Broadstairs, U.K.

For those of you who might not have been told . . .
We went to Broadstairs, England, U.K. for a good 7 days this past week.
The main purpose of our visit was to be trained in a teaching method that is very popular over here, and when we were not in the classroom, we were often out and about with a camera.

We started the trip by boarding this large ferry. 

Once out to sea (or rather, out in the middle of the English Channel) we got some really fresh air on the deck. 

On the deck we just enjoyed the open view. 

 . . . because inside the ship the windows kind of got in the way. 

When we weren't freezing on the deck, we were enjoying our first taste of British food. Specifically FISH & CHIPS for Luke. 

When we arrived, we were greeted by the cliffs of Dover. 

Behold the  . . . gray cliffs of Dover. People say that they are white in the sunlight, but we saw them through a fog. 

Dover Castle. We only got to see it close up through the lens of a camera, but we're told it's pretty spectacular. 

We arrived at our destination in the late afternoon to a cold empty college building. 

Hilderstone College is the name of the school where we studied. 

Merriland is the name of the place where we stayed. It's the green building in the middle and if it looks like a small old fashioned hotel, you'd be right on track. That's exactly what it was before the owner converted it into some some apartments on top and a few guest rooms in the front. 

Inside our room . . .

Looking out our front window. The street is empty in this photo, but we had a lot of fun 'people watching' from this view. 

Our lodgings weren't the only ones with a name rather than an address. We were told that the buildings in the town either had to have a name clearly on them or a number. And a surprising amount of homes chose the name option. It might have been a headache for the mailman, but I found the idea fairly endearing.

But then again, the names rarely made logical sense. For example, this is "Birch House". And not only is it made of brick, there wasn't a tree in the yard. I'm sure that's where the history of the place could explain what presently looks like an oddity. 

And "Field View" probably had a view of a field in 1912, but no longer. 

But no matter, here are some views of what the town of Broadstairs looked like our first day there, which was a snowy one. 

Here are some views from some not so snowy days (there was a fair amount of snow, but it didn't last long). These are the glorious victorian seaside homes. It seems that nice coastline soon or later becomes  nice real estate. 

All closed up for winter, but still colorful. 

(Photography credit for the last two pictures goes to Luke)

This photo was taken on a separate occasion, but after walking around on the snowy coastline we ended up in the 'Tartar Friggate' for a little something to help us get the feeling back into our toes. 

Consequently we found out that the British pints are a bit large than what we have experienced before.

Thanks to that our stay at the 'Tartar Friggate' was a long one, but we didn't mind because it was much more comfortable than outdoors.  

A Bit of Brussels

We enjoyed the muddy but beautiful Belgian countryside and we hope you will too!

We weren't the only ones out and about- someone was horseback riding and another person was taking a stroll. 

Belgian homes look a bit different from the Dutch ones we'd become accustomed to, so we photographed quite a few. 

I really enjoyed the contrast of these two architectural styles side by side, but it the one on the right does give off a far less neighborly vibe. 

Someone's nice garden. 

A nice Belgian street view. 

According to the Belgians, studies show that you are more likely to remember an image than a number or letter so that is how they hope you remember where you have parked. We parked next to the turtle, and to support their research -- we had not trouble remembering our parking place. 

With Friends

It may have been a month ago, but in case you wanted to see a peek into the time we spent with friends during Christmas break, here are a few snapshots. 

We stayed with some friends from church who invited us to spend a few delightful days with their extended family. 

It was a happy time. 

From the outside the home may not look very spacious, but it was very well laid out and had enough rooms to easily accomodate all of us. The home was in a sort of 'suburb' outside Brussels. 

The last course (before dessert) was a choice of cheese, a side of jam and a glass of wine, it's a course that was introduced to them by the French Belgians. 

It's called 'gourmet' and it is all about making your own little dishes on the cooker. It falls into the category of fondue, hobo-pies, etc. 

Most of the dishes you can make are a combination of egg, meat and veggies-- like an omelette. 

And then out comes the pannekoeken batter for dessert. 

We thoroughly enjoyed it. 

There and Back Again

There and Back Again
A tale of going to see The Hobbit
by Courtney Ridout

Where to begin . . . ah yes. With the tickets.
I am glad I have a husband who researches things, because if not, we would have had a wasted and disappointing first trip to the theater. Because, if you would like to see a movie in Rotterdam, especially if it is a movie worth seeing, you must reserve your tickets ahead of time and preferably online.

So we did just that. A week in advance I was the anxious owner of two carefully chosen (assigned!) seats in the large movie theater not far from our home for an Imax 3D showing of The Hobbit (part 1).
Then the Friday before THE weekend I printed off the tickets.

A co-worker had also seen The Hobbit and enjoyed it so we got to talking about it, and thankfully he dropped the hint that the printed tickets aren't the actual tickets, you need to arrive at the theatre 30 minutes in advance so that you can scan your print-out on the ticket machine in the theater which will print the actual tickets.

Sounded fine to us. So we had to get to the theatre a little early? Should be no problem. Except that on the day of the actual showing we were running a little bit late due to slightly uncontrollable circumstances. And in a fateful moment we re-read the fine print on the ticket papers. It said something like "you must validate your tickets 90-30 minutes before the showing time or your tickets may be re-sold to another customer" (in Dutch).

WHAT?? It was 38 minutes before the showing when read about this tiny little detail. Plus we were a 10 minute walk from the movie theater! I'm poor at math, but a first grader could tell that that added up to trouble.

We had been planning to grab a nice bite to eat from the train stations cheap and quick meal options (which was right on our way) so that we could be sustained through the 3 hour film. After all it was about 12:45 pm and neither of us had eaten more than a small bowl of granola for the day. And by this time that was hours past. We began to feel Hobbit-like panic at the thought of having to go another 3 hours without food.

Although the panic was building up inside us, we realized that getting to the movie theater on time was top priority so we doubled the pace. You would have thought that we were being hunted by wargs.

Our speed saved us, we arrived at the ticket machine exactly 31 minutes before the showing and with elf-like dexterity I punched in the numbers of our barcode so that the ticket machine surrendered the two tickets assuring us a place to sit and watch the movie.

That left us about a crunched 10 minutes to find, buy and eat whatever we were going to have for lunch (when the 10 minute commute either way was factored in). Back to the train station we went, this time it was hunger that increased our speed. All the sandwiches in the cheapest and best store were sold out, so we split up and found our own replacements and tried to choose the fastest moving lines.

Then, chewing, swallowing, and drinking all along the way back to the movie theater, we somehow finished in time to give our empty lunch bags a synchronized throw into the waste basket as we whipped the freshly printed tickets out with our other hand and presented them to the ticket checker.

Feeling just a little bit proud of our efficiency we strode up to our theater door just in time to find our assigned seats, put on our 3D glasses, nestle into our chairs and the previews began. We watched a cute preview that would have been rated R for language if it had been in the States (different words have different 'force' here because they are not the native language, and British English doesn't necessarily view the same words as 'strong' words).

But the rustling, whispering, talking, munching, slurping, etc. of the viewers during the previews was pretty disturbing. And I remembered that rumor had it that the audiences in this theater were the worst of The Netherlands for making disturbing noises during the films so I began to despair that my first viewing of The Hobbit would be a tainted one.

However, my fears were needless. Whether it was my eyes and ears that tuned all else off once the title appeared on the screen or if it was that the audience finally settled and silenced, I'm not sure, but all that matters is that I was able to soak in the whole movie with quite a bit of delight.

The only detail, and it is a small one, that may have tainted my experience was that I could not understand almost any of the orcish/goblinish, or elvish that was spoken. Not because the movie was lacking subtitles, no, it had subtitles in Dutch all through out the movie, therefore when it came time to translating the non-English script it just continued into the flow of Dutch subtitles, so I found myself listening to the orcs talk and wondering why I had never had trouble understanding their speech before . . when it hit me-- if I happen to be in The Netherlands when the next movie is released I had better be more advanced in orcish/elvish or Dutch or I'll have the same problem again.

Since I don't live in Middle Earth Dutch is the most practical option . . . but I'm still considering the others an option.

And incase you're wondering how much of this tale is true, all I will say in answer is a quote from Gandalf, "All good stories deserve some embellishment." -- although it sounded to me like Peter Jackson defending himself against the many people who carefully track where the movie leaves the path of the book. Luckily for him, I understand that line.