Monday 19th May

Up on time – we find it helps if we leave the blinds open – but still took a while to get away from the campsite. Stopped in at Magriete and Wim’s for coffee. Y & J were there too. Good chat then we left for Delft. We caught a ferry at some point and then parked on a canal and wandered into the old town. Many of the houses have tiny porches that are right on the canal. Very quaint old town. Two great churches and a beautiful market square – kids got to pretend they were in Venice again as they chased the pigeons around. Lots of Delft Blue ware – but all we bought was a hat for Kate.

Made our way up to Ermelo – the town that Andrew’s dad grew up in. We landed on cousin Betty’s doorstep – she tells us that there are about 4500 people in the town but you would never know it as it seems very spread out and green. Forrest everywhere. We are staying in a well-wooded campsite within the town boundaries with its own indoor and outdoor pools as well as a twisty waterslided. I can’t imagine that the kids are going to want to leave in a hurry.

We had a coffee and met Elsche (14) and Anneliene (11) who played with the kids. They had a great time and our kids are a bit mad that we won’t see them again. They had tadpoles and a Russian Dwarf Hamster – like the ones we had seen in KL. The kids had a good play with him and then played littlest petshop with Annalein. Elsche has a swing in her attic bedroom and one wall is completely black except for flames leaping up it. She is doing several of her high school subjects in English and has 15 hours of English a week at school. They are pretty serious about their foreign languages here.

Betty came with us to see Tante Corrie. We have seen her in Blacktown and it was good to catch up and hear what her family are up to. She gave the kids a pile of Lindt easter eggs – I think Mum and Dad might have to have a few.

We weren’t able to see Jan-Andreis who has a restaurant here (which was a shame because it would have been great for Isaac to meet his son who is 8 yrs old) but we checked out the old bakery (now a rug shop) where all 14 of the van Bentum kids were born.