rolmops
Vice Admiral
- Joined
- Feb 24, 2002
- Messages
- 5,420
It has been a few days since we are back and jet lag has worn off a bit,so here's what we did in Europe and why we did it.
First the why.
Two reasons.My father,bless him,celebrated his 93th birthday and rather then see him again at his funeral I decided to go and visit him while he is around and kicking.He is slowing down,but I suspect to see him reach a hundred or more.My wife celebrates her big 5 so it was time to do something special.
We left Upstate on a flight to Detroit and from there we crossed to Amsterdam using the northern route.Going this way saved us 5 hours in layover and flying time.Once we were in Holland,we first visited my father and then we hit 2 Van Gogh museums after which we crashed in a nice bar stool which later on caused me a bit of a headache.The next day we traveled to the northern most part of Holland in order to visit a research fellow who works with my wife on a project and so far they only communicated online.For me,this day was an eye opener.For two reasons.The first one being the beauty of these flat lands which I never realized when I was a kid. Secondly the changes that are reshaping the character of the land.Imagine seeing the windmills that were build hundreds of years ago being dwarfed by the modern wind mills that stand next to every farm and dot the land by the hundreds of dozens.Wind generated electricity has become the new cash crop for these dutch farmers.It produces year round and they love it!
In the city of franeker,Friesland,( www.jusonline.nl/eisinga/gallery.htm ) we visited a Planetarium,the oldest one in the world that is still working,that was build in the living room of a wool merchant who build it in the seventeen eighties,well over 200 years ago, using wooden sprockets,about ten thousand hand forged nails,nine weights and a time piece.This planetarium moves at the exact speed of the heavenly bodies around us and it is so exact that it has not been adjusted once in over two hundred years.There is a small room where you can see the mechanical parts at work and in the eighteenth century living room you can see the planets as they slowly move through the sky.The city itself is breath taking with its canals and medieval to eighteenth century glory.This is a must for every visitor.
Standing on the dikes looking out over the sea, I saw the gas drilling platforms dotting the coast,but they were being crowded out by huge wind mills.The farm dairy barns which had reed roofs when I was a kid now have their south facing surfaces covered with row after row of solar energy collectors.This was a bit of a disappointment at first but it was also amazing to see these collectors being used in countries that are up as far north as central Canada.
Everybody talked about global warming and what is being done about it.We were shown huge projects,which are taking place along the rivers.All the inland river dikes are being strengthened and made higher than before.We were told that the sea dikes are high enough as it is, but with higher sea levels to be expected in the near future, the river levels will go up as well.We were told that 2 dutch companies are under contract to rebuild the New Orleans "water household" as they call it.Water in Holland is a national concern,and there are no politics played with it.
After Holland we flew to Stockholm in Sweden.This part of the trip really started as a joke.My brother told me he could buy tickets from Dusseldorf/Wese airport to Stockholm for ONE euro cent a piece so I said ,sure go ahead.As it turned out there is an Irish Charter company called Ryanair that flies to secondary airports around Europe for amazingly low prices.Our return tickets from Dusseldorf to Stockholm,which is roughly a 2 hour flight were $40 a piece with all the duties and taxes included.
Stockholm deserves a report with pictures and such all by itself, so I will do that at a later time today.
Now it is time to go out and stock up on fuel and food stock for the snow storm that is heading our way.
First the why.
Two reasons.My father,bless him,celebrated his 93th birthday and rather then see him again at his funeral I decided to go and visit him while he is around and kicking.He is slowing down,but I suspect to see him reach a hundred or more.My wife celebrates her big 5 so it was time to do something special.
We left Upstate on a flight to Detroit and from there we crossed to Amsterdam using the northern route.Going this way saved us 5 hours in layover and flying time.Once we were in Holland,we first visited my father and then we hit 2 Van Gogh museums after which we crashed in a nice bar stool which later on caused me a bit of a headache.The next day we traveled to the northern most part of Holland in order to visit a research fellow who works with my wife on a project and so far they only communicated online.For me,this day was an eye opener.For two reasons.The first one being the beauty of these flat lands which I never realized when I was a kid. Secondly the changes that are reshaping the character of the land.Imagine seeing the windmills that were build hundreds of years ago being dwarfed by the modern wind mills that stand next to every farm and dot the land by the hundreds of dozens.Wind generated electricity has become the new cash crop for these dutch farmers.It produces year round and they love it!
In the city of franeker,Friesland,( www.jusonline.nl/eisinga/gallery.htm ) we visited a Planetarium,the oldest one in the world that is still working,that was build in the living room of a wool merchant who build it in the seventeen eighties,well over 200 years ago, using wooden sprockets,about ten thousand hand forged nails,nine weights and a time piece.This planetarium moves at the exact speed of the heavenly bodies around us and it is so exact that it has not been adjusted once in over two hundred years.There is a small room where you can see the mechanical parts at work and in the eighteenth century living room you can see the planets as they slowly move through the sky.The city itself is breath taking with its canals and medieval to eighteenth century glory.This is a must for every visitor.
Standing on the dikes looking out over the sea, I saw the gas drilling platforms dotting the coast,but they were being crowded out by huge wind mills.The farm dairy barns which had reed roofs when I was a kid now have their south facing surfaces covered with row after row of solar energy collectors.This was a bit of a disappointment at first but it was also amazing to see these collectors being used in countries that are up as far north as central Canada.
Everybody talked about global warming and what is being done about it.We were shown huge projects,which are taking place along the rivers.All the inland river dikes are being strengthened and made higher than before.We were told that the sea dikes are high enough as it is, but with higher sea levels to be expected in the near future, the river levels will go up as well.We were told that 2 dutch companies are under contract to rebuild the New Orleans "water household" as they call it.Water in Holland is a national concern,and there are no politics played with it.
After Holland we flew to Stockholm in Sweden.This part of the trip really started as a joke.My brother told me he could buy tickets from Dusseldorf/Wese airport to Stockholm for ONE euro cent a piece so I said ,sure go ahead.As it turned out there is an Irish Charter company called Ryanair that flies to secondary airports around Europe for amazingly low prices.Our return tickets from Dusseldorf to Stockholm,which is roughly a 2 hour flight were $40 a piece with all the duties and taxes included.
Stockholm deserves a report with pictures and such all by itself, so I will do that at a later time today.
Now it is time to go out and stock up on fuel and food stock for the snow storm that is heading our way.
