some root vegetables and miso sauce
Pastry filled with parsnip puree, root veggies, chiccory, and watercress
Dessert, choice of:
Chocolate chessnut pastry with blood orange sorbet
Alcohol soaked pineapple, with caramel, moscavado sugar, and hangop
Now, I don't like cheese unless it is melted, I'm not a fan of nuts, I don't do seafood/fish, I don't like pineapple, and beets taste like dirty feet. So....there was nothing on the first course that I would eat. DH ordered the salmon blinis, and I ordered the carpaccio for him to eat, so he got both.
I had never had parsnip, or miso sauce, and I don't usually like sauces, so I ordered the steak with the sauce on the side. Generally, for dinner, you will also be served fries and a salad with your main course....that was not the case here. I didn't mind the parsnip, but I didn't like the texture...very pasty...gummy, I guess. But it was all I had, so I ate it. The sauce was decent as long as I didn't eat to much of it. It was pretty salty.
The dessert, I love chocolate, but not nuts, so I tasted it, and the whole thing had a strong coffee taste to it, and I hate coffee. The sorbet was good, but it was a tiny scoop that rested on a bed of chessnut crumble, and I couldn't get the sorbet without the crumble sticking to it, so I ended up giving my dessert to DH. Normally he likes pineapple in yogurt, so I was surpised he ordered the chocolate pastry, but it was good he did, because those who had the pineapple said the hangop was REALLY salty, and most didn't eat it. They told the server and she said it was SUPPOSED to be salty, but our group wasn't the only one to complain about it.
The food LOOKED beautiful:
Salmon blinis
Carpaccio:
My steak with sauce on the side, and DH's with the sauce on it:
I should clarify, DH said it was parsnip, but having never had it, I don't even know what it looks like, and I can't be sure of that translation....same with chiccory. I'm trusting him.
And chocolate chessnut pastry:
After dinner, DH and I went in search of a grocery store so I could get more food. Dinner was one of those take your time things.....we were seated just after 6pm and at 7:30 I still hadn't had any food. And it was already 9:40 when we got out of there and walked to the nearest grocery store, which closed at 10. Needless to say, I was still quite hungry. So I got a muffin and some doritos and called it good. I hate to do that, especially since I usually go to bed before 10 and I don't like to eat after 7 pm, but there was no way I'd get to sleep with my tummy growling. Disappointing food day!! The steak was great, except for it having fraternized with the gummy parsnip puree, which gave it an odd texture, but that was literally the only food I had halfway enjoyed that day. The rest was just eat enough of it to make sure I wasn't starving before we were fed again.
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
Exactly!! 2 bad dining weekends in a row...I'm making DH take me out for GOOD food tonight.
Goofyernmost
Well-Known Member
Question... would it be to much to ask how you know what dirty feet taste like? Never mind, I probably don't want to know.
Just joking. But, I really don't want to know. 
Last edited:
Nothing worse then leaving a restaurant hungry!
Gabe1
Ivory Tower Squabble EST 2011. WINDMILL SURVIVOR
The food is yummy.Food looks yummy!!
It must have been a surprise when they announced the $10 cover--luckily, you were just there to eat and run.
Watching the pro fights can be a bit tough at times. But I really have admiration for the sport. Hubs has been a boxer for the last 10 years (not pro, just his choice of exercise). The sport is a heavy duty workout--major cardio. Hubs (and his coach) run miles together to build endurance--he's also done 8 local (charity) road races this year. Boxers like the sport because it's a constant strategic challenge to keep up with the other guy. It's both a physical and mental challenge. Certainly not for everyone (not for me), but it remains a popular sport for many.
Yeah I can’t watch people punching each other I cringe just when I just get a glimpse. I’d rather watch a Puppy
Bowl woof!
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
After finally getting food, we went to bed, and it was such a nice bed. I woke up several times in the middle of the night, not sure why, because I was sooooo comfortable. But I gave up going back to sleep at 6:30 and got up to shower. Nice shower!!! And they gave us conditioner as well as shampoo, which is awesome because most hotels don't.
We had breakfast included at the hotel. It was a pretty nice buffet. They had scrambled and fried eggs, bacon, sausage links, yogurt, fruit, granola, croissants, bread, rolls, ham, cheese, salami, etc, nutella, jam, butter, and they had french toast made from sugar bread, which is kind of like brioche, but has clumps of caramelized sugar in it....they don't use maple syrup here in the netherlands, so it was a bit dry, but it tasted good. I made sure to fill up at breakfast, not knowing what kind of food we'd get for lunch or when. Our tour guide was picking us up at 10, and we needed to leave right then, because we had a very tight schedule.
It was a walking tour through the city. We started with the hotel, which is how we heard the story of the dynamite. Then we went to various places and he told about the history. There was a sort of courtyard outside of the "jewish school". Apparently, prior to WWII, that was the Jewish district....a lot of jewish people lived in that area, and that's where all their stores were and things, and their school. Jewish children went to public school, but did lessons in Hebrew and the Torah at the Jewish school on Wednesday afternoons when they other children were free. Once the Germans took over, they banned Jewish children from public schools....so the only education they got was in the Jewish school, but children started disappearing as they were sent to camps or went into hiding. There's a placque on the wall that says in Hebrew and in Dutch "There are no children here anymore". Next to that square is a catholic church, which I didn't bother to take a picture of, because there was scaffolding around it, and we didn't get to go inside. The Dutch Royal family was originally from Leeuwarden, and they had their own entrance to the church, and their seats were raised up above even the priest's lecturn, because they were supposed to be the most important people.
There was a subsidized housing area in that section of town, that was set aside for single elderly women and the rich people of the town paid for them. In order to live there, you had to be a single woman of at least 45 years old. 45 was elderly.
He also showed us the highest point of the city....which was basically just a few inches higher than every other point in the city. I don't remember why he said it was build on this "hill", but I do remember him telling us that the reason the corners at intersections were rounded was because carriages needed the extra space to get around the corner.
We saw a statue of the man considered to be the father of Leeuwarden, and he was always depicted as a soldier, even though he was actually crippled, because he was a brilliant military strategist, even though he had never been a soldier before. Out of respect for him, he was depicted in a dignified and honored manner, instead of with a cane and crippled. We couldn't get to the statue because there was a huge Judo demonstration going on in that square, so he told us the story, but the statue was across the square from where we were standing.
We visited the St. Anthony guesthouse which was for the elderly, and had a gorgeous garden, that we couldn't go into. It looked like a really nice place to live. Apparently, as legend has it, St. Anthony was a pig farmer, and his symbol is a little bell, because back in those days, people were superstitious and believed pigs ate children. So a pig farmer would need to ring a bell before entering a city so all the children were warned to go inside so they wouldn't be eaten by pigs. So all the buildings in that area had a bell on the gable. It was also surrounded by scaffolding.
We went to the Princessenhof, which was apparently where MC Escher was born. Well, I am not sure if he was born in that building, or just in Leeuwarden, and they have a tribute to him in that building. But he was mentioned. Inside the building, which I believe is now a museum, though we didn't get to go inside, there are 2 japanese vases that depict a woman from Leeuwarden. Back in the 1800s, the Dutch had a trade agreement with Japan. The Japanese were afraid of colonization and Catholic conversion, so they would not allow westerners into Japan. They had stopped trading with the Portugese and now only had trade agreements with the Netherlands. There was an island off the mainland in Japan and Dutch traders were allowed to be on the island, but could not enter mainland Japan. Japanese traders would come to the island. The head of the Dutch trading company missed his wife and children while he was on trading expedition. No women or children were allowed on the island with the merchants, because the Japanese wanted the Dutchmen to want to go home eventually. But the head guy brought his wife and child anyway, and the Japanese refused her. A standard trade trip would last 3 months on the island, and he kept applying to officials, trying to get permission for his family to stay in those 3 months that they were there. Of course, the Japanese had never seen a western woman before and had heard from the Japanese merchants about the strange-looking western woman with long curly red hair and big blue eyes. In that 3 month span, she had been painted 500 times by japanese artists. People were so curious about her, and copies of the paintings were made, and copies of those copies were made....her image was on 4,000,000 items, including the 2 vases that are now housed in the Princessenhof. Eventually, Titsia Bergsma was sent home when that trading expedition ended , and ended up in Den Haag, and her husband never saw her again, and she had no idea that her image had been famous in Japan and was on 4,000,000 different items sent all over the world.
We also saw a tower, and I wish I had thought to take a picture of it....it was right near the end of the tour. The tower was built by a famous builder, commissioned by the Catholic church. The original plans included a tower, 120 meters high, that would be the highest tower in the Netherlands. As the tower was being built, it was discovered after only 10 meters that it was crooked. They let it settle and then tried to build it straight up, but it didn't work. After 40 meters, they realized there was no sense in completing it, as it would most likely fall over. So there's this very crooked tower there. At the time, the Catholic church was the main religion and Protestants were trying to gain status, etc....it was fortuitous for them because they said that for the tower to already be so crooked, it must be a sign from God that the Catholic church was done, and the city of Leeuwarden has been more Protestant from that point on.
Not my picture:
And then the last stop was this part that used to be the harbor there, back when there was a channel of water there. It was the seedy part of Leeuwarden. Not long ago, it was decided to clean it up, and they demolished a lot of the old grafiti covered buildings. When they rebuilt, the artist said he wanted to pay homage to that old broken down part of the city, and they used the graffiti covered bricks to build the new building. So, they had a bunch of people who helped to rebuild and when the artist came to look at the work, he found they had used professionals and the whole thing was all pretty and straight and nice, which was not the image he wanted, so they knocked it down and rebuilt. He wanted to show that it's new, built on a foundation of the old. So I had a hard time finding pictures, but this, without the guitar: (not my pictures)
And if you look in the center of this one, you can see the 2 colors of the wall on that building. Red brick on the top, grey on the bottom. The lower part is the graffiti bricks, and that looks like the above picture, but without the guitar:
So basically, they used the old bricks to build up and then switched to new bricks on top...new, built on top of the old.
After that, we went to the Achmea tower. These are DH's pictures, because I'm terrified of heights and refused to go near the windows. Had I realized what we were doing, I would have stayed below.
After that, we walked back to our hotel, got our bags, and got back on the bus. We felt bad because there were apparently some people who had paid for a tour, only when we left achmea, they saw us and thought we were the tour group, and they followed us. They thought something was up when they noticed there was no guide saying anything. We got all the way back to the hotel and tried to follow us in when they saw us talking with the bus driver and they realized they had followed the wrong group. I don't know why they thought we were their group....but then they had to walk all the way back and try to get placed with a different tour.
We got on the bus and went to Willemsoord for lunch. It was after 2pm before we got there...I was hungry. And then our meal was announced....the organization had seen this place in a popular newspaper here as having won an award for the best meatball in the Netherlands. The dutch meatball is basically like a hamburger, but without a bun and it's got certain seasonings in it. I can't stand the things. Whatever seasoning they use is just nasty to me. And it's surved with mayonnaise, which I also won't touch. So....lunch was a meatball, served on a bed of bell peppers and onions.
DH looks at me, and mouths "I'm so sorry!!!!" because it was yet another meal I wouldn't eat. Fortunately, I still had the rest of the doritos from the night before, so once we were back on the bus, I broke out the chips and that was my "lunch" on the way home at 3:30 in the afternoon.
We got back to the office and said goodbye to everyone and went home.
We had breakfast included at the hotel. It was a pretty nice buffet. They had scrambled and fried eggs, bacon, sausage links, yogurt, fruit, granola, croissants, bread, rolls, ham, cheese, salami, etc, nutella, jam, butter, and they had french toast made from sugar bread, which is kind of like brioche, but has clumps of caramelized sugar in it....they don't use maple syrup here in the netherlands, so it was a bit dry, but it tasted good. I made sure to fill up at breakfast, not knowing what kind of food we'd get for lunch or when. Our tour guide was picking us up at 10, and we needed to leave right then, because we had a very tight schedule.
It was a walking tour through the city. We started with the hotel, which is how we heard the story of the dynamite. Then we went to various places and he told about the history. There was a sort of courtyard outside of the "jewish school". Apparently, prior to WWII, that was the Jewish district....a lot of jewish people lived in that area, and that's where all their stores were and things, and their school. Jewish children went to public school, but did lessons in Hebrew and the Torah at the Jewish school on Wednesday afternoons when they other children were free. Once the Germans took over, they banned Jewish children from public schools....so the only education they got was in the Jewish school, but children started disappearing as they were sent to camps or went into hiding. There's a placque on the wall that says in Hebrew and in Dutch "There are no children here anymore". Next to that square is a catholic church, which I didn't bother to take a picture of, because there was scaffolding around it, and we didn't get to go inside. The Dutch Royal family was originally from Leeuwarden, and they had their own entrance to the church, and their seats were raised up above even the priest's lecturn, because they were supposed to be the most important people.
There was a subsidized housing area in that section of town, that was set aside for single elderly women and the rich people of the town paid for them. In order to live there, you had to be a single woman of at least 45 years old. 45 was elderly.
He also showed us the highest point of the city....which was basically just a few inches higher than every other point in the city. I don't remember why he said it was build on this "hill", but I do remember him telling us that the reason the corners at intersections were rounded was because carriages needed the extra space to get around the corner.
We saw a statue of the man considered to be the father of Leeuwarden, and he was always depicted as a soldier, even though he was actually crippled, because he was a brilliant military strategist, even though he had never been a soldier before. Out of respect for him, he was depicted in a dignified and honored manner, instead of with a cane and crippled. We couldn't get to the statue because there was a huge Judo demonstration going on in that square, so he told us the story, but the statue was across the square from where we were standing.
We visited the St. Anthony guesthouse which was for the elderly, and had a gorgeous garden, that we couldn't go into. It looked like a really nice place to live. Apparently, as legend has it, St. Anthony was a pig farmer, and his symbol is a little bell, because back in those days, people were superstitious and believed pigs ate children. So a pig farmer would need to ring a bell before entering a city so all the children were warned to go inside so they wouldn't be eaten by pigs. So all the buildings in that area had a bell on the gable. It was also surrounded by scaffolding.
We went to the Princessenhof, which was apparently where MC Escher was born. Well, I am not sure if he was born in that building, or just in Leeuwarden, and they have a tribute to him in that building. But he was mentioned. Inside the building, which I believe is now a museum, though we didn't get to go inside, there are 2 japanese vases that depict a woman from Leeuwarden. Back in the 1800s, the Dutch had a trade agreement with Japan. The Japanese were afraid of colonization and Catholic conversion, so they would not allow westerners into Japan. They had stopped trading with the Portugese and now only had trade agreements with the Netherlands. There was an island off the mainland in Japan and Dutch traders were allowed to be on the island, but could not enter mainland Japan. Japanese traders would come to the island. The head of the Dutch trading company missed his wife and children while he was on trading expedition. No women or children were allowed on the island with the merchants, because the Japanese wanted the Dutchmen to want to go home eventually. But the head guy brought his wife and child anyway, and the Japanese refused her. A standard trade trip would last 3 months on the island, and he kept applying to officials, trying to get permission for his family to stay in those 3 months that they were there. Of course, the Japanese had never seen a western woman before and had heard from the Japanese merchants about the strange-looking western woman with long curly red hair and big blue eyes. In that 3 month span, she had been painted 500 times by japanese artists. People were so curious about her, and copies of the paintings were made, and copies of those copies were made....her image was on 4,000,000 items, including the 2 vases that are now housed in the Princessenhof. Eventually, Titsia Bergsma was sent home when that trading expedition ended , and ended up in Den Haag, and her husband never saw her again, and she had no idea that her image had been famous in Japan and was on 4,000,000 different items sent all over the world.
We also saw a tower, and I wish I had thought to take a picture of it....it was right near the end of the tour. The tower was built by a famous builder, commissioned by the Catholic church. The original plans included a tower, 120 meters high, that would be the highest tower in the Netherlands. As the tower was being built, it was discovered after only 10 meters that it was crooked. They let it settle and then tried to build it straight up, but it didn't work. After 40 meters, they realized there was no sense in completing it, as it would most likely fall over. So there's this very crooked tower there. At the time, the Catholic church was the main religion and Protestants were trying to gain status, etc....it was fortuitous for them because they said that for the tower to already be so crooked, it must be a sign from God that the Catholic church was done, and the city of Leeuwarden has been more Protestant from that point on.
Not my picture:
And then the last stop was this part that used to be the harbor there, back when there was a channel of water there. It was the seedy part of Leeuwarden. Not long ago, it was decided to clean it up, and they demolished a lot of the old grafiti covered buildings. When they rebuilt, the artist said he wanted to pay homage to that old broken down part of the city, and they used the graffiti covered bricks to build the new building. So, they had a bunch of people who helped to rebuild and when the artist came to look at the work, he found they had used professionals and the whole thing was all pretty and straight and nice, which was not the image he wanted, so they knocked it down and rebuilt. He wanted to show that it's new, built on a foundation of the old. So I had a hard time finding pictures, but this, without the guitar: (not my pictures)
And if you look in the center of this one, you can see the 2 colors of the wall on that building. Red brick on the top, grey on the bottom. The lower part is the graffiti bricks, and that looks like the above picture, but without the guitar:
So basically, they used the old bricks to build up and then switched to new bricks on top...new, built on top of the old.
After that, we went to the Achmea tower. These are DH's pictures, because I'm terrified of heights and refused to go near the windows. Had I realized what we were doing, I would have stayed below.
After that, we walked back to our hotel, got our bags, and got back on the bus. We felt bad because there were apparently some people who had paid for a tour, only when we left achmea, they saw us and thought we were the tour group, and they followed us. They thought something was up when they noticed there was no guide saying anything. We got all the way back to the hotel and tried to follow us in when they saw us talking with the bus driver and they realized they had followed the wrong group. I don't know why they thought we were their group....but then they had to walk all the way back and try to get placed with a different tour.
We got on the bus and went to Willemsoord for lunch. It was after 2pm before we got there...I was hungry. And then our meal was announced....the organization had seen this place in a popular newspaper here as having won an award for the best meatball in the Netherlands. The dutch meatball is basically like a hamburger, but without a bun and it's got certain seasonings in it. I can't stand the things. Whatever seasoning they use is just nasty to me. And it's surved with mayonnaise, which I also won't touch. So....lunch was a meatball, served on a bed of bell peppers and onions.
DH looks at me, and mouths "I'm so sorry!!!!" because it was yet another meal I wouldn't eat. Fortunately, I still had the rest of the doritos from the night before, so once we were back on the bus, I broke out the chips and that was my "lunch" on the way home at 3:30 in the afternoon.We got back to the office and said goodbye to everyone and went home.
Songbird76
Well-Known Member
Haha! Well, I don't, but that's what I IMAGINE dirty feet taste like. I've accidentally gotten dirt in my mouth, and that's kind of what beets taste like to me, not to mention your sense of smell and taste are linked. So...yeah. Can't stand beets.Question... would it be to much to ask how you know what dirty feet taste like? Never mind, I probably don't want to know.
Just joking. But, I really don't want to know.
MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
Those were meager choices to choose from. They also don't seem to serve a lot of vegetables with the main dish.
MySmallWorldof4
Well-Known Member
Beets have an earthy flavor. The pickled ones are really good though. I found that out by accident. It was in a salad and I just decided to try it and I liked it.Question... would it be to much to ask how you know what dirty feet taste like? Never mind, I probably don't want to know.
Just joking. But, I really don't want to know.
Gabe1
Ivory Tower Squabble EST 2011. WINDMILL SURVIVOR
Thank you! I'm hoping. This boot is so big, it is like wearing a big backpack on a crowded Disney bus while standing, but a nice glass of wine is more comforting than 2 Advil.
Cesar R M
Well-Known Member
The general design of the central area looked more like a church. Is that design prevalent in castles and royalty "homes" in your country?
I know that every country as its own style.
Cesar R M
Well-Known Member
Barons are supposed to be the lowest of the nobility right?
Surprising they had this huge castle.