On my last morning, the snow drifted down and made Utrecht look like a fairy tale.  It almost killed me to leave!  Of course, it had its co…

so I'm back in the UK now, doing the reflective thing.  I've lost, over the months, one scarf, one pair of leather gloves, a hat, and my dignity…

My goodness, it was cold by the time we went to Amsterdam, which my brother was insisting on referring to as "hamsterjam."  Of course by this ti…

We wanted to go to somewhere pretty, as well as the major cities, and Leiden is very close to Amsterdam, so it won.  Doug and I set off, Doug li…

I went to Hortus in December, which is not the traditional time to go to Botanical Gardens but we wanted to get warm. I realise that this is a poor …

When Doug and I were planninghis trip, the only thing that he was clear about was that he wanted to see Rotterdam.  I asked him why, and he star…

Doug and I shivered our way off the train and into Olivier for dinner.  The greeter explained that there's be an hour or so before we could sit …

I had promised Doug some noodles from Yam Yam noodles To Go (sic) and could I find it?  Could I heck.  It was not behind the Binnestad.&nbs…

Scheveningen was one of my favorite places on the Netherlands, so it was the first place I wanted to show Doug when he got here.  Off we went, a…

On my last day alone in the Netherlands, I had a busy day planned - two museums and a meeting with Sweetski, whose real name is Rudolph, and had invi…

FOAM is a photography museum in Amsterdam, and it is brilliant, although it is currently renovating bits. it is light, airy, and has a little shop a…

Eva and I had been planning to go to the Dickens Festival in Deventer for a while.  For me, there were two main reasons: 1) The Muppet Christma…

Inge, a friend from work, had invited me to Enschede for the day.  Enschede is way up in the North of the Netherlands, not far from the border, …

Friday was the day I had decided to go to CoBRA.  I was late - a bit of a staying in bed too long incident - but I thought, well, it can't be to…

CoBRA is dedicated to the European post war art movement of the same name, based in Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Brussels. The permanent collection incl…

Today was my last day at work, and I was feling a bit blue.  The thought of returning to the UK - a land entirely devoid of good coffee, where I…

The 13th is my last day at Nivel, and next week, I have to go back to rainy England and learn to be a healthcare manager.  No more turning up to…

Il Pozzo is an Italian restaurant on the Oudgraacht in Utrecht, where I had a leaving do. It was really, really nice. I had hopes for it. To the…

Apertivo is a café bar in Utrecht, and this review is for the bar Midweek. I have this feeling that all this might not be true on a weekend - it lo…

This is the chocolate museum of the Lindt chocolate company. The displays cover the manufacturing of chocolate, where it grows (including a greenhou…

On Sunday, my long awaited trip to Germany to see Köln and meet Lauro and Luci came around at last. Of course, I overslept.  My flat …

Cologne Cathedral is a spectacular cathedral in Cologne. A UNESCO heritage sight, it is one of the largest churches in the world, and seriously tall…

I had stuff I wanted to do today.  Sensible stuff - notes for my appraisal, study things, that kind of thing.  I went to the office, sat do…

The aboriginal art museum is a small, private museum in Utrecht dedicated to showcasing contemporary aboriginal art. It is covered by the museumkaar…

This museum specialises in mechanical music, from chiming clocks through the ancestors of record players and automatic violin machines to enormous ca…

Coffee Lovers is a café near the Maas and the library in Maastricht. it serves excellent tea, made out of real tea leaves that turn up in a little …

One of the few places that I still really wanted to go to in the Netherlands was Maastricht, a small city tucked a very long way away near France and…

This is a cool, slightly studenty café (we'd probably call it a Bistro at home) with nice decor near the Lieve Vrou church in Maastricht. The a…

Michel and Edith, who I visited in Den Bosch last week, invited me to Edith's parents house for Sinta Klaas dinner this week.  They live quite a…

Sometimes, and especially before Christmas, a girl has to knock all the intellectual stuff on the head, put her museumkaart away, and go shopping.&nb…

OK, I know. Shopping free? The woman's mad :) Well, put it this way. None of the shops have a cover charge, and no-one is making you spend mone…

Olivier is a café restaurant near the station and Hoog Catherine shopping centre in Utrecht, inside an old church. It specialises in Belgian beers …

Hieronymous Bosch was a mediaval painter, famous today for his surreal, disturbing works about Hell and morality. most of his most famous works of a…

Den Bosch wasn't somewhere I'd planned to back go to, but Michel and Edith invited me to dinner and i was proved happily wrong about the need for a r…

Crossing Border is an arts/ music/ literature festival in Den Haag. This year, guests ranged from Black rebel Motorcycle Club through Kula Shaker an…

Once again, it's going to be a tough entry to make make sense.  OMG, OMG, LOL, etc. Crossing Border is a festival held annually in Den Haag.&nb…

Dinner with friends in Utrecht. 

Eyecon is the Spanish Restaurant at the Copenhagen airport. I ate their because it became apparent that I would just have to cope with an expensive …

On Sunday, Allie had to get a very early flight.  This left me in Copenhagen with a free day.  Well, I thought, I only have about five hour…

Louisiana is a museum of modern and contemporary art on the coast near Copenhagen, with a sculpture garden, a restaurant, and good views of Sweden ac…

This probably belongs in the food blog, and also, I think I might have spelled the placename wrong because the place I was staying in and the place o…

On the Saturday, Allie and I took our trip to the Louisiana museum.  We left about lunchtime, and it was roughly an hour's journey to Humlebaek …

mama rosa's is a Mexican restaurant in the main pedestrianised shopping area in Copenhagen. Spread over several floors, it is pleasantly lit and dec…

once we finished at the lab, Allie's supervisor Salim took us into Copenhagen.  We went shopping on the long shopping street, and got dinner in …

Tivoli Gardens is an amusement park in Copenhagen. It's one of the oldest in the world, and when I went, had re-opened for teh Christmas season and …

I had to get up at 3.15am to catch my flight here, and when I arrived, I honestly felt that parts of me were still floating over Germany somewhere mi…

The music hall is a large live music venue at ArenA boulevard in Amsterdam, and a great venue. The facilities include a well staffed cloakroom, enou…

It is going to be very, very hard to maintain a standard of comprehensibility here.  I mean, the temptation is to either just revert totally to …

When I visited the museum, they'd swapped a fair bit of their collection for a collection from Copenhagen for a temporary exchange. This means that …

Sheviningen is the beach near Den Haag, which is a two-strip tram ride from the city centre. There is a wide, sandy beach (apparently there is a nud…

One of the great family activities in the clan Sarah Elaine's Parents, is going on day trips in inappropriate weather.  As I spent several forma…

On Saturday I went to Nijmegen with my flatmate, Eva, who's from Indonesia, and Ilka, who's from Berlin.  We had an invite from a friend of Eva'…

On Friday, I finally had to give in and learn to use strippenkaarts for the buses.  Michel, my colleague, had invited me to watch his band …

I went out for some food and a drink with my colleagues, and it was a good night.  I'd been to a conference in the hospital in Hardwijk - I thou…

Winkel van Sinkel is a large café restaurant by the canal in Utrecht. I've walked past this place almost every day for months, and never had anyone…

Museumnaacht is an absolutely fantastic idea.  40 museums across Amsterdam open their doors to you, and some very interesting types of performan…

This weekend was busy, and a little strange.  And it started with didgeridoos. Actually, it started with one of my characteristic little wander…

NEMO is a science centre, aiming at an audience of children. It is also host to a city beach in summer, and there is a great view from the roof. …

The Hermitage is the world famous museum of St Petersburg. because of the size of its collection, it can't show everything at once, so it has opened…

The Van Gogh museum is big. When I went, there was also a special exhibition on Barcelona at the turn of the century, which was quite interesting to…

I went for a bit of a wander, and these are some of the photos.  The canals have lots of little carvings around them - this is one of my curre…

Boom Chicago use a combination of improv and scripted comedy, along with video sketches set in Amsterdam. The night I went was the Wild West show, w…

Last Friday, Jenneth and I finally had a chance to meet up, and we went to Boom Chicago on the Leidseplein.  I'll post a proper review here on t…

Monday was Lisa's last night in town, so I left work a little early - I'll work longer later and catch up - and we went for another walk in Utrecht.&…

Stairway to heaven is a large, loosely rock themed bar in Utrecht, and this is sort of a placeholder review. When we went, it was a monday night and…

On Sunday Lisa and I went to Amsterdam, on the very cool double decker train.  We then got muddled up and lost, looking for the sex museum.&nbsp…

Sushi is a small Japanese restaurant up a side street a couple of blocks from Dam Square. A set four course meal for two, tea, plum wine and reasona…

The tour of the Dom Tower costs 7.50€, 6.50€ for students, and is not covered by the museumkaart. You have to take the tour to go up the tower, …

Restaurant Amor is a Tapas and Spanish bar on the Oudgraacht in Utrecht (not the one I found on my first night, a different one). Tapas for two, wat…

The night we went, Café Beurs was showing the final of the rugby world cup. I have decided not to blame the café for the English defeat - South Af…

This weekend, my friend Lisa came over from England to visit.  She arrived about 11am, and we left her suitcase in a locker at the station and w…

The Catharijneconvent (Catherine Convent) museum in Utrecht is dedicated to Christian Religious Art, and as it was free museum day and I'd slept in t…

The maritime museum in Rotterdam is about 10 Euros to get in, although I used my museumkaart so it didn't cost me anything. On balance, I think I'm …

Peter, Kati and I went to Rotterdam on Saturday, and I liked it a lot.  Rotterdam has a lot more cranes than I'm used to seeing in the Netherlan…

The Euromast is very, very good. And I'm giving it five stars, because I have a new ambition. Just nobody tell my mum. ;-) The Euromast is a la…

I really should get more imaginative with the titles! On Saturday, I went to Gouda with Peter (one of my colleagues) and his girlfriend Kati.  …

Walk to Wok serves good noodles fast. This is as much, really, as you ought to need to say. Walk to Wok is near the Oudegracht, on the way to the…

The Centraal museum, Utrecht, is one of the more unusual museums I've been to recently. It spans an unusually wide timespan, for a start. From the …

On Saturday I went back to Den Haag, mostly because the Super Furry Animals are playing a mini-festival in November and I would rather go to a festiv…

Just briefly, then, on Thursday I went to my collegue Michel's wedding.  It was lovely. The ceremony was held in the town hall, which I thi…

There are many things I was not told when I came to the Netherlands.  No-one warned me, for example, that crossing the bike lanes here is a bit …

I am now living in a little room on the edge of Lombok, a really diverse bit of Utrecht about 5 minutes from the station and 20 minutes from wor…

There was singing, there was wine, there are some very, very unflattering photos of me.

This morning, as I came up to breakfast, some guy was watching porn.  It turns out that I am actually a terrible prude.  Porn, per say, I d…

B and B Utrecht is a hostel just outside of the main town centre in Utrecht. The accomodation, physically speaking, was OK. The bathrooms were damp…

I'm counting on all of my facebook friends to point out to me if I'm being dull, OK?  There's only one person I know who's all that interested i…

Boring entry, I'm afraid.  I am sitting in my room in my parents' house.  Me and all the assorted detritus that you end up leaving at your …