Arnhem: Houten, Open Air Museum, Oudheusen, Heusden, 's-Hertogenbosch

Friday 26 May 2023

After having been picked up from the ship our first stop was Houten.  Wim and Gerrie dropped us off in Arnhem after lunch and our introduction to the family.

Tom, Kevin and Marion, Wim and Gerrie and Heidi (in the 1st picture); Tom and Su (in the 2nd picture) At the table, judging by the expressions, we must be discussing something very serious. ;-)

Saturday 27 May 2023

Arnhem

On the first day on our own the day was spent catching up on a lot of chores. Washing was saved up for nearly 3 weeks, so the washing machine and the dryer (ánd me!) got a good work-out. 🙂 After dinner we walked to the small shopping centre and my favourite supermarket, Jumbo, to get some more supplies. The evenings are long and shops open till 9 pm, so it doesn't feel strange at all to be out so late. So far a few pictures of the garden....

Sunday 28 May 2023

Having happy hour outside in the afternoon sunshine. A little bee kept us company for a moment.

Monday 29 May 2023

Today we courageously took the bus (two, in fact) to the other side of Arnhem to visit the Dutch Open Air Museum. Although I have been there before, there were some new exhibits to see, so it was quite enjoyable. Getting on the right buses back was a challenge (mainly because it was a public holiday, which had changed the time tables), but we made it home.

Tuesday 30 May 2023

A quiet day at home, which gave Kevin the time to make a video of the house we're in for two weeks. Unfortunately the blog doesn't allow for the size, so I'll keep the videos on my laptop. 

Wednesday 31 May 2023

After our encounter with the buses and knowing how cumbersome it would be to use public transport everywhere we decided to investigate into hiring a car, but first we enjoyed coffee and (a real Dutch) chocomel in the sun at Café Arnhem. In Dutch: even een terrasje pikken.

In the afternoon we picked up our hire car. Going places, like we do, it takes too much time to work out, and travel on, public transport. The additional walking distances can be prohibitive at times as well.

Thursday 1 June 2023

A trip down memory lane today.

Oudheusden

In the morning we visit Oudheusden. This is the house where the boys were born and we lived till our emigration to Australia.

Heusden

From there we drive to nearby Heusden. We walk through the narrow streets after finding a spot for the car away from the paid parking area. It is a busy tourist town after all. We leave again after coffee with "worstebroodjes" (a type of Dutch sausage roll), photographing the windmills and cheese stand on the market and exploring a bit more of the town.

's-Hertogenbosch

Next stop is 's-Hertogenbosch. Again we park away from the centre, which gives me the chance to show Kevin various places of my youth. First I pluck up the courage to ring the bell at the house where I was born. A very friendly lady, refugee from Bosnia, now lives there and opened the door. She invited us in and I was allowed to look around. Everything, layout mainly of course, was exactly the way I remembered it. I was surprised at how small the living areas where in those times and what living area there was had to be shared with another person! Housing shortage after the war!

A few more pictures of the city centre. Buildings on the market, the town hall (where I got married) and the building where my father's workplace was housed (the house with nr. 9). I would have loved to include more places, but there is only so much walking one can do in a day. Of course we had coffee in the sunshine again!

On the way back we walked past my primary school. We had also been past the high school, but I forgot to take pictures.

And since we had parked opposite the unit where I'd lived from '54 till '70 I had to include a picture of it as well. It's on the first floor, the one with the sunflowers in the window. My parents left in '96 when they both had to go to a nursing home.

Brocante and Antique market in Heusden and lunch with Margriet

Saturday, 1 August 2015

 

We wake up to another wonderful morning, and get ready to go on a 1 hour drive to Heusden.  Heusden is a very old fortified town, dating back to the 8th century.  We used to live in Oudheusden, which was part of Heusden, until we migrated to Australia.

Patricia and I take a short detour through the streets, because I would like to show her where we used to live and I also wanted to see it for myself again.  A lot had changed.  We have been away now for 35 years and in those years we have seen the decline of the area and houses, but now it's all much improved again with better maintained houses, lovely gardens and so much greenery! The biggest change was the disappearance of the supermarket on the corner where I used to do all my shopping.  A very strange sight indeed.

Next we went on to the town centre where we were to meet Margriet.  We parked the car away from the centre and a horse-drawn wagon took us to the market place.

 

Patricia and I walked around for a bit until it was time for our date, and met up with Margriet and next Patricia did her rounds by herself and let us talk.

We had a lot to catch up with and it was great to see Margriet so well, because she's been very ill.  Just over a year go I visited her in hospital.

We had lunch at De Pannekoekenbakker (a pancake restaurant) after which Margriet went home again for her daily rest and visitors later in the day.

Patricia and I decided to combine a walk through town with a geocache hunt: a multi.  We had to walk through a lot of streets to find all the numbers 8 which appeared in pictures of the cache description, a bit like the multi with the pictures that we did in Nederhorst den Berg.

One of the numbers 8 of course (but not the correct one!) ;-)