Category Archives: travel

Lockdown eases and ‘normality’ returns in the Netherlands

Posted on June 23, 2020 by

Getting out and about again The lockdown has been eased a lot quicker in NL than in the UK. Hairdressers, restaurants, cafes, some museums and non-essential shops opened on 1st June. So it was with some excitement that Frank and … Continue reading →

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First House-sit of the Year

Posted on March 24, 2020 by

Unless you are a Buddha living under a tree you will have noticed we are in the grip of a pandemic which has severely restricted our freedom of movement. It now seems like some distant dream when we could move … Continue reading →

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Central Library, Oosterdok – The Jewel in Amsterdam’s Crown

Posted on February 4, 2020 by

OBA which stands for Openbare Bibliotheek Amsterdam boasts in total 26 branch libraries, 177,000 members and has 1.3 million books, CDs and DVDs in its collection. Amsterdam Central Library, Oosterdok is one of my favourite places in the city. The … Continue reading →

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The End of the Dutch Golden Age

Posted on November 20, 2019 by

A Night in the Museum Only last week I was invited to an evening in the Rijksmuseum by a girlfriend who is a friend of the institution. The event offered a chance to speed-date with various experts dotted around the … Continue reading →

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Balloon Flight over the Chateau

Posted on October 2, 2019 by

Frank and I celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary in September. On our ninth house-sit of this year we decided to book a balloon flight. Paying for our accommodation in kind (offering pet care) means we free up cash which can … Continue reading →

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Sailing along the Amsterdam Canals

Posted on August 27, 2019 by

Dear readers, I promised you a blog about Amsterdam and here it is! You might remember that Frank and I are OOPOEHs. Omas en Opas Passen Op Een Huisdier, which translates into the rather unflattering; Grandpas and Grandmas look after … Continue reading →

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All Good Things…

Posted on July 23, 2019 by

After two months of house-sitting it is sadly almost time to go home again. We’ve travelled through Hertfordshire, Nottinghamshire, East Riding of Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Staffordshire, Cheshire, Leicestershire and spent the last two weeks in the smallest county in England, Rutland. … Continue reading →

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Llamas, Outrageous Wealth and The Black Death

Posted on June 7, 2019 by

It’s a first! pet-sitting llamas in deepest Peru, I mean deepest Hertfordshire. Continue reading →

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Is it OK to trample on the tulips, in pursuit of the ultimate selfie?

Posted on April 25, 2019 by

We live in an era of narcissism fuelled by sites such as Facebook and Instagram. Many people post images of themselves amongst the tulip fields surrounding the famous spring gardens, de Keukenhof and this often involves traipsing through and destroying … Continue reading →

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Creative Hub – De Ceuvel in #Amsterdam

Posted on March 5, 2019 by

Sorry for the radio silence, dear followers! I have been doing a turbo-boost fiction course which I blogged about for Writers Abroad here. That took up my writing energy for a bit. Clichéd Vision The new series on BBC1, Sunday … Continue reading →

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