We left the wind and rain in Amsterdam and travelled to Utrecht by train.
Utrecht is a small university town with a very young and sophisticated vib with lots of shops, restaurants and bars. The city is ancient with many wonderful buildings, churches and cobblestone paved streets. Similar to Amsterdam (and all towns/cities in Holland) there is a network of canals winding thru the centre of the town, which enabled commerce in centuries past.
This past week we used Utrecht as our "base camp" and travelled to; the Hague, Kinderdijk, Haarlem and Delft by rail.
We visited museums, art galleries, restaurants, coffee shops, markets and historic buildings........ A real Europe experience. We got a real sense of the pride the Dutch have in their country. A popular saying here is " God created the world but the Dutch built Holland". Huge portions of this country have been wrestled from the North Sea by world leading hydraulic engineering. A vast network of dams, dikes, canals and water pumping stations have accomplished this task. The traditional national symbol of Holland is a windmill which is an 18th century "green" water pump which has survived into the 21st century.
This week we made an attempt at a Euro "hat trick"......... 3 Michelin rated restaurants in 24 hours. That proved too much we only achieved 2,...... there is always next week. On that subject..... The food is wonderful here, lots of interesting small restaurants with inventive menus and excellent ingredients.
The weather has improved and today we had blue skies and warm temperatures.
Holland is a very easy country to travel in, much easier than England/Great Britain. Everyone in NL speaks North American english and drives on the right side if the road.
Tomorrow we are off to Belgium and the second half of our holiday. Ciao.