Posts Tagged With: Winter

Fun in the snow (Or: Storm Darcy arrives in the Netherlands)

Marco and I went for a walk around lunchtime today to take a few pictures of the snow that fell. It was fairly cold, but that was mostly restricted to my fingertips.

First a picture of a very cold Hofvijfer. There were actually about 10-15 birds in this part of the water, although it is pretty difficult to see.

I didn’t even see the bird flying above when I was taking the picture. My only thought was of my freezing hands and wondering how fast I could take the picture and put my gloves back on.

Lange Voorhout. Off in the distance (and almost impossible to see) is the Escher museum (official website in English). Did you know it is possible to take a virtual tour of the museum? I found it pretty interesting, even if I felt like I had to move the mouse in the “wrong” direction to move around. Note: I’m not sure if they will keep the virtual tour up after the museum opens its doors again, so don’t wait too long.

Look at the snow on this car on the Lange Voorhout – you can see how hard the wind was blowing.

Handhaving grijpt in vanwege drukte tijdens sneeuwpret from regio15.nl in Dutch. In English: Security intervenes due to overcrowding during “snow fun”. The University of Delft’s library is built into a hillside, which means their roof is basically a grassy hill. They said it was okay to snow down the hill (provided no one uses sharp objects which might damage the roof underneath), but of course that meant massive crowds arrived by the afternoon. It is a very cool library design; I’ve been inside once.

Code Orange weather warning issued for Monday; Expect school closures, roadway problems from nltimes.nl. Code orange is a step lower than today’s code red, so there is some improvement. Monday should have been the first day that primary schools were allowed to re-open in the Netherlands, but the weather has definitely thrown a curveball in that regard.

Opps. Tram 16 derailed earlier this morning. Admittedly HTM (The Hague’s bus and tram provider) is still trying to ride most of their routes, with an adjusted schedule. NS, the national train service, said no trains would run today. Amsterdam’s buses and trams were running this morning but have since stopped. Amsterdam’s metro held out a bit longer, until earlier this evening, before that was stopped as well.

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Code red (Or: Brrr, cold and windy!)

Later this evening and tomorrow the Netherlands will be under a “code red” warning for Storm Darcy. Apparently the last time the entire country was under code red was February 2012, before I arrived in the Netherlands.

Dutch issue Code Red weather alert for snowdrifts, blizzard conditions from nltimes.nl. The expected snowfall itself varies anywhere from 2 to 6 inches; it really depends on who you are listening to. The wind is the real problem for traffic, since it will cause snow drifts and limited visibility. Some days it will feel like -15c to -18c (closer to 0F) next week, which is rare in this country. Some news sites are calling this a “once in ten years” event.

And of course, what you would expect to see in this situation…

Empty shelves, of course. That’s the bread area by an Albert Heijn (grocery store).

Dutch health services announce closure of all test and vaccination sites due to weather alert from nltimes.nl. Makes sense. Even the Dutch government is getting in on the action, posting a page about having “fun in the snow” in a responsible, corona proof way: Schaatsen, schaatsbanen, sneeuw en winterweer from rijksoverheid.nl in Dutch. Mainly rules about skating, snow ball fights, etc. Oh, and don’t forget to be inside by 21:00 for the curfew…

In other news: Legendary rock band Golden Earring stops after 60 years on ALS diagnosis from nltimes.nl. Golden Earring (English Wikipedia) is a Dutch rock band from The Hague, internationally known for their hit “Radar Love”, among others. Here is a YouTube link of Radar Love.

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Five Guys (Or: Time for a bit of fast food)

Marco graciously allowed me to change our plans; we picked up Five Guys for dinner tonight. We haven’t been in there a year and a half, probably… definitely not since the corona crisis started. Which is a bit strange, since it is much quieter there these days. Unfortunately for them.

That’s technically where the line would be, if there was a line. And of course there are no free shelled peanuts at the moment.

But ignoring that – woo, Five Guys! Hamburger with jalapeños, grilled onions and mustard for me, with cajun fries. This time we were smart and ordered “cajun on the side”, so we could add the spices ourselves. That meant the spice was a bit more uneven, but at least they were not completely coated in cajun spices this time.

One of the two message boards at Five Guys, a staple by all of their locations I think.

350 snow plows ready to keep Dutch roads clear over snowy weekend from nltimes.nl. Snoooowww! And cold. With lots of wind. So we’ll just stay inside all week? (Of course some Dutchies will strap on their ice skates and rush outside.)

As frost and snow looms, the Dutch draw up rules for Covid-proof skating from dutchnews.nl. See what I mean?

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Falafel (Or: A tasty Sunday meal)

On Sunday Marco and I had falafel for dinner. It is part of FOAM @ home, a pickup service offered every Friday.

It is one of those things – I am sure I have had falafel before (deep-fried balls made from ground chickpeas or lava beans, served in a pita). However I have no direct memory of it so it could indeed be the first time.

It was pretty tasty, a perfect light meal for a Sunday evening.

Eurovision planning live event in Rotterdam; In-person audience unknown from nltimes.nl. It seems like ages ago, but the Netherlands did win the Eurovision Song Contest back in 2019, which meant they were able to host the event in 2020. Only the 2020 event was cancelled due to the coronavirus, so they will be hosting the 2021 event instead.

Milder temps to give way for icy weekend from nltimes.nl. Brrr. Winter is coming back this weekend with temperatures around freezing and high winds. Also a chance of snow, but we will need to wait and see if that happens. Again, brrrrrr.

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Snow (Or: What is snow again?)

Buienradar (“Shower radar”) says parts of the Netherlands are looking at snow this weekend. As usually happens, it’s a minuscule amount, maybe an inch or two. It will also probably disappear within 24 hours when it starts raining later on Sunday – but hey, it is still snow!

Snow expected in NL this weekend from dutchnews.nl

It’s definitely been a few years since it has snowed here. Maybe Spring 2018? I posted a photo of the Hofvijfer with snow on top of the water that month. Either way, this weekend should be interesting.

In other news, we had tacos last night and Marco took a photo of his. Check it out:

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Beef stew (Or: A blast from the past)

Marco and I make beef stew in our slow cooker about once a year. The beef stew recipe we used this time was from Allrecipes. I like any recipe that only has two steps, don’t you? This time we did it on high setting (4-6 hours) because I had zero interest in stepping out of my nice warm bed before 09:00. In the end it cooked about 5 hours, with the last 30-45 minutes on medium instead of high.

The beef was so tender you could easily pull it apart with a fork. And as you can tell I think potatoes are the second hero of the dish, so I definitely made sure I had a lot of those. Finally, the bread in the background is from Albert Heijn and is their Liefde & Passie spelt brood (Love & Passion spelt bread – a bit hardier to help with the dipping).

The nostalgia is high with this dish. I loved eating this in the winter as a kid. This and chili are Marco and I’s favorite slow cooker dishes. Third place for me is probably pulled chicken.

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One night of frost (Or: Time to go ice skating?!)

Here is another Dutch stereotype for you: the Dutch love to go ice staking. As I mentioned a few weeks back, the Elfstedentocht (Wikipedia) is the event that stops the country – except for the fact that it has not been held since 1997 due to a lack of ice. Opps.

But the Dutch are an innovative folk and will find any way they can to go ice skating. A student from the university TU Twente developed a system to help keep ice frozen for longer. And this was put to the test on Sunday night as temperatures dropped under the freezing point. He put foam concrete under a layer of asphalt, and then added a layer of water on the asphalt. It froze overnight, creating an ice rink. The foam concrete helps retain the ice that forms, keeping the ice rink intact longer.

The best part? The ice skating rink can be found in the town Winterswijk, near Germany. The name translates loosely to “Winter neighborhood”, which is a great name in this case.

Video: Winterswijk skating rink open after one night of moderate frost from dutchnews.nl.

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Hot chocolate (Or: The case of the disappearing cookie)

Yesterday Marco, Roger and I made a cup of hot chocolate before sending Roger off back into the cold. Hot chocolate, whipped cream, chocolate powder, and a piece of speculaas cookie (Albert Heijn link to the cookie).

Keep your eye on that cookie…

… by the time Marco noticed, it was gone. Marco did say the bottom of his hot chocolate did taste rather speculaas-y, though.

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Christmas crafts (Or: The joy of the unexpected)

One gift that made Marco laugh (for a long time I might add!) was made by Marco’s dad and his wife:

The gift: two bottles of “melted snowman”

How cute is that? We now own two melted snowman! Complete with the melted ice (safely stored in a water bottle) and a tiny plastic bag containing his hat, nose, eyes, and mouth. Hehe!

Another craft from them was the yearly Christmas card – check it out!

Keeping company with the 2018 Christmas caed is an old tin (which previously had Lebkuchen in it) and a fully decked out library.

And a much deserved close up of the Christmas card, so that you can better see the intricacies of it:

Check it out…

Mooi! (beautiful)

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Just a bit of snow (Or: Buitenhof in the winter)

The Netherlands has been under a cold spell recently. The wind changed direction and started coming from Siberia. No joke. There was one day with a temperature that felt like -20c (-4f). Brrr! 

But it did bring out some nice photos, including one of mine:

Snow on the Buitenhof, The Hague.jpg

I am happy to report that the wind changed direction on Sunday, so the breeze bit of snow is now gone again. Not that I have anything against snow, but this country definitely doesn’t know how to deal with it.

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