Swan Song

I am ending my blog with one of my favourite pictures. I captured it in the France about two years ago.  A lone swan must have felt threatened by Zonder Zorg with its large leeboard as he made repeated Kamikaze-like attacks, but diverted at the last minute. Diverting was a wise decision as the swan stood no chance against a 64ft iron skûsje. 

Thank you for reading my blog.

Cheers.
Edith

Celebrations and Felicitations

This painting has accompanied me through numerious household moves and is always the first to be placed on the wall. Once again the painting has made its way back onto the walls of the old loft. It was a gift from my parents and was painted by my father, who was practicing toward being an art forger. The original was painted by Jan Steen, who used his family, including the dog as models in his paintings. Most of his paintings displayed a sense of chaos and disarray, which led to a Dutch proverb, referring to a mess as "the household of Jan Steen".  

This setting depicts a family celebration and we have much to celebrate Genevieves 34th birthday. It is also my grandson Xander's 3rd birthday. I'll drink to that!  

Elfstedentoch - Eleven Cities Tour

The Eleven Cities Tour, which is a skating tour nearly 200 kilometers long. It is held as a speed skating match with 300 contestants and a leisure tour of 16,000 skaters.

The tour leads past eleven historical cities of the Frisian Province. It starts in Leeuwarden and goes to Sneek, IJlst, Stavoren, Hindeloopen, Workum, Bolsward, Harlingen, Franeker, Dokkum and back to Leeuwarden.

The tour takes place only in winters when the ice reaches 15 centimeters thick along the entire course. The last tours were held in 1985, 1986 and 1997 and all skaters must be members of the Association of the Eleven Frisian Cities; a starting permit is required. Skaters must collect a stamp in each city and at an additional three secret checkpoints and complete the course before midnight of the tour day. The finish point of the trip is on a canal near Leeuwarden called the Bonkevaart.

Since the Elfstedentocht is a rare event when temperatures drop below zero for a few days, the country gets excited, and excitement intensifies as the temperature remains sub-zero. The day before the tour many Dutch flocks to Leeuwarden to celebrate the "Night of Leeuwarden," a city-wide street party. 

There had been mention of skating the eleven cities as far back as 1760 and it is a part of the Friesian tradition. In 1890 Pim Mulier conceived the idea of an organized tour with the first one being held in 1909. The winters from 1939 to 1941 were severe, with the race being run in each of them. The 1940 race ran three months before the German Invasion of the Netherlands and had 3000 competitors who started at 05:00 on the 30th of January. The arrival at the finish of the first five skaters at 16:34 made the front page of the Dutch Newspapers.

The 1963 race was classified as "hellish" when only 69 of 10,000 were able to finish the race in -18ºC temperatures and a harsh eastern wind. The next race was held in 1985, and with the more than two-decade gap, skates, clothing and training had advanced and changed. 

The 1985 race ended prematurely because of thawing and skaters were taken off the ice by 22:00. A skater named WA Van Buren managed to finish. Prince Willem-Alexander, who had skated under that pseudonym is now King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands. Van Buren means from the neighborhood.

The House Painter

House painting has been a tradition trade in my family for centuries. I grew up among paint cans, the smell of turpentine and solvents with used brushes soaking in it. Paint splattered ladders and coveralls not far away. The paint at the time was oil based and slow drying and Hydrated Lime used for white washing. The lime was water based, inexpensive and could be tinted safely for indoor as well as outdoors.

When I entered the vacated loft last month, it was looking at an empty canvas just waiting for paint. I decide to lime-wash the brick walls as it adheres to mortar and brick. It's usage in the restoration of old brick buildings. I found a supplier nearby that still sold large bags of it.

The application of the lime on the brick was relatively easy, just messy as the consistency of the lime is thin. It takes a day to dry thoroughly and to turn white.  The result was pleasing and decided to do the ceilings at the same time. I did a test in a small room, but it requited far too many coats to cover the dark wood. I went for regular ceiling paint with two coats to cover sufficiently. 

The old loft is now much lighter, brighter and I am pleased with the results.

The kayaker

A Day InThe Life of Sequitur
I had lived in at the foothills for Mt Seymour for more than twenty years. Our house overlooked Indian Arm and the small harbour of Deep Cove.

I became a kayaker after taking a few lessons in its little harbour. I had always rented a kayak in the Village and had the good fortune to pick a Current Design in Kevlar. I didn’t have to store it, maintain it, nor haul it in and out of storage. I would call ahead of time and they would haul out my favourite kayak and have it ready. 

After paddling for two hours in Indian Arm, I would return the wet gear and walk back home. The drawback was that when kayaking off the Island, I had to rent equipment and the gear was for the tourist rental market, of lesser quality and stronger durability.

I had sold the family home in Deep Cove and moved to Parksville on the Island. The housing complex was right on the water and ideal for a quick paddle.

 I also bought a new kayak to take out on longer excursions.

The Broken Group Islands not far away and further up the coast just outside Telegraph Cove is Johnson Strait known for whale watching, to name a few destinations.

I have a passion for being on the water, to go into the remoteness that British Columba’s coast have to offer.

Paddling and camping with friends, to see the animals in the wild, know when to keep your distance and always keep an eye open for a bear.

Schokland - An Island On The Mainland

I first came across this painting in 1975 in the Zuider Zee Museum in Enkhuizen. The Museum was much smaller then and to me, this was one of the fascinating exhibits. The painting was intriguing, filled with drama and tension as it depicted the last days before the evacuation of Schokland, then an island in the Zuider Zee.

Archeological excavations show that the island had once been part of the mainland and had been inhabited 6500 years ago. Excavations also show that 2000 years ago the area was starting to lose chunks to the sea. Gradually Schokland became a peninsula and then an island. During the ninth and tenth centuries, the inhabitants started building terps and dikes to keep the remaining land. By the nineteenth century, the farmland on the island had disappeared and the Islanders became fishermen. The reduced island was plagued by floods 

The small island was divided in two, with the northern part governed by Amsterdam and the remainder by Emmeloord. It was also divided as Catholic and protestant and they were strongly against intermarriage of faiths. With an ever shrinking gene pool and seventy-five percent of the inhabitants on welfare, the 650 residents were evacuated by Royal decree in 1859. The Schoklanders were relocated to surrounding villages which had a mix of Catholics and Protestants.

The former island now stands in the midst of a polder. Noordoostpolder was reclaimed from the sea in 1942 and now houses a museum and the restored church and has parts of the dikes still visible. In 1995 it became the first UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Netherlands.

The angry Zuider Zee, to which the island once surrendered, has been replaced with a sea of potatoes. 

Return to the Loft

We had rented out of loft apartment for nearly two years, while I rented a small apartment close to the airport. My newly rented apartment was 450 square feet (137.16 meters) and conveniently located above the Skytrain station and stores. 

The view from the 17th floor was stunning as I watched sunsets over Vancouver Island and at night watched the string of lights in the sky as flights arrive at YVR airport. My lease for the year had expired with no extension given. Not that I wasn’t the perfect tenant, but the fact that there was a loophole in the renter's agreement. The apartment owner could increase the rent significantly on a new lease only; giving them the opportunity to maximize the rent by $300 which does not include a parking space. The increase made it unafordable for temporary accommodation and it was time to return to the loft. 

I gave my tenant at the loft the required two months notice and he found a new place right away giving me a month to come back to the loft.  With the now empty space, being like a clean canvas, it gave me the opportunity to give it a well-deserved paint over. 

My previous tenant has also left me with an entire wall painted black. Chalkboard black, which made the entrance rather dark and was on my list for textured wallpaper.

 I had invited Annelies, my granddaughter, to draw on the wall as this was the only time she was allowed to do just that before wallpapering. 

The loft had been a telephone exchange building, built in 1913 of red brick and wooden beams. About eight years ago it was converted into living space. The plank ceilings which were left natural has darkened and aged through time. The roughly cut planks placed on it sides to form the roof and the flooring has a simplistic design of their own. Supported by exposed Douglas Fir beams are also used as posts throughout the building.