June 2023 – Our travels aboard Lady M

June 14, 2023

A day trip to the Depot Boijmans van Beuningen (Rotterdam)

Depot Boijmans van Beuningen is purpose-built publicly-accessible art storage facility about a 20-minute walk from Rotterdam’s central station. The building appears like a giant mirrored glass teacup (about 40m high) was designed by the same architects (MVRDV) who designed Rotterdam’s iconic “Market Hall” (which we visited on our blog in 2021).

The stunning 3-D curved mirror glass paneled exterior complete with space-age aircraft style doors

Here we are, gazing up at centre photo, patiently waiting for the 11am opening time

The Depot took about 4 years to construct and was opened in late 2021. It houses the combined art collections of F.J.O. Boijmans, who died in 1847 after donating his vast collection to the City of Rotterdam with the intention of founding a museum, and D.G van Beuningen, a Rotterdam businessman whose collection was donated and added in 1958. Both of these gentlemen wanted the public to share their enjoyment – what a wonderful gift. The Depot also stores works of art for some private collectors, and also provides extensive restoration facilities for various forms of art.

We were told the insured value of the contents (more than 150,000 items ranging from paintings to drawings and manuscripts, wooden and metalwork to ceramics) is around Euro 8 billion. The collection is arranged in high security climate and light-controlled rooms according to the climate requirements of the object.

It was the last day of May when we took the train into Rotterdam Centraal (Euro 12/each for an open day return) for our 11:15 entry time at the Depot. Because the museum is essentially a storage facility with a carefully controlled environment including temperature and humidity, there are limits on the total number of people that can be in the building at any time. The Euro 20 entry fee allows you to explore on your own, but also includes a 45-minute small group guided tour, which we grabbed without hesitation, and which turned out to be very worthwhile.

View up the wonderfully light-filled central atrium with staircases and lifts, which is used for displaying all sorts of art forms, as you will see . . . .

Here we are attired in our dust coats (courtesy of the Depot) which are required to be worn if you do the guided tour

Our first stop was the Selection, a group of about a dozen paintings which were on display hanging between panes of glass so that you can see the front and back of each – quite unusual, and some interesting stories to be seen.

This painting (circa 1500) in an unusual octagonal frame is “The Pedlar” by Hieronymus Bosch. Apparently it was painted as part of a triptych which was sawn into pieces after his death !

Pieter Bruegel’s “The Tower of Babel” circa 1568. The level of detail is simply stunning

Vincent van Gogh’s portrait of Armand Roulin (1888), the 17 year-old son of his friend Joseph Roulin of Arles in France

Here we are with our group of 8 and our tour guide. Our highlight was a 15 minute entry into the main painting storage room which is home to about 2,500 works of art mounted on radially sliding hanging frames. The works behind our tour guide are from the 14th century, and the lights are not normally on

Here is Elaine in an identical space on the next floor, which is currently being designed for storage and exhibition

The art comes in all shapes and sizes – and materials

Like we said – some of the works of art are quite unusual

Of course, no art collection could be considered complete without at least one bicycle – this one triangulated with tensioned cables

And to cap it all off, the view from the rooftop garden and terraces, of the Nieuwe Instituut, an architecture and design institute which is right next door

A smattering of photos and a little bit of information to hopefully whet your appetite.

We think the Depot is an opportunity not to be missed if you are visiting Rotterdam – and of course you can always do the 15 minute walk to MVRDV’s Market Hall, before or after, for a meal, drink or both, and get to see another great architectural icon for free!

June 12, 2023February 19, 2024

Dordrecht and Gouda

On a rather windy Thursday 25 May, after washing the boat, topping up our water and visiting the nearby bakery for some morning tea supplies (‘boatie code’ for apple flaps or fruit scrolls or, in this case, both), we wafted out of Willemstad marina and eastward onto the expanse of the Hollandse Diep. We were fortunate to tuck in behind a 2,000t commercial barge and tagged along with him for about 1.5 hours before we turned north into the not-too-busy Dordtsche Kil, which links the Hollandse Diep with the Oude Mass River which flows through Rotterdam into the North Sea at the Hook of Holland (top left quadrant in the map).

Our PC Navigo route plan for this leg of the journey. Willemstad is bottom centre, Dordrecht just below and right of centre, and Gouda top and right of centre. The large city (dark brown) just left and above the centre is Rotterdam. The total distance for this leg of our journey was approximately 61 km

There is a huge industrial / petrochemical area called Moerdijk (very bottom, just right of centre in the above map) which draws your eye as you motor towards, and eventually past it for the first hour or so after leaving Willemstad. As you can imagine, there are many 2,000 to 3,000+ tonne gas and fuel barges making their way in and out of Moerdijk throughout the day. Fortunately the Hollandsche Diep has a very wide and well-marked channel, so there is plenty of room for everyone.

Dordrecht and a side-trip to the Kinderdijk

We were able to get a mooring for four nights at the KDR & ZV (Royal Dordrecht Rowing & Sailing Association), although they put us on the first jetty just inside the entrance, where we suffered a bit with wash from passing barges during our stay. That evening we enjoyed a sundowner with new-found friends Mark and Philippa from UK, who we had met the previous morning before leaving Willemstad, and whose yacht ‘Snow Goose“was now moored in the nearby Wijnhaven, a 500m walk away.

This was actually our third visit to Dordrecht, quite a compact and easy to get around friendly small city. With 7C overnight temperatures and cold northerly winds, the weather was still too cold for bike riding! Never mind, we lucked out with Saturday being the local market day, and spent a couple of hours enjoying the crowd and the sights, returning home with a fresh papaya (Paw Paw), roasted cashews, avocados and some fresh tuna steak for dinner.

Street view with the leaning Grote Kerk in the background

A visit to the Hof van Holland Museum in the afternoon was very educational. This museum records the events surrounding the Dutch revolt against their Spanish masters (King Philip II) and Catholicism, which lasted from 1568 to 1648 (the 80 Years War), and celebrates the victory of the Dutch freedoms of speech, of worship, of conscience, and to be who you are, as a result of this war. Dordrecht was the first city in Holland to be granted city rights in 1572 under the “First Assembly of the Free States”, at which time Dordrecht installed a Calvinist city administration, and began the orderly removal of altar pieces and the images of saints from churches.

This late 1500’s cartoon depicts the Calvinist’s (those on the right) belief that the Catholic church (those on the left) placed too much importance on outward appearances, beautiful and worldly objects and the opinions of monks, rather than the written word contained in the Bible

Of course, after a full-on day in the city, time to go and find the local brewery, Stadsbrouwerij Dordrecht is based in an ancient brewery building a few hundred metres from our mooring. We made an impromptu visit and they were very happy to give as a brief tour. The brewery provides training by volunteer master brewers to young and old aspiring brewers, and produces 2 x 50 litre batches on each of four brewing days per week.

The four brews produced by Stadsbrouwerij Dordrecht under the label “Schapenkopje” (Sheeps Head). Tim was very happy with them all, especially the Amber

That evening was the annual end of school year procession, when children from primary school upwards complete their end-of-year walk to celebrate their graduation, accompanied by school band(s) and many accompanied by proud parents and even grandparents, and it seems the whole town lines the streets to cheer them on. The procession, of an estimated couple of thousand children, lasted for more than a hour, and passed within metres of our mooring, so we had an excellent view of the proceedings. The only other time we have witnessed one of these processions was in Ter Appel in 2018, which we also mentioned in our blog at the time.

A brief video of the annual end-of-school-year procession, taken from our mooring (Don’t forget to have the audio ON)

The following day we made a ferry trip from Dordrecht (via Rotterdam, which we had not realised, and which made for a rather long day) to visit the Unesco World Heritage-listed Kinderdijk site and its 19 world-famous windmills which were built in the mid-1700’s. It was a rather “touristy” place to visit, but nevertheless it was wonderful to be able to walk through it all and see these beautifully maintained historical machines in such a pleasant environment.

We were also fortunate to be blessed with a lovely clear sunny day, although there was still a chilly northerly wind

That evening we decided to dine out for a change, and chose Proeflokaal Bregje, only about 100m from our mooring and a good value-for-money restaurant which we had enjoyed in 2022. We were joined by Mark and Philippa on their final evening in Dordrecht, and we all enjoyed the food and service and are happy to recommend to others.

Sunday 28 May turned out to be a public holiday, the weather caused Tim to make a note in the diary “its almost summer“, and we visited the museum at the Dordrecht Patrician Home at the Wolvershaven (we learned that a patrician is a person of high social rank), which has been opened to the public by the current owner.

This home is a combination of two buildings which were built in the mid-1600’s, and were later combined into the single home we see today, explaining the mid-1700’s facade

Grand circular room on the north side of the house, which looks directly on to the confluence of the Noord and the Oude Maas Rivers

Onwards to Gouda

On Monday 29 May, despite 25 to 30km/hour chilly winds for most of the day, we motored up to Gouda, knowing that we would be sheltered from the wind at our planned mooring on the Turfsingel. The trip took us up the Noord, left turn (downstream) into the Nieuwe Maas (Lek) River, then shortly after a right turn (north) into the Hollandsche IJssel (a very pretty stretch of river) and finally a short stretch on the Nieuwe Gouwe. There are two locks on the approach to Gouda, though neither had any noticeable change in water level.

We ended up mooring up next to our friends Mark & Philippa who were collecting friends from UK that evening from the station in Gouda, to join them on Snow Goose for a trip further north. In Dordrecht Mark had told us about an interesting art storage gallery in Rotterdam called Depot Boijmans van Beuningen, and that evening we booked on-line for our entry and train tickets for the following day. More about that in our next post, which will be dedicated to this gallery.

On our only previous visit to Gouda, we had enjoyed the history, but neither time nor the weather was not on our side, so we had decided that we’d like to return and see the inside of Gouda’s amazing Town Hall, learn some more about the ancient St Johns Church (opposite the Town Hall), and also to visit the Gouda Museum.

The rear of Gouda’s 1448 Town Hall on market day, when the weekly cheese market is a popular tourist attraction

The Wedding Hall, with its centuries-old green tapestries

Yet another view of the tower of St John’s Church – this time across the Grand Market square through centuries-old glass

St John’s church is hemmed in by many old buildings, and not very easy to photograph

St John’s Church in its present form was rebuilt between 1485 and 1510, after the original church was destroyed by fire in 1438 (the same fire that destroyed the original Gouda Town Hall). The collection of 72 stained glass windows from the 16th century, and the largest of its kind in the Netherlands, almost entirely pre-date the assignment of the church to the Protestant faith in 1573, but were kept because of their historical significance, whilst the altar and other Catholic artifacts were removed.

The stained glass from before 1573 includes depictions of various donors including King Philip II of Spain, his wife and sister, Prince William of Orange, bishops, Knights of the Golden Fleece and Commanders of the Order of the Knights of St John – the last in this period is from 1571. Since 1573, further stained glass was added between 1594 and 1603, but this time by donors including the States of Holland, the Board of Polders of Rijnland, and the free towns of Holland which had relationships with Gouda, including Dordrecht, Monnickendam, Leyden (Leiden), Haerlem (Haarlem), and the towns of North Holland.

Dated 1559, this window “The Bearing of the Cross” features the donor Nicolaas van Nieuwland (first Bishop of Haarlem) in yellow cloak

Dated 1596 and donated by the town of Haarlem, depicting the capture of the Egyptian port of Damietta, famous in Haarlem naval history

The above is but a small example of the extensive history in stained glass at St Johns, and we highly recommend a few hours of observation if you ever find yourself in Gouda.

A mere stone’s throw away from St John’s you will find the imposing entrance to Gouda Museum, which has been housed within the 1665 Catharina Gasthuis (Catherine’s Hospital) since 1947. The museum, in addition to having some lovely spaces, and a chapel within its walls dating from 1474, houses a large collection of Gouda pottery, as well as some 17th century militia group paintings and Dutch paintings from the 19th century.

Tim remembers from his high school history that 1665 was the year of the Great Plague in London

This large scale model depicts Gouda as it was in 1562. You can see the Town Hall in the Grote Markt, and St John’s Church (which was being rebuilt at the time, after the fire). Gouda’s layout has changed very little since this time

Spectacular tile tableau of a colourful rooster, and a close-up of the head. Dated from 1624 – 1649, the details and the quality is striking

The original hospital pharmacy has been located in this room since 1655, although this pharmacy interior is from another location. Medicines were made here for the homeless, poor, sick and elderly who were staying in the hospital. Ultimately, it served the entire city – the poor came to receive free medicine, and the rich paid for theirs

Up in the attic of the museum (just look at those hefty hewn oak joists) we sat and absorbed the beauty and craftsmanship of this sample of fine Gouda pottery

Apparently these two, which are about a metre high and were produced by the “Plazuid” Company in Gouda in the very early 1900’s, were made for the window display of a luxury department store, to draw customers

We fell in love with this wonderfully lifelike and colourful tile tableau (approx 1.2m x 0.8m) from 1914 of the offices and warehouse of the Gouda Cheese Trading Company, which were located on the Kattensingel, about 400m from where we were moored. Tim took a walk there, but unfortunately these buildings have disappeared

As we mentioned earlier, we also devoted a day from our Gouda mooring to take a day-trip to Rotterdam on the train to visit the Depot Boijmans van Beuningen. We are looking forward to sharing that with you in our next post . . . . . . soon !

June 4, 2023

Tholen, Steenbergen and Willemstad (Dordrecht to follow)

The route map below gives an overview of this leg of the journey, as we visit Tholen and Steenbergen for the first time and, Willemstad for the second time, and (in our next post) Dordrecht for the third time.

Plan of our northerly route (the thin red line) from Antwerp to Dordrecht, visiting Tholen, Steenbergen and Willemstad along the way

We departed Antwerp on the cloudy and chilly morning of 16 May, passing through the Port of Antwerp whilst the harbour authority monitored us via our AIS transceiver (refer to previous post for an explanation of this) and made radio contact with us each time we crossed from one sector to the next.

This is a larger scale view of our route (thin red line) through the Port of Antwerp (at the bottom of the previous map), from Willemdok in the south to the start of the Schelde Rijn Kanaal (and our exit point from the Port). There is a 5km scale line at bottom left, so you can see our journey through the Port was close to 20km, which took us about 2 hours. The wide snaking grey river is the tidal Schelde winding its way north and west towards Vlissingen and the North Sea

Things were a lot smoother and quieter once we reached the Schelde Rijn Kanaal, and after passing through the lock at Kreekrak (a fall of 2.1m) it was a short and pleasant motor into the town harbour at the star-fort town of Tholen for a few nights’ stay.

Google aerial photo of Tholen, clearly showing the star fort configuration of the ancient fortified town. The entrance from the Schelde Rijn Kanaal into the harbour and marinas is just off the bottom of the photo

Here’s our lovely *Lady M* comfortably moored in Tholen’s town harbour

We did a 5.5km walk to the nearby village of Oud Vossemeer the following day, rewarded ourselves with coffee and a superb apple tart (no cream, mind you) and discovered that this village was the home of the ancestors of F.D. Roosevelt (32nd president of the USA) who had traveled to New Amsterdam (subsequently New York) from the Netherlands with the Pilgrim Fathers in the 1600’s.

Tholen is home to a couple of well-preserved windmills. The one on the left looks like it might still be in working order, whereas the other (built 1848) has been beautifully converted into a fine home of grand proportions

Despite the overnight low of 5C, we braved our first ride of the season the following morning when it reached 13C. Much to our regret. The wind blew as we slogged our way west around the southern part of the island of Tholen before we headed inland and home. It was colder when we got back to Lady M than it was when we had started almost 2 hours earlier!

Here’s another one of those quaintly distorted houses we seem to find all over the Netherlands. This one bears the date 1619, and the quality of the brick, masonry and joinery restorations speaks volumes about the skills of Dutch building tradesmen

Tholen’s Town Hall, which dates from 1475, has 35 melodic carillon bells which still ring out the passing of time – a daily reminder of the rich history in this part of the world

We took ourselves off to the the nearby town of Bergen op Zoom (pronounced “Zome”) by bus on Friday morning and visited the Markiezerhof, a 15th century Marquis’ palace (a Marquis is higher than a Lord, by the way), but not before buying our Netherlands Museum Kaarts (Euro 64.50 each). These cards are valid for 12 months and give us access to more than 450 museums and historical buildings around the country – excellent value for money when you realise that a typical museum entry fee is Euro 10 to 16 per person, and sometimes Euro 20 or more.

The entrance to Bergen op Zoom’s Markiezerhof – a very grand palace

There was an art exhibition in one of the grand rooms, and these two beautiful glass works by artist Vicky van der Plas caught our eyes, named “Tea Time” and “Cocktail Time”

This very large and detailed model depicts Bergen op Zoom in the 1500’s. The city’s St Gertrude Church is just below and left of centre, and the Markiezerhof is just above and right of centre, and both are still very much alive

And here is an ancient map from an earlier time in the city’s history. This one hangs in the Town Hall, which was constructed in the early 1400’s.

The view from the tower of St Gertude’s church (after climbing the 180 steps) looking west over the Grote Markt (Market Square) towards the vast expanse of the Oosterschelde

There is a historic synagogue in Bergen op Zoom, which was shut down during the German occupation in WWII, but has since been restored as a permanent reminder of the terrible persecution suffered by the Jews at that time. The synagogue no longer operates because the Jewish population in the town was effectively obliterated.

The entrance foyer displays a memorial to those from the town, some as young as 18 (and one child aged 5), who died in concentration camps

Bergen op Zoom’s synagogue as it is today, and as it was in the late 1930’s

Despite this tragic part of the city’s history, we found Bergen op Zoom to be a lively and bustling city, and well worth a visit. We chose to moor at Tholen because the village atmosphere seemed a bit more inviting, whereas Bergen’s harbour and its facilities did not really appeal.

Saturday 20 May was a lovely clear and sunny morning, though still cold and breezy, when we continued motoring down the Schelde Rijn Canal into the expanse of the Volkerak, hugging the southern shoreline and then ducking in to the Steenbergse Vliet (“vliet” translates as “flow”) which eventually took us to the pretty little harbour of Steenbergen. The harbour has more than 100 resident vessels, some of them very “up-market” too – there is obviously some wealth in this town!

On the winding Steenbergse Vliet we passed the abandoned Fort Henricus, which was an outlier star-fort protecting Steenbergen from around 1627. We walked back the following day and explored the revetments and moats, all exactly as they were in the day, but all the buildings are gone.

Fort Henricus lower left, protecting the entrance to the Steenbergse Vliet and the city of Steenbergen

Aerial shot of Fort Henricus as it is today (courtesy of **https://routiq.com**)

Steenbergen’s harbour was very well run, clean and tidy, with a modern central shower / toilet / laundry facility and the harbour master’s office above – and a supermarket only 200m away – all very convenient! The town itself is quite pleasant but not particularly inspiring, with very little historical architecture. There is a good gelato shop in the main street !

Steenbergen’s rather overbearing and daunting St Gummarus church was built in 1902 and is offset from the single main street. We found it rather cold and uninviting, both inside and out

Our mooring at Steenbergen’s marina, with the spires of St Gummarus in the town centre beyond

Steenbergen does have a beautifully maintained cemetery on the outskirts of town, where we found the combined grave of two 1943 “Dambusters” heroes, Wing Commander G.P. Gibson and Squadron Leader J.B. Warwick. They were shot down during a bombing raid on Rheydt near Munich in Germany in September 1944, and both died when they crashed near Steenbergen.

Gibson and Warwick are buried together in Steenbergen. Wing Commander Gibson was only 26 years old when he died

Monday 22 May saw us depart Steenbergen on a rather misty morning, carefully winding our way downstream and back out onto the Volkerak. We tucked in behind a large commercial barge and cruised down to Volkerak Lock in about 2 hours and went through together with six other “sports boats” after a short wait.

I know we have featured the Volkerak Locks in a post a few years back, but as previously, we remain impressed by the size of the facility and also the sheer number of commercial vessels passing through two of the three commercial locks in both directions. Very busy, and so glad that us “sports boats” had our own lock well away from all the action!

Aerial photo of the Volkerak Locks, with the star fort town of Willemstad centre right. The north-west lock is for “sports boats”, and the three south-eastern locks are for commercial vessels

Willemstad is a lovely historical star fort town which has an ancient feel about it – a bit like the star fort town of Heusden. This is our second visit, and we think that the Dutch do a great job in preserving their history by carefully controlling development in and around historic sites.

We were given a good mooring in the inner harbour and Tim spent almost 2 hours trying to repair one of the mast “Navigation” lights, only to discover it was actually working all the time, but was operated by a separate switch because it was an “Anchor Light” (and not a Navigation Light after all) ! . . . . . We live and learn.

Willemstad proved to be a good refuge from the 25-40km/hour winds which blew up the following day – this was the day we put together most of the last blog, whilst hiding from the weather. Talking of weather, whilst walking around the town in the afternoon we discovered this visual record of historical water levels in the town, dating back to 1775.

Historical flood levels. Behind Elaine you can see the nominal water level in the harbour. The stones indicate, from bottom to top, historical flood levels in 1775, 1808, 1894, 1916 and 1953. Interesting to note that the historical flood levels at this location have consistently increased over the last 245+ years

Oh! So Dutch ! The walk into town from Willemstad’s back (outer) harbour. The windmill overlooks the inner harbour, and has been converted into a residence. The clock tower and spire in the background is Willemstad’s Town Hall, which dates from the 1580’s

What to do on a wild and windy day in Willemstad? Enjoy a fine lunch – in this case, at Mauritz Grand Cafe – highly recommended

We both love the tropical colour and style from this poster in the restaurant. Entitled “*Bieres de la Meuse*“, an advertisement for beer produced by Alphonse Mucha in 1897

As a result of the rather extreme weather over the last couple of days, we were treated to a rather spectacular cloud trail that evening after the wind had subsided.

Sunset view from our mooring of the extensive cloud trail over Willemstad on the evening of 24 May 2023

And with that cloud trail and sunset in mind, we will bid you farewell until our next post, when we will spend a few days in Dordrecht before moving on to Gouda, from where we took a side trip into Rotterdam to visit the amazing (inside and outside) Depot Boijmans van Beuningen . . . but more about that in the next post.