Happy birthday to the Queen of the Netherlands. Even though the parties were yesterday, April 30 is the official birthday of the queen. It is really the birthday of the prior queen. But her daughter Beatrice, the present queen decided to keep the celebration date as April 30 to honor her mother and since her own birthday is at the end of January, it is too cold for a party then. In addition, as it is usually a big drunken party, they had it on Saturday instead of Sunday for religious reasons. Everyone wears orange as the original king of Holland was Willem of Orange. Thank you very much to Henk and Truus De, our Netherland friends who were our hosts for several days.

We started our day with a walking tour of Middelburg. Most all of the buildings were destroyed by the Germans during World War II. We saw the old monastery and the rebuilt remains of many buildings. After that, we traveled to the Neeltje Jans visitor center.

The visitor center contains history of the great flood of January 31, 1953 when the dikes broke and 1835 people died. In response to this, all the dikes and dams in The Netherlands were made taller and they also started the “Delta Project”. This is a dam/lock system built on the place where the Rhine, Meuse and Schelde rivers come together in Zeeland Netherlands. The dam is built so that it is only lowered/activated when there is bad weather. It took 30 years to complete and was built at a cost of $5billion. All of the rock and land fill had to be imported from other countries as none exists in the below sea level country of The Netherlands. Since installation in 1987, the dam has only been activiated around 20 times and no flooding has occurred. Not only had there been a huge flood in 1953, but in 1421, 6000 people died in flooding. The Delta Project has been cited as the greatest achievement of the Dutch people. It has resulted in dams, locks, secondary dams and structures. We walked on the dam and Norm even walked up, down, and on top of the steel catwalk. Wow. Afterwards, we met our boat and sailed to Rotterdam.

We spent the day in the city that is an open air museum on ancient buildings- Brugge (Bruges). We saw the only statue carved by Michaelangelo outside of Italy. It is a marble statue of the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus. We of course ate Belgian Chocolate before our lunch. We found a semi-hidden restaurant that our friends Joan and Gordon had heard about “T’Pandreitje”. Cindy had an incredible Sea Bass and Norm had very tasty scallops. The only problem was that the scallops cost 10 Euros apiece while for the same price, Cindy had a whole wonderful meal. Oh well. Due to the trading practices of the people of Bruges in the past, they were not attacked by the Vikings as they openly traded with them. When the port to the North Sea silted up, the city fell into decline. The king of Belgium, Leopold III decided that he wanted Brugge restored and that is why the city has been restored since the late 1800’s.

Off to Brussels. Welcome to the capital city of Europe (the common market) and NATO. It is also the capital of the Belgian Federation. Belgium has 3 sections, one that speaks Flemish, one that speaks French and one that speaks German. It has been ruled by all of these nations so it is a mystery why there is not also a section that speaks Spanish as they were ruled by the Spaniards for the longest period of time. We traveled through narrow streets, saw buildings from the 15 and 16 hundreds. We saw the statue of the boy peeing into a fountain. His name is Mannekin Pis and various countries take turns dressing the statue in different clothing during the year. We ate “Mussels in Brussels” for lunch at an outdoor restaurant. Well, one of us ate mussels. Someone with short hair was too chicken to eat her own mussels. Before we had lunch, we had desert by eating a Belgian Waffle in Belgium. It had strawberries, bananas, and chocolate. What a way to start lunch. We had a nice walk around the city and then drove back to Antwerp where our boat is anchored. Antwerp is the largest port in Belgium and the 4th largest port in the world. Brussels also has a statue of Rodins Thinker.

We had a walking tour of Dordrecht and saw the buildings built along the waterways, the tiny streets, the old building that used to be the butchers guild and is now a library. This is where the first meeting of the States General took place in 1572 and the town considers it the oldest town in Holland which is often disputed by other Dutch towns.

We then went to the Kinderdijk windmill area. Here are 11 windmills that used to power the pumps to keep the water from overflowing. This is a Unesco World Heritage Site. Now, all but one are inhabited and used only once per year. We toured one from the inside and saw the tiny living space. The bed was built for someone the length of Cindy so a windmill will not be Norms next house. Kinderdijk is on the Unesco world heritage list. We had cheese tasting back on the ship. Tonight we sailed into the port of Antwerp, Belgium. This is one of the largest ports in Europe and will be our base for the next two nights.

About 4am we docked in Arnhem, the place where 3000 British, Canadian and Polish soldiers died trying to save the bridge from the Nazis. The movie A Bridge Too Far is about this battle. Norm managed to wake up early again for the 7am exercise class while Cindy relaxed and showered. After breakfast we took a 45 minute bus trip to the Het Loo Palace. Het Loo means open place and the palace, now museum, provided us with an historical overview of the 300 years the ruling family of the Netherlands, the Orange-Nassaus, lived there. King Stadtholder William III created the palace in the late 17th century and Queen Wilhelmina was the last member to reside there. The gardens have been reconstructed based on 17th century drawings. Lunch on board, then off on a bus again for the Kroeller Mueller museum. This museum was opened in 1938 by Helene Kroeller-Mueller and her husband who were avid art collectors. In the process of opening the museum, they first built a castle to house the museum but decided it would be too small after seeing it completed. They also started the site on another area and again decided that it too was not right. So, it took 3 tries to finally get it right. It now sits in the middle of a beautiful national park. This museum has many paintings by Van Gogh including another painting of “The Potato Eaters”. It turns out he painted 3 of these. One is here; one is in the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, and one in America. The paintings here included many bright paintings as opposed to the dark paintings in Amsterdam. They also have Picasso, Monet, Pissaro, Cezanne and many other artists. The only problem was that the outdoor sculpture garden closed 30 minutes before the museum, so we did not get to go into the garden.

We sailed to Nijmegen tonight. We walked around this small port town but chose to stay away from the casino. We walked to the old church and saw a building across from the church that had statues of the 12 apostles on the second floor.

After returning, we enjoyed the dancing of De Klepperklumpkes folklore dance group. Cindy even was a featured dancer. Of course the tallest man chose to dance with her.

First stop Hoorn walking tour. This town is said to have 365 monuments and historical buildings. One for each day of the year. We saw the “Old Ladies Home” and an old church that has been turned into shops, including a baby store. This is due to the large decline in church attendance throughout Holland and they needed something to do with the churches. Hoorn is a former sea port and home of Jan Pieterszoon Coen who was the first governor of Indonesia and the founder of Jakarta (it was called Batavia in the beginning). Hoorn is also the place that gave the name to Cape Horn in Chile. We passed the tower defense system of the original city. After strolling through the old section and some of the newer store areas, we stopped for a cup of coffee at a Tex-Mex restaurant on the square where the statue to Jan Coen stands.

We set sail in the afternoon for Volendam. This is another sea town that is known for its smoked eel. Instead, we chose to eat Fries. We went to the Volendam museum and saw clothing from 125 years ago, history of the town and a room with wall murals made totally from Cigar Bands. Volendam must be quite a rocking place. Tonight , Norm will be one of the “Liars” in the “Liars Club” contest. Oh, good news. After almost 4 months, Cindy is learning how to change settings and use different styles on her camera. We now have pictures in black and white, and in sienna. Cool!

Also, after lunch there was a young man who demonstrated the making of wooden shoes. It appeared that he was doing a good business with his various souvenirs after his presentation.

Dinner choices tonight were catfish or wild boar. Neither seemed to be a roaring success. But around 10pm the Liar’s Club contest began. There were a series of words displayed, which we have been told are English words, for which no one knows the meaning. So, each of 4 individuals provided definitions, mostly humorus(even the actual meanings), of which only one had the correct definition. All of us voted as to who was right. Cindy’s group did not win, but since Norm was a volunteer we got a free drink after the event. We stayed up late conversing with our cruise director Werney, who has spent the last 15 years cruising the world, a very interesting man.

We had a bus tour of Amsterdam followed by a canal boat trip. We visited the Rijksmuseum to see Rembrandt paintings and many other artists. The Rijksmuseum was created in 1808 by King Louis Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon Bonaparte. It was officially opened as the Rijksmuseum in 1885 and houses over 5000 paintings. The most famous Rembrandt painting is “The Nightwatch” which is a huge wall painting that used to hang in a civil defense hall in Amsterdam. 200 years after the painting was made, it was moved to a new spot and because it was considered to be too large, it was cut down. The painting originally had 33 people but now only shows 30 people. This painting was hidden in caves near Maastricht during WWII so it avoided confiscation by the Nazis.

We decided to stay in the Museum Square and visit the Van Gogh museum on our own. While there was a long line to get in and very crowded near the paintings, we enjoyed observing from a distance. There was also a special exhibit comparing Rembrandt and Caravaggio, which was extremely well done. We took the trolley back to Centraal Station and found our way back to the ship later in the afternoon.

We have actually started to sail on the river tonight. Very fun. We are going through a lock as this is being written. Gotta go now, things to see.

We lounged all day and joined the Viking Neptune river boat today.

We walked enough to qualify for a marathon today. We toured downtown Amsterdam and saw the Red Light district, the Coffee shops that don’t only serve coffee, the flower and vegetable markets, the canals, the main churches and the old buildings. Many of the buildings date to 15, 16 or 1700’s. The buildings all lean in one way or another. They were all leaning several inches to the front so that goods lifted to the upper stories would not damage the façade of the buildings. Many buildings also lean to the side. This is caused by the pilings that are driven into the river bed have rotted and resulted in the building shifting. The entire town and most of the country are below sea level and only dry due to the Dams and Dikes that have been built. We had dinner at a fondue restaurant next to the Oost Kerk (East Church). The restaurant may have had the steepest steps in the world to get to the eating floor. We all shared different cheese fondues and had a great dinner. We went to bed at 1am 2 nights in a row. This is a record for us these days.

Off to Amsterdam this afternoon. Our friend Henk picked us up at the airport and then we all got stuck in afternoon rush traffic. When we got to the house, his wife Truus made us a wonderful dinner and we shared a bottle of French wine we had picked up along the way. What fun to meet up again with friends we met in Indonesia travels. After dinner, we went out to a small town for a drink at a small pub that was built in the 1500’s. We saw the traffic cones that show the XXX marking which is shown all around Amsterdam. No, it does not stand for X-Rated. It actually represents the 3 major problems of the past, The Plague, The Flood and The Fire that all caused major damage to Amsterdam. The three X’s are a remembrance. Today, the three X’s also represent current problems of mad bicyclists, pickpockets, and dog doo on the street!

We rented a car and drove to Cannes, home of the international film festival. The only international personality who was in town was Cindy Capitani. We took a ferry boat to St. Marguerite Island. This is the place where the man in the Iron mask was imprisoned for 11 years. No one knows who he was but he was attended by many people even in jail suggesting he was important. The only strange thing was that no one was at the ticket booth so we just walked in. We then learned that nothing was open except a small hotel that is inside the prison. The museums and art gallery had closed an hour before we arrived. We walked all around the prison yard and buildings and then took a walk around a large portion of the island and the beach. After returning to Cannes, we hit the road again and doive to Marseille where we fly out of tomorrow. We walked into the hotel and asked a nice concierge how to get to the A8 expressway to Marseille. He politely showed us a sign to follow but did not tell us that it would take forever to get to the highway due to evening rush. This turned out to be good practice in driving a manual transmission car for Cindy as traffic took us about an hour just to get to the expressway. And due to the clutch being so strong, Cindy could barely move her left leg the next day.

We went to the Matisse museum this morning in Cimiez, Nice. We saw many paintings and sculptures. The building is right next to a Roman building ruin so we really saw two attractions. After the museum, we went to Franciscan Monastery of Nice to see paintings from 1475 and 1514. The ceiling is also painted with frescoes. Outside the Monastery is a cemetery which has the grave of Matisse and his wife. There were many ancient tombs there.

After this, we walked downhill to the Marc Chagall museum. We saw many paintings of his interpretation of the Old Testament. He has three stained glass windows in the auditorium and a huge wall mosaic outside the museum. We had lunch at an outdoor café on the premises, took a taxi back to the hotel and relaxed. With as many art museums as we have seen on our trip, we should either become Artists or Art Critics. These museums were great.

Today we spent the morning at St. Paul de Vence. This is a hanging village built on the side of a mountain to avoid Saracen attack in the 13th century. It was rebuilt in 1537 and then again many times a people have lived there continuously. This is a town completely surrounded by a rampart wall and has only a few streets. Many painters have spent time in this town including Marc Chagall, Pablo Picasso, and Renoir. Marc Chagall died there and is buried in the town cemetery, where there are splendid views of the countryside. There are many artist shops in town along with many dogs in the street that are not picked up after. Watch out for landmines!

After touring St Paul de Vence, we toured the Flower and Vegetable markets in the old city of Nice. We had lunch at an outdoor Italian café, Spaghettissimo, with gnocchi provincial and fettuccini alfredo enjoying the sunshine and the local musicians. Then we went for a walk up to the ruins of the old fortress/castle on the nearby hill, Le Chateau, with its cascading waterfall. We managed to avoid the rain that threatened and never quite came down and had a wonderful panoramic view of the city. We went to the hotel pick up spot only to find that the transport bus did not show, so we took a taxi back.

Happy Birthday Ellen! We got to sleep in today. In the afternoon, we took a trip to Monaco. After the Vatican, it is the world’s smallest sovereign state. It covers only ¾ of a square mile. It is half the size of New York City Central Park. We saw the town and fortress of the Palace. Lucky for us, the Prince was away today so the palace was open for tours. On the way to Monaco, we saw several homes of famous persons who live in the area. We saw the estate of Bill Gates and the home of Elton John. Elton was unfortunately out of wine and did not ask us in to his home even for tea. We also saw the home of Jean-Claude Van Damme which is in Monaco. He has a person spend time in his home so he can be considered a resident of Monaco which has no income taxes. It is also known as a banking haven.

In Monaco, we saw the outside of the Oceanographic museum which was run by Jacques Cousteau for 30 years until 1988. He was a hero until he told the people to get rid of the old aquarium water. Unfortunately, it had a form of bacterial plague to the waters around Monaco and Nice and killed all the plankton so the whitefish left and the fisherman are now out of business. We did see the “Yellow Submarine” of Cousteau. We also toured the 12th century Church of St Nicolas. It was rebuilt in the 19th century in the Neo-Romanesque style. Inside are the tombs of Bishops and several family members including Prince Renier III and Princess Grace Kelly. At the palace, we saw paintings from many eras, cannons donated by Louis XIV, furniture and sculptures. It is a monument to lavish living.

Then we were off to Monte Carlo to see the site of the Grand Prix race course and the Casino. When the Prince originally decided to introduce gambling long ago, he was concerned that his own people might lose their money. No current Monaco citizens are allowed into the Casino. This place has the world’s highest per capita income. We saw Ferraris, Rolls Royces, Porsches, Mercedes, BMW’s and the occasional Smart Car or Hyundai. What a parade of cars. We did not go into the Casino as we would have to pay and we have already seen it in the James Bond Movie Tomorrow Never Dies. We did take time for an awesome ice cream cone in front of the Paris Café. We did not go to the Paris Hotel restaurant, Louis XV, which specializes in meals of 500 Euros per person and has wine that costs 25,000 Euros a bottle. Better to just have ice cream.