This morning (it was another beautiful sunny morning) we went venturing forth to the south side of the bridges in Rotterdam to try and track down where my grandparents and father used to live.
We looked up the addresses and tram lines on Google maps the night before so we had a rough idea where we were going and had written down the surrounding street names and tram stops. We caught the tram number 25 down from the “centraal” station – which being our first tram trip in the Netherlands was an attraction by itself (it feels like the right way to travel around here if you don’t have a bike). It was a Sunday so nearly everything was shut in the suburbs, but when we got off at the requisite tram stop, the area had a relatively tidy feel to it and people were wandering around visiting the few food stores still open on Groene Hilledijk.
After some walking about (we headed the wrong way in the first instance) we located the large park which is near Kouterstraat, and wandered through it until we found the street. Unfortunately we couldn’t find a number 4a anywhere along Kouterstraat.
Two story red brick townhouses lined the narrow street, and there were some small trees (but that was about it). I stopped to chat to some young girls (two teens and a toddler) who were sitting on the street and through an intricate system of hand language and basic English and Dutch we finely came to an understanding – they didn’t think there was a number 4 here either. So Greg and I took some photos and and wandered off back to the park – which appears not to have ponds in it anymore but a small canal down the side – and walked the other way to hunt down Molenwei.
It was a really lovely walk over to Molenwei. The streets are green. There are small well tended gardens, with colourful flowers in bloom. There were ducks wandering around the canals. We had more luck in Molenwei. We easily found number 55 and 57 which Dad thought were the numbers that Oma and Opa’s families used to live in. All they are all so alike on this stretch of suburb that substituting different numbers would leave you with a very similar impression.
The houses are more flat (vertically) than I ever pictured. I had a mental image of small front yards (like some of the previous streets we had walked through). But these houses faced straight onto the pavement and street, and were built straight up – like giant rectangular prisms). However, I did wander down the back pathways that run down the middle of the block – and the backyards are exactly as I pictured them. All small. Some with gardens, some paved. Most with small statues, and chairs and other such backyard objects. Much more personalised, and cosy than the front.
It was hard to imagine family members once living around here. But really nice to have visited.
So after this busy morning, we went back to the hotel, collected our bags and headed to the beach. Well – to Noordwijk to be more exact. The train trip was quick and picturesque. With all the rolling green fields, and perfect black and white cows it is not hard to picture this as a country for cheese making (and all other things dairy).
After the train trip, we had to board a bus, and then because we got off at slightly the wrong stop – I know nothing about that – walk for at least 30min (I gave up keeping track) with all our luggage to find our accommodation. By the time we got there I was a nice rosy red in the face – helped along by an uncharacteristically hot day in The Netherlands.
We chose the Bed and Breakfast because it was within our budget, but as it turns out it is a much better option than the hotels in town. We are staying right on the edge of town with a gorgeous view of the coloured stripes of flower fields running out to the seaside dunes in the distance.
Maria (whose house it is – we are occupying one of the bedrooms on the 2nd floor of a townhouse) shooed us out the door to go swimming while the hot weather lasted.
So we ended the day with a swim in the flat North Sea (in keeping with all things flat here), which is brown instead of blue like in Australia, and then had fish, chips, and salads at a beach side café.
Alice
