Why buy postcards when you can just snap a photo? Such as the one above, taken last month, of the De Adriaan, a rustic windmill in Haarlem, Netherlands.
The windmill isn't original — built in 1779, it burned down in 1932 — but a lovingly-crafted reproduction on the precise spot, opened in 2002. Edie and I took the tour, and learned a lot — particularly about the connection between the windmills and Amsterdam's meteoric commercial rise. We think of them as charming anachronisms, now, but they were cutting edge technology 300 years ago.
I can't share the photo without giving a shoutout to Karen Turner and her Wanderlustingk blog. She is the reason we were in Haarlem in the first place. My wife and I decided to go to Amsterdam at the last moment — just a couple weeks ahead of time — and after we bought our plane tickets, I was surprised to have difficulty finding a room at an affordable hotel, meaning under $300 a night. Even the $400 and $500 hotel rooms were nothing to get excited about. Basic rooms, quite small, most lacking a queen sized bed.
With what-have-we-done panic setting in, I fled to the internet for guidance, and immediately found Turner's 25 ESSENTIAL TRAVEL TIPS FOR AMSTERDAM FROM AN AMSTERDAM RESIDENT. The first few — don't stand in the bike lane, wear comfortable shoes, carry ID at all times — while no doubt useful, did not address our particular problem. But No. 5 was: "BOOK YOUR HOTEL OR HOSTEL EARLY, ESPECIALLY FOR PEAK SEASON (SPRING/SUMMER)" and for those for whom this was impossible, included this key piece of advice:
The windmill isn't original — built in 1779, it burned down in 1932 — but a lovingly-crafted reproduction on the precise spot, opened in 2002. Edie and I took the tour, and learned a lot — particularly about the connection between the windmills and Amsterdam's meteoric commercial rise. We think of them as charming anachronisms, now, but they were cutting edge technology 300 years ago.
I can't share the photo without giving a shoutout to Karen Turner and her Wanderlustingk blog. She is the reason we were in Haarlem in the first place. My wife and I decided to go to Amsterdam at the last moment — just a couple weeks ahead of time — and after we bought our plane tickets, I was surprised to have difficulty finding a room at an affordable hotel, meaning under $300 a night. Even the $400 and $500 hotel rooms were nothing to get excited about. Basic rooms, quite small, most lacking a queen sized bed.
With what-have-we-done panic setting in, I fled to the internet for guidance, and immediately found Turner's 25 ESSENTIAL TRAVEL TIPS FOR AMSTERDAM FROM AN AMSTERDAM RESIDENT. The first few — don't stand in the bike lane, wear comfortable shoes, carry ID at all times — while no doubt useful, did not address our particular problem. But No. 5 was: "BOOK YOUR HOTEL OR HOSTEL EARLY, ESPECIALLY FOR PEAK SEASON (SPRING/SUMMER)" and for those for whom this was impossible, included this key piece of advice:
Some people choose to stay outside of Amsterdam to save up to 40% (like my dad did), however you’ll need to factor in the cost of traveling to/from Amsterdam daily per person. Haarlem is a lovely city about 20 minutes from Amsterdam.
We really liked Haarlem — not only was there a charming windmill, but a perfect little restaurant, Jacobu Pieck, at 18 Warmoesstraat. We ate there three times. We also visited the Franz Hals museum, and took in an organ concert at the Grote Kerk, the town's main church, which has been at that location since 1307. The organ was finished in 1738, and played by Mendelssohn, Handel and a 10-year-old Mozart. We saw Rob Nederlof play, and he was excellent. Tickets were four Euros.
I liked Amsterdam, particularly the Van Gogh Museum, a must-see lifetime experience, and the Rijksmuseum, which isn't the Prado or the Art Institute for that matter, though still worth a look-see. But we loved Haarlem.
Good move! When I visited the Netherlands I had an apartment in Leiden through Untours. We easily traveled all over because it is a small country with an inexpensive train system. Everyone spoke English. Happy you guys loved it too. Barbara M P
ReplyDeleteWell here is certainly a list of greats: The organ was finished in 1738, and played by Mendelssohn, Handel and a 10-year-old Mozart.
ReplyDeleteThat sentence jumped out at me, too! For anyone privileged enough to play it since, what a continuum of which to be a part, to play those same keys. Whoa. Years ago, at the Art Institute, there was a marble bust on display from some Grecian era, thousands of years ago. I looked around to make sure a docent wasn't nearby and then touched it, just barely, with the tip of one index finger. Just the idea that someone had carved that face thousands of years ago and now here I was, standing in a museum in Chicago, touching it, too, felt really profound.
DeleteYeah...but...
DeleteI think you know what comes next. I understand exactly where you were coming from...and I have felt the exact same urge that you felt. But if everyone gave into those urges (and I'm sure that many, many other people do so), it would permanently and irreparably damage the antiquities.
Take a good look at what millions of touching fingers have done to the famed bronze lions at the entrance to the Art Institute. Especially the faces and the tails.
"That sentence jumped out at me, too! For anyone privileged enough to play it since, what a continuum of which to be a part, to play those same keys."
DeleteNot quite the same thing, perhaps, but when I spent a summer helping my uncle with his pianola (player-piano) restoration business, he showed me some piano rolls that had been produced many decades ago by the original composers playing their own works. (I will let Wikipedia cover the details of how pianolas operate.) It was positively... creepy?... in a good way... to watch a pianola playing "Maple Leaf Rag" and know that Scott Joplin himself was at the keyboard. Scott had "recorded" it in 1899, but here we were in the late 20th century, watching the keys of our own pianola move under his direction. (You can see it on YouTube.)
Great travel tips, and a welcome respite from the news. Thank you.
ReplyDelete"the Van Gogh Museum, a must-see lifetime experience" - Heartily seconded! I'd seen plenty of his work reproduced in books before, but seeing it in person for the first time--and in such numbers--was overwhelming. I hadn't anticipated the dimensionality of the paint on the canvas. I spent lots of time standing as close to the paintings as I could and then looking down/across them, to explore their topography. And his letters, like the one including a preliminary sketch for what became "The Sower"! Breathtaking.
ReplyDeleteI think your criticism via faint praise of the Rijksmuseum was unwarranted. My wife and I thought it was sensational. (Van G museum, too, of course).
ReplyDeleteThere was a major Van Gogh exhibition at the Detroit Institute of Arts last winter. We traveled there in December. It was absolutely mobbed. You stood in lines and shuffled along, getting an all-too-brief glimpse of each canvas. Not the way we would have liked to view his pieces, but at least we got to see Van Gogh's magnificent work in the flesh...up close and personal. Well, sort of, anyway.
ReplyDeleteI consoled myself by imagining that the museums of Europe are just as packed, especially with American tourists. But perhaps that is not the case. If only one could have spent a good deal of time standing near the paintings--and then looking closely at them. But that was not the situation in which we found ourselves. Hey, at least we had free passes [shrug].