In the heart of the city centre of Den Bosch is located this modern, and a bit mediterranian, restaurant called Picasso. The menu seemed very nice and complete, so we had a lot of choises to make. I don't think you could orders something untastfull here. The food looked great at the dishes and it tasted as we supposed it would. We had to wait a while because of bad communication (it was quite busy and sunny at the terrace), but the food and all the overall service. Price +-35 - 40 euros incl. drinks.

Rotterdam-Sliedrecht Zwijndrecht-Breda-Tilburg-Den Bosch

Drove up to Den Bosch with two colleagues from Asia for the day.  As a Sunday in the Netherlands, almost everything was closed, but it helped make it easier for us to find parking and enjoy the city without the crowds.

Cafe and restaurant "De Stip" is a small and cozy place in the "Uilenburg", an old part of Den Bosch. It is one in a row of small restaurants, but in my view it is the most special and has the best food. The founder of the restaurant was a hobby cook who invited friends over to eat at his place. When the word spread about the good food, people started to show up uninvited. This evolved into a restaurant. The location of today's "De Stip", however, is not the original one. The old building was torn down to make room for the big bank at the corner of the street. What remains of "De Stip"'s history is, that there are no menues. The waitress will recite to you all the dishes that are on offer (10 or more) and you'll have to concentrate to remember what you'd like. But don't worry, they'll repeat the list for you. They serve meat, fish and pasta dishes, most a combination of different kitchens. Their spare ribs are famous in Den Bosch. The staff is young, friendly and efficient. It is not possible to book a table. Since the place is very popular, prepare for having to wait for a table, but that usually doesn't take much longer than 15 minutes.

:-(

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 return trip.  having over slept a little - it was the morning after Crossing Border and I'd sort of banged my head off of a wall on the way home, long story, my hood makes me look like Kenny from South Park and I didn't see the building - so I only had an hour once I got there to explore before I met Michel and Edith outside the town hall.  The weather was horrible - a thin cold drizzle.  Den Bosch was pretty enough to make up for both that and the annoying fact my 6-month old camera's zoom is broken, and I have no idea where the receipt could be.  So most of these photos were taken on my wander, and many of them really needed that zoom! 

I met Michel and Edith slightly late, having been distracted by several statues on the way, and we went to the Bosch arts centre, dedicated to Hieronymous Bosch, who is top of the list of people whose imaginations I would not like to be in.  Sin, death, demons, and people doing really improbable looking things to each other in giant floating shoes or flying fish galleons.  And Jesus, of course.  A bit of redemption.  But mostly flaming cities and bloody torture.  Which makes it all sound really depressing, but it's so weird that it's actually quite a fun trip!  Especially as to anyone who watched David Bowie in Labyrinth as many times as I did, the demons mostly look like muppet goblins...

Dinner was great.  Edith made traditional Dutch things, and a really lovely soup.  We ended up talking really late and I stayed the night, leading to the highly glamorous going to work in yesterday's t-shirt thing that I haven't done since Uni - I am definately recovering my lost adolescence!  But luckily they had spare toiletries etc, and I was really happy because I didn't have to get on the nacht train by myself.

Hieronymous Bosch was a mediaval painter, famous today for his surreal, disturbing works about Hell and morality. most of his most famous works of art are scattered around the world - there are several in teh Prado in Madrid, for example. But Den Bosch, his hometown, is host to a huge collection of painted, good quality reproductions of his work. The museum is in a former church, which in itself is stunningly beautiful, full of mosaics and stained glass windows. Against this background are set the reproductions and a collection of large models of some of the most famous creatures, demons and characters from his paintings. An audio guide is available in English, and offers a tour starting in the tower of the church and working its way down. It was very interesting. Guided tours with a person are only available in Dutch. In the basement is a recreation of Bosch's studio. There is a shop and a café. The museumkaart is not valid here.

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 think is probably more or less 17th century - that's the result of a quick wikisearch just now so don't quote me.  The interior is trying very hard to look more mediaval; the wedding ceremony was held in a small chamber with sort of embossed leather-y stuff on the walls.  There were glass chandeliers, room for maybe thirty people to sit down, and if I thought that a townhall wedding would be like that in Swindon I'd be more than happy to skip the stately home-church-bungee circus that most people I know go in for!  They walked in to a Nirvana song, the bride was absolutely stunning and everyone seemed very happy indeed, and I wished I knew Dutch so that I could have congratulated people in Dutch rather than loudly in English.  It makes you feel like a character in an Edwardian novel to have to behave like that!  The photos were nice too - very quick, very humorous, and none of the posing for hours with your foot at right angles to your leg that wears on the nerves at a British wedding. 

Peter (another collegue; he's from Hungary) and I weren't going to go back to work or to a relative's place (for obvious reasons) before the party at 9pm, so we went to the cathedral of Saint John, which is stunning.  There's some intersting newish looking windows amongst the ancient ones and a pretty amazing looking organ, which I'd love to hear played some time. 

After that, we decided to go and sit and talk rubbish in a cafe for a while, which we did, then we went for a curry.  I have no idea how we stumbled across the only curry house in Den Bosch; some sort of weird British homing instinct, I guess!  It was really nice, and right across the square from the town hall again.  After that, we went to the party, drank some tea, and listened to (amongst other things) Michel sing a love song to Edith and someone else sing a Yiddish love song; I don't think I've ever been to a wedding with so much talent kicking around in the room.  I got a late train back, got home to bed, and had had a really, really nice day. 

Ryanair again. I visit Janneke who flatted with us in Auckland in 2001. Nice apartment in Den Bosch. Nice city. They like Indonesian food here alot (I guess it's because it was a colony for like 400 years).

I like holland. Must come back.