Sunday, July 12, 2026
We took a walking tour of the Hague with our tour guide Leon. It was his 22nd birthday. He was delightful.
Someone taught Leon Bruce’s name and Bruce was the catchall of all of the jokes. As expected with Bruce, he took it all with good grace.
We stopped by King Wilhelm’s office, but he wasn’t there. It is Sunday, afterall.
Some people found a bench in the shade (or in the shadow, as many tour guides have said).
This is certainly Netherlandy looking, isn’t it?
I like this apartment building by the central train station.
We went to the beach for lunch. The Hague is right on the North Sea, so it didn’t take long. I needed a bathroom, so we were questing. Bathrooms cost 1 – 1.50 euro and we were out of money. We went into a mall, but the restrooms were closed. We found a Lightning McQueen that was blue, but Keith smiled big anyway and got right down to drive him.
We cleverly went into a bowling alley and found a bathroom. Keith found an ATM and got 50-euro notes. The bowling man broke his stupidly big money, then showed him where he could get coins for bills. What a win!!
There was a unclaimed package store in the mall that was really hopping. People were getting prizes, I’m sure!
We found Dan and Stacy and ate at next-door-neighbor tables. All the seats are faced toward the sea, so that is how it is. It was comfy. We had nachos.
We walked down to the water with toes (mine, not Keith’s) in the sand, but I just didn’t want to deal with the mess of wet feet, so I didn’t go in. Augh. That just sounds so lame. It was so lame.
There were big sunglasses.
There was a big, beautiful building that I believe was once upon a time a wonderful beachside resort where the beautiful people came to take in the sea air. I did not research. I do not need any other information.
There was a carousel that had the up and down horses, but it also had rocking horses. We just watched it go around with the little girl rocking forward and backward. I wish I had ridden it. Augh. Lame again!
We visited the windmills at Zaanse Schans. Almost all of the Netherlands is land reclaimed from the water. The windmills powered the pumps that got rid of the water. It is strange to realize the water is not down the hill, it is right next to you, and the land behind you is lower that you are. It was a very picturesque place and fun to walk around. We had an error with our tickets, so we didn’t get to go into windmills. I have to watch it on YouTube later and pretend.
We saw wooden shoes in the real people world…
and also in slipper form…
I took an Instagram picture. Or at least I think I did. Isn’t that when you hold out a food or a drink and take a picture of it somewhere pretty? Here you go!
Our drive to Amsterdam was the end our bus and bus driver, Jakob. Not everyone was on the bus when I heard that, but I grabbed a picture of some of our back-of-the-bus hooligans.
Our hotel in Amsterdam is nice. The weather was supposed to be HOT again, but it is not and that is wonderful.
We had dinner at Restaurant Indrapura and it was marvelous. I can’t even begin to remember all the foods we had, but generally the consensus was that the chicken satay was best, followed by the crispy potatoes with nuts and the veg in coconut milk.
Dessert was not just pound cake, but super hard to make from the Great British Baking show pound cake.
