Spring 2013: Dutch flower fields, lost in daffodils and hyacinths...

 

Every year hundreds of tourists get lost in the Dutch flower fields in search for unique pictures or angles...Due to the long and very chilly winter all Dutch bulb flowers are delayed this year in the low lands. So when my first "flower"-visitors arrived last weekend and we went searching for flower fields, no tulip fields were in sight. However we could literally swim in white-purple-pink-rose-yellow sea of aromatic hyacinths and some daffodils...All pictures are taken in the fields around Lisse&Noordwijkerhout.

Dutch spring sky in Rijswijk, Holland

 

The Dutch sky always impress me with some fantastic blue shades, fluffy clouds and yesterday with tons of contrails (white-stripes left after airplane)...
As yesterday was the official first warm spring day I decided to share the beautiful sky with you:-) Happy new week!

Fluffy dandelions in Rijswijk, Holland...

 

Every spring one of the first flowers to greet the warming sun is the yellow dandelion! Funny enough at the end of its stay with us this flower tranforms to a very fluffy white ball...Few days ago I spent some time looking closely to this fluffy plant and took into pictures some of its spectacular details! One may also use its leaves in the salad, they are a bit acid, but mixed with other salad sorts makes a fresh meal;

Colourful Dutch tulip fields 2012 edition, around Noordwijkerhout

 

One of the most colouful and fantastic ways to enjoy tulipland Holland in the second part of April is a walk/bike through the flower-bulb area...My favourite/secret place is Noordwijkerhout. Around this village every year the tulip and other flower bulbs paint the fields in amazing colour combination and nature masterpieces!

We even flew over the fields into picture above, have a look here:

Dutch flower/tulip fields 2012: seen from the air with Dakota DC3

 

Welcome to Tulipland 2012! Its is again this colourful (however extremely chilly) time of the spring, when the flower-bulb-area between Leiden and Amsterdam offers tons of different colours...So how about looking down at all this beauty from the air? Today I am taking you with me on board of the Dakota DC 3 (built in 1944 in USA) for a flower-tour in the air!

 

This trip starting in Schiphol-Oost will take us over the blooming Bollenstreek, the spring garden Keukenhof up to the beach resort Noordwijk, then we will fly over Noordwijkerhout; Sassenheim and Lisse! Enjoy the geometry of the flower fields, the flashy colours of those tulips, daffodils and hyacinths...In my next entry we will visit the same fields from the ground:-))

 
Can you try zo fidn the word "love" in one of the tulip fields on the pic below (I am helping you by saying: reeeed:-):

 

And last but not least lets have a quick look in the waiting hall&another second look on the fantastic Dakota DC3! A hug thanks goes to the captans& the weather for the sun and blue sky...

Tulip fields in Flevoland 2011

Last weekend, on the way to the island Ameland I was really impressed to see tons of colourful tulip fields from the highway driving in the Dutch province Flevoland, (passing by Lelystadand Noordoostpolder). This part of the Netherlands was literally added to the country in the 1960-ies....

Flevoland consists of two areas, both under the sea level, up to minus 14m. This area has been gained by draining the Zuiderzee once after the Afsluitdijk had been created and finished in 1932. The land in Flevoland is mainly sand and what grows best on sand ground: flowers!:-) Enjoy the amazing colours and geometric forms...

Dutch flower fields 2011 and baby pigs...

It is again flower fields time! Last weekend one could enjoy tons of colourful flower fields: tulips, hyacinths, daffodils....btw its me in the picture above, posing in the middle of the hyacinths:-) It was pretty busy as you can see in the back: tons of people doing the same as me...

While enjoying the tulip fields, in the garden in front of a house in Noordwijkerhout, I saw a pair of baby pigs...They were really cute and curious and having fun with all the people passing by.

Just a Dutch autumn Sunday in AWD...

Last Sunday, after the rain stopped, i decided to discover the famous AWD, Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen. This dune area south of Amsterdam is nature reserve. Every year the water clearing stations filtrate drinking water for the city of Amsterdam...

On one of the last autumn days of the year the walk was very pleasant and some treasure waited to be discovered...

Skating on frozen canals in the Netherlands...

Some colleagues told me they did not remember (in the last 20 years...) a winter as cold and white as this one in the Netherlands. Last year (and to be more exact in January 2009) was the first time the Dutch canals were frozen (again) for the last..... 12 years!!! Why is it so surprising-well some decades ago this was happening every winter in the low lands...

But to come back to last and (of course!) this year! Young and old (and even the Queen-if one may trust the press) put on the skates and went on ice. Does not matter the skates: on ice I have seen next to the well-known figure- and ice-hockey-skates also the very famous here Dutch "noren" (speed-skates: the one on left side, picture above). A Swedish colleague impressed me with the Skandinavian version of speed skating: the one without a shoe and very funny form, on the right side in the above shot.

Snow-ball fights were also possible...But the minus-temperatures lasted only a bit more than a week and the ducks are happy now to have again water!