Holland Trip: Day 2 Duinrell and Scheveningen Beach

Ray's Journal:

The next day all the children want to do is go the water park and amusement park which are attached to the camp. Neil, Misty, and Angie go explore the amusement park while Alexis and myself go to the indoor water park. The water slides they have are awesome! They encompass everything from beginner to outstanding coolness in a water tube. Lexi and I are there for 2 hours (our limit based on what we paid, but also on our stamina). we really enjoyed the fun here.

Angie's Journal:

Our day started off with us taking care of a few things before we went to have some fun at the attached theme park. First order of business get our "passport photos" for the IDs required to get into the park.

Family Photos for ID cards

Next we had to go to the grocery store to check out the local goodies.

Pancake shaped sponge cake

We then went to the theme park and had some fun. We ended up splitting up because Lexi REALLY wanted to do the water park and Neil wanted to do the theme park. It was a lot of fun, but since I had Misty and Ray was in the water we have no pictures of the amusement park.

For dinner we decided to try a pancake house which The Netherlands seems to have in abundance. Before our trip, a couple friend of ours told us to go to Scheveningen Beach if we could. Fortunately, we were staying nearby and there was a pancake house on the beach strip.

The red canopy is 't Pannekoekenhuisje that we had dinner.

By the time we hit the beach we were starving, so it was very fortunate the Pancake House was one of the first restaurants we came across. Behind the restaurants is the fancy building in the background is the Kurhaus hotel.

Scheveningen Beach Walk

As we continued down the beach, we came across a lot of restaurants that were actually on the beach. The kids wanted to go back later in the week to one of these restaurants, but we never made it back.

Somewhere along the beach, Lexi found a bungee trampoline place. We had decided the kids can do one "experience" of their choice every day on this holiday. Ironically, this was the only day they did anything; Neil blew his money at the arcade.

Holland Trip: Day 1 Traveling to Holland

Given the options of places to go for spring break, the kids were sold on Duinrell (check out the video on this page to get a better idea of what hooked the kids).

Ray's Pre-trip Journal:

What a stressor getting ready for a week vacation can be! We need a vacation just from our vacation preps. I’ve been working too hard again and Angie has done all the research. I hate leaving her that way. Then, as always with me, I am packing at the last minute and the rest of family is watching what I pack in order to know what they should have packed (and throwing in last minute items to already under packed baggage.

Angie's Journal:
We started our trip driving to Dover to hit the Dover-Calais ferry. We made such good time that we arrived 2 hours early. Luckily we were able to get on the earlier ferry, which was overcrowded. We hadn't used this ferry company before, so I was very disappointed in the ship. The last time we took the Dover-Calais ferry there was plenty of seats, a nice cafeteria, and a play room for Misty. This company offered a coffee shop with prepackaged sandwiches, and we ended up sitting on the floor because there was no seats. Needless to say, I was not impressed but the previous company went bankrupt (I believe over labor union disputes). Thankfully the ferry ride isn't long, so we were off to continue our journey to the Netherlands in no time. Our road trip had us going from Calais, France through Belgium, and then onto the Netherlands. We were anxiously awaiting the Belgium boarder because we wanted to get our passports stamped when we came across this sign along with a sign we believe said Welcome to Belgium.

Apparently, the whole EU deal means the took down all their boarders. So much for getting stamps in our passport. We discussed at length were we might be able to get one, but we really just wanted to get to Holland in time to unpack and have a nice dinner. 

Sign reads: Nederland as we enter The Netherlands

Since we had booked late (i.e. not 6 months in advance), accommodations where limited since we were going on Spring Break. We've been warned that all of Europe takes their breaks at the same time, so places get booked up quickly. Anyways, we had the option of "Glamping" which is kind of a new idea we learned about when we moved here. It is camping with style, or so they claim. Basically you get a huge tent that has rooms with beds in it. You get a small living area and an equipped camp kitchen.

Neil took some lovely pictures of the inside of the tent to give you guys an idea.

Lexi's Room

Neil's Room

Master Bedroom

The black thing in the right hand corner is a wardrobe to store your clothes. 

Common Area

We were able to bring in chairs from the outside so we all had a place to sit down. 

Kitchen

The camp kitchen had plenty of storage and kitchen supplies, as well as a mini fridge.

The place we were staying had a grocery store and multiple restaurants. We decided to splurge on an Italian buffet, but we saved some money by only paying for one hour. All the buffets we found charged us based on the time we planned to stay. It seems silly, but most Europeans take about 2 hours to eat dinner. Honestly I don't get it because the Europeans have much smaller portions than us Americans, so I couldn't imagine they eat more...they just eat slower. 

Ray's Journal:

After a short trip down to the coast (ahhh Dover and her white cliffs! what a great starting point, as we learned on the trip to Normandy) we find ourselves running 2 hours early. But the ferryman is understanding and doesn’t want a crying baby to wait 2 hours to load a boat, so he issues us tickets to the very next ferry! What nice people!

The ferry ride over to Calais is as unremarkable as the last time, but still a very nice way to spend time with the family. Angie is still wound up from the preparations yesterday and is stressed so everything bothers her. We have to sit on the floor to eat lunch because the ferry is totally booked and they don’t have enough chairs for a normal booking.

A few minutes in the French countryside and she is feeling better. Then we cross the Belgium border well before any of us expected and she is more relaxed still. The weather starts improving and it looks like all will be well. Unfortunately, my lack of sleep the last few days has caught up with us and Angie must drive for an hour while I nap.

We arrive at camp and get checked in. The nicest people are all working their first day of “Camp duty”. We get shown to our campsite by a lady on bicycle. Its a nice enough camp and very quiet.

Christmas at Hughenden Manor

We have a pass that allows us to get into old houses through the country. During the holidays they have various events going on. This place was close by and had a few Christmas events going on.

Lexi and Misty played around in the gardens for awhile playing follow the leader.

Then they had a little train ride that Misty loved.

Adding the pine sprigs

Lexi helping me with the wreath

Misty helping out

Next we made wreaths by bending wooden sticks into a circle and adding pine layers and holy bushes.

Then we went off to see Santa. They do Santa visits different than in the states. First off you have to pay, this one was £6 but it was worth it...and you will see why later. All the kids wait in a room full of crafts. When it is your turn you get escorted to the door to the hallway where Santa is located (or that is how this one worked). Once there you were alone with Santa for however long you want. It is just a personal time with Santa. You can take all the pictures you want, and Santa just sits and talks to you.

Misty was pretty scared.

She just covered her mouth and wouldn't go near him.

Santa was very nice, understanding, and patient. In the end he reaches into his bag of goodies.

Misty walks away with a gift and she is pretty excited about that.

This is the hallway we walked down to get to Santa.

She opens her gift and finds a dolphin hand puppet.

She loves her new toy, and we think she understands it came from Santa.

The 100 Acre Woods: Home of Winnie-the-Pooh

Family at Pooh Sticks Bridge

As you see we are one short on our journey because Neil had to catch up on some homework. We thought it was very responsible of him to insist to stay home so he could do his work.

We headed out for our adventure to the 100 Acre Woods, which in reality is 500 acres in Ashdown Forest. This is the place where A.A. Milne and his son Christopher Robin played and came up with the famous Adventures of Winnie-the-Pooh. The family lived in London and had a weekend house here in the 100 acre woods. Christopher Robin's mother used to make up little stories about the stuffed animals around the house, which A.A.Milne used to create the tales of Pooh.

Scenic View

Lexi has quite the eye for photography and insisted that Ray take a picture of me here. Lexi said the lighting and landscape was just perfect. I must admit this is a pretty good picture of me :)

Cool Red Mushroom

We all thought this mushroom looked cool and added to the fairy tale look of this whole place.

Piglets House

We believe this is Piglet's house. It is the lone pine in the middle of a field of brambles and shrubs. Nothing was labeled, so we were left to our own imaginations about what things were. They had a vague map, but it was difficult to be certain we were on the right trail the whole time.

Rabbit's Garden

This probably isn't the best picture of it, but this reminded us of Rabbit's garden. To the far left the trees just came together in a dome shape, almost like a whole in the forest. Then there was these stakes in the ground, probably to support new trees being planted, but the effect was really neat.

Racing sticks at Pooh Sticks Bridge

We had a lot of fun at Pooh Sticks Bridge. The bridge was a bit of a hike away from everything else, but it was well worth it.

Roo's Sand Pit

At first we thought this was Eeyore's Gloomy Place, but after consulting the trail map we discovered it was really Roo's Sand Pit. The place that was labeled as Eeyore's Gloomy Place wasn't really that gloomy. This sand pit doesn't look very sandy either, so maybe it really depends on the time of year.

Memorial to A.A. Milne

This is a memorial plaque for A.A. Milne. It just gives the name of A.A. Milne and his illustrated and says something about how they amused the world with Winnie the Pooh. Ok honestly historical markers are really Ray's thing, so if you want to know the exact writing ask him.

Harrods Christmas Parade

Waiting for the parade to start

I must first say I was slightly disappointed at first. I thought it was going to be like the Macy's Day parade, but it was nothing like that. There were no floats, only one band, and a lot of dancers. The disappointment soon disappeared because it was totally AWESOME!!! You will notice there is one family member missing...aside from Ray hiding behind the camera. Neil was too lazy to wake up early enough to come :( We were all a little bummed, but it was pretty early. We shared out bounty of candy and treats that were passed out to us.

Lexi enjoying herself

Misty waving at everyone

While we waited for the parade there were street performers going up and down the road playing the with kids and doing tricks. Then employees of Harrods were passing out balloons, candy, and drinks to the crowds while we waited. The parade was small, but that was alright. We saw Santa and his reindeer, and they even had fake snow coming from the top of Harrods.

Misty holding the chocolate coins that were given to her

As you can see the chocolate coins where the size of Misty's head!

Santa waving to everyone

Reindeers

We went into Harrods after the store, and we had a lot of fun. Aside from the rush getting in after the parade, we didn't have much of a crowd. Its a big store, so I guess that helps. We saw the Christmas room, the Toy Room, and the new Harry Potter room. It seems they are turning Harry Potter into a bit of a tourist thing here. It was still cool because they had props and costumes from the movies.

Director Lexi

In the Harry Potter room there was a lot of props from the movies. They had a lot of outfits and uniforms, as well as random props.

Here is one of the props from the movie. It is the Gryffindor Sword.

Lexi with a Hagrid mask

We ended our shopping trip by stopping in the food section. We got some snacks for the tube ride home. Misty was already asleep by then, so we got our goodies and headed home. Next year we will book a slot with Santa so Misty can sit on his lap after the parade.

Pumpkin Farm 2011

I know it has been awhile since I have posted something, but the kids have been busy with school projects and scouts. We managed to get out and find a pumpkin farm here in the UK. It was more like a little kiddie carnival which happened to be a farm that grows pumpkins. 

Misty on the toddler trampolines.

Lexi took Misty on a little car ride.

Neil and Misty taking a break.

It was a little disappointing picking out our pumpkins. See the Brits are extremely cautious about liability issues (i.e. they are more worried than Americans about being sued). So they pumpkin vines where cut and the pumpkins where spread out in the field of died pumpkin vines. Of course they had large bins of pumpkins for those too lazy to hunt for a pumpkin. The size of the pumpkins were pretty small too, but that is because the weather here isn't great. Despite the differences we managed to have a good time.

Misty carrying her pumpkin

The Headless Neil