Holland

Then we drove to Beekse Bergen Safari (3.5 hours away) since our friends were vacationing there too. She booked our lodge right next to theirs since she speaks Dutch (and Mandarin and English). It was a 3 bedroom lodge where 2 rooms had bunk beds. The outside of the lodge was painted like a zebra and right next to a lake. More importantly, it was right next to their lodge. X was extremely happy to see his friend again! And C loves hanging out with T and F. So it was great that all the boys played well together. When you stay inside the park you have access to the spell park and the zoo. Apparently this place has been here since the 60s so nothing is electronic. We actually enjoyed it!  Kids had to pedal the monster trucks and the race cars, the turtle was hand operated, kids could climb these huge air balls, trampolines galore, golf, water squirt gun game, funny mirrors and small rides. It’s a place you would NEVER EVER see in the US. I saw lawsuit after lawsuit after being inside for 5 minutes if this was located in the US. But you know what – the kids were able to be kids and play. And I loved it. Especially the cool weather. As far as the zoo, it was nice too. But we were on a mission to get to the eagle show at 1:30 at the zoo which, little did we know, was at the back of the zoo. We bypassed all the exhibits and boy did we haul butt. Unfortunately we didn’t make it. That’s ok because we got to ride the bus around the zoo to see the animals up and close. Saw a giraffe licking the rain off a car and eating a metal ring around an antenna on the car. We even saw a baby giraffe and a baby zebra. A fact we learned on the bus ride is that the antlers of deer just fall off and regrow. Kind of like a snail getting a bigger home, but more natural.  Fun fact for you to know.

Then our friend took us to this pancake restaurant. First time she mentioned it I seriously thought we were going to iHop. The restaurant was 180 degrees from what I imagined. It had a play area for the kids inside and a huge playground outside. Kids got to order a truck pancake (although my sister in law makes way cooler pancakes) and had different candies to decorate their pancake. They also got 5 coins to pick something out at the small store (which was like a bookshelf with various toys that cost anywhere from 1 – 20 coins) and they got dessert afterwards.  The food was very tasty. My kids were entertained, we had full bellies, no kids were fighting and we were in good company. I seriously think this was my favorite part of our Holland trip.

After an awesome 2 night stay at the safari we drove to Kinderdijk to see the wind mills. It’s a UNESCO world heritage site and these windmills were original since the 1740s. The famous tourist site, Zaanse Schans has windmills that were relocated here and it was more touristy, so we opted not to go there. It took us 2 hours to walk Kinderdijk and browse inside 2 windmills. Apparently there were 15 people living in one windmill back in the good ol’ days and it was extremely small inside. You couldn’t even stand up straight in some places.  Now some are occupied today with just a couple of people. C was so into the mangle (or wringer) device that removed water from linens. He played with this thing for 15 minutes. He could have played longer but we wanted to head out. X’s favorite part was a taxidermy mouse. Our favorite was exploring the first windmill where we could really check out 3 floors of the windmill. I totally just checked off another thing on my bucket list.

Now we were off to Delft where I found us another Air B&B. All I have to say is location location location and free parking. The place was awesome too. Her and her husband are architects and designed the studio. The floor was made up of 1 inch 2x4s (think the end of a 2×4) and they enclosed a bunk bed in a closet style space. The kids used it as their secret hideout! She outdid herself with that design. So Delft is fabulous. It was so quaint. Actually I think all of Holland is quaint. Think of towns that have “old downtowns” that are a block or 2 long. Delft is like blocks and blocks of an “old downtown” feel but better because it has canals all over the place, restaurants galore, churches, markets, a square, shopping, grocery stores, bakeries, delicious gelato and such a cozy feeling. And it’s not very crowded.  One night wasn’t enough. I needed at least 2-3 nights in Delft because there are so many little places to explore there.

We were going to do the boat ride on the canal but it started raining so we spontaneously (which my husband hates doing) changed our plans to go to Maduradam at The Hague. Maduradam had small sized scale models of the different historical places in the Netherlands. Some were interactive which the kids could enjoy. They even had a small sized model of an amusement park with working roller coaster, bumper cars, ferris wheel etc. 2 exhibitions had a coin machine where the “tulip factory” would fabricate a tulip pin and the “clog factory” would make clogs. So you would physically get a tulip pin and clog pin. That was such an awesome idea!!  One thing that is a let down is that the food is really expensive. It was like eating at Disney World. Expensive and mediocre food. So we opted to leave The Hague and eat somewhere we could easily find a parking spot. Ended up eating at Sporde where a race car was outside the kids could play around on. Score.

And now we were off to the first B&B we stayed at. When we arrived they had wine for us and a box of chocolate for the boys!  Such awesome people. Hope we get to go to Holland again. I would do the same vacation over again except more days in Delft and bringing an empty suitcase to pack with food. Because another favorite thing about Holland was the food and shopping at Albert Heijn. After being in Shanghai, finding quality meat is quite difficult. When you do find it, it’s 3-4 times more expensive. So when I can find real salami for prices cheaper than the US I was in heaven. I also found an awesome mint they only make in the Netherlands. Kind of wish I never found them because I can’t buy them anywhere else!! And hazelnuts are such a big thing in Holland and I’m a hazelnut lover so once again – food heaven.

First vacation we weren’t sick!!!!  Hooray!!!  Imagine an emoticon showing some cute thing jumping up and down with a humongous smile. That was me and L on vacation. Finally.

I will say that I did enjoy a European vacation more than an Asian vacation. I didn’t have to worry about water and my boys ate so much here. Drinking faucet water (as Lolo called it) was a highlight of our trip. Imagine that. Something so simple.

I think we can keep going back on holidays…

Thanks for helping us out with our trip L!  More memories to be made in Beijing 2017?!!