Ian and Jill stopped by this afternoon for a bit. Ian has built 2 trimarans in Australia so knows “just a bit” about boats. Went over some of our systems with Bill, hope Bill remembers at least the most important bits. Very generous of them to help out like that. I was able to ask a few questions, and looks like we should be able to add a small fridge without too much problem. That will be nice. Warm beer is definitely not my thing. Our house energy use here seems to be almost nonexistent. We only use the water pump and recharge small electronics – cell phones, the computer, MP3s, etc – and only when we are on shore power, so using a fridge when on shore power and the few things I’d like to use only occasionally doesn’t seem to be an issue. This boat is really turning out to be a comfortable little haven for two. It is going to get quite chummy quite fast if we have guests, but that’ll be OK for a while. Shopped for yesterday’s meals at our first really decent market. Not quite as comprehensive as I’d hoped, but good. A woman there was selling “genuine English pies.” We bought one and shared it for dinner, very good actually. A bit scorched on the bottom as we had to heat it in a skillet instead of an oven, but good none the less. Amazingly good, sometimes amazingly inexpensive fresh veg. We found a WiFi hot spot at the “big” department store in town, so we may pack up the computer some early morning and go over there and have breakfast. They also have a book department on the same floor with a nice cookbook section, so . . . . . . . . Bill says I need to include a photo of me on the boat so you-all know I'm really here, so . .
Haarlem 7/12/11 5:35
Spent yesterday playing telephone tag with Frank, the former owner. He is evidently leaving for France on Saturday, and he is trying to meet up with us to help us decipher some of the systems on board. Otherwise, not much to do. Well, there’s lots to do, we’re just not doing it. We’re not living like tourists here, which is exactly what we wanted. Most days are more like a day doing odd jobs around the house, or maybe stocking up on groceries, or sitting in the shade reading a book. (I guess to some extent we’re also decompressing from getting ready for Adam and Amy’s wedding. The relative inactivity feels decidedly not right) We’re just doing all this in a different language and in a different context. Really good days have small triumphs of living – yesterday we found the laundromat! We’re not spending a lot of time gazing at the old buildings, it’s more that the laundromat is tucked into one of those old buildings and we get to study the architecture as we wait for our clothes to dry. Different perspective??? The weather has been fabulous. The forecast last week called for one day of guaranteed rain, then fair and mostly sunny for the foreseeable future. Well, the rainy day consisted of some pleasant, mild showers in the morning and sun all afternoon. The mostly sunny has been right on target. We seem to have snagged one of the best moorings in the city. Other boat owners keep casually stopping by (difficult to be “casual” when we’re on the end of a long pier) and asking us how long we’re staying – meaning when are we going to leave. As soon as one of the 4 boats that can fit in starts its motor to leave, the vultures gather waiting to see who can grab the spot. Yesterday a retired Dutch truck driver managed to fit in a 5th boat. A 11 meter boat in a 10 meter space at that. He managed by sliding his rear in under the point of our bow, and his bow in under the dinghy on the boat in front of us, all with millimeters to spare. Lines all over the place, but he’s happy. I’m looking forward to adding that fridge and a small electric oven that we’ll only use when we’re on shore power. Meals have been a bit sparse and simple up until now, and it would be nice to have the option to eat a bit differently if we chose. Also, even though the veg here is amazing, I haven’t been able to work myself up about eating salads, and I love salads. There’s a “curio” (junk??) market on Wednesday and an “antique” market on Saturday that I’m curious about, we’ll see what that amounts to and whether we can find something there that we NEED and that adds some character to the boat. She is a character, but the interior needs a bit of personalization.
Haarlem 7/13/2011 1:30
We felt that we should do something to be tourists occasionally, so we went to the Frans Hals Museum over the weekend and yesterday morning we did the tour of the almshouses and their courtyards. These were a tad more interesting than the “where’s the mailbox?” tour we did yesterday afternoon. The Hals museum was very interesting, but somewhat overpriced we thought. The almshouse tour was a self-guided walk that gave us plenty of exercise for the day and a framework for just walking around the city and looking. Found a really lovely little Quilt Shop near the museum. The amazing thing seemed to be the “street gardens.” I really don’t know what to call them. We’d turn the corner into these small, narrow streets in out of the way areas, and they’d be absolutely choked with plantings. At first, it seemed to be just a case of someone pulling a brick or paving stone out of the ground near the foundation of a building and planting something – quite often hollyhocks.
As we went further into the older, more confined areas of the city, people had moved these ad hoc gardens further out into the pathways.
The streets were barely a car’s width to begin with, and this would be further restricted by benches, large container plantings, and whole areas where the pavement stonework seemed to have been dug up and replaced with lush plantings of flowers.
In one case, there was even a tall streetlamp planted in the middle of the road, complete with grape arbor!
The streets had turned into courtyards and extensions of the indoor living space, no cars within blocks – they just couldn’t have made it in. I can live like this . . . . . . . . .
The streets had turned into courtyards and extensions of the indoor living space, no cars within blocks – they just couldn’t have made it in. I can live like this . . . . . . . . .
Haarlem 7/13/2011 19:23
Frank, the former owner of our boat, came by for a visit this morning. We finally got a tour of the boat from the systems perspective. We have a lot of shore power outlets we were unaware of. That’s good news. It means that a fridge and an oven are definite possibilities. He showed Bill how to use the Kabola heater, a real plus as it is starting to turn a bit chilly. The weather has changed with a vengeance, chilly and wet and much more what I remember from past visits to the Netherlands. We now have a better understanding of the solar power system, though it’s still not making a lot of sense. I guess we’ll just have to keep an eye on that and learn by watching. On the boat, we’ve been living from the Dutch supermarkets. It reminds me of when we were first married and I couldn’t cook worth a fig. Strange cans make it into a pot and we eat whatever comes off the stove. We’ve found a few goodies: the box of plain tomato sauce with basil from Albert Hein is a real favorite. It’s tomato sauce that’s very fresh and light, and we can use it in innumerable ways. Some of the canned soups aren’t too bad. Once I get a handle on them and can start adding personal touches, they could be quite good and worth the storage space. There are pre-baked vol au vent shells that would be quite usable if we had an oven to heat them just a bit before we served them, and they are not too bad at room temperature. The “fresh” pasta at the supermarket, and especially at the Saturday market!!, can be good. Of course we are pigging out on cheeses, and that with a fresh bakery roll and a slice of meat makes a simple and quite tasty lunch, and quite deluxe with a salad. Other items are best unmentioned. Given that we have limited storage, I think we’ll stick to what works. Anyway, we’re starting to settle into something resembling a rhythm, and starting to feel like this is home.
Today could have been such a bust, and it wasn’t. We had planned to do laundry – the laundromat never opened. We had planned to take in an organ recital by an American musician, but when we needed to leave there was a heavy, driving rain that hasn’t let up all day. We had planned to have a nice dinner at a restaurant we like very much, but again the rain made that an unattractive prospect. We did get showers, even though the hot water machine ate my coins. But in reality it was marked by some small but significant and positive events. We found a very inexpensive and basic oven at what is the equivalent of a dollar store. That gave us a lovely meal from whatever we had on board without going out in the pouring rain. Ian stopped by to offer us a television they weren’t using. We don’t need a TV, but for him to come down here from their barge in this miserable weather to offer was a supreme gesture of kindness. Bill lit a fire in the wood stove, we’ve had a lovely HOT dinner, and we are totally content just to sit here with a cup of tea and a warm fire.
This sounds wonderful and I love the pictures!
ReplyDelete