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2014 trip to The Netherlands, Denmark and Norway


ElgaKoster

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Right now I am far away from home and busy attending the annual summer miniature school in Tune Denmark. Since the sun woke me up so early I thought I would start telling you about some of the things I have seen so far.

On Friday I went to the Zuiderzee museum in Enkhuizen, The Netherlands, for me it was quite interesting because of the links this area have with my own country's history. It was from here that the VOC's ships sailed to the Cape of Good Hope, for those who are interested, here is a link with a bit of the early history.

http://www.sahistory.org.za/cape-town/dutch-settlement

The museum at Zuiderzee tells the story of how people lived in the early 1900's in the area, the houses etc were all moved from their original locations and rebuilt at the museum, here is some more on the history.

http://www.zuiderzeemuseum.nl/en/44/discover/history/

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One of the tiny houses.

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A bandsaw in the woodworkers shop, it was powered by a steam engine in the attic above.

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A table saw, I would have loved to see it in action.

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This little summer house can turn 360 degrees, Josje and I thought it was probably intended for invalids with tuberculosis etc, this way you could get as much sun on you as you wanted/needed!

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I found the roof construction of this farm house very interesting as it looks exactly like the roof construction of the Cape Dutch houses.

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Josje spotted my surname on a grave stone that forms part of the church floor in the museum :-)

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I want one of those little summer houses!  Thanks for posting the pictures!  All very interesting.

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Thank you for taking your time to share all these wonderful pictures/links. The little turning summer house is really interesting.

 

Hope you and Josje are having fun! I look forward to hearing all about your class.

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Yes Bonni, although it was stuck or locked, but Josje has seen it working before.

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On Saturday we went to Egeskov Castle in Denmark, we only got there at about 3pm in spite of the fact that we left Josje's house at 5:40am, it was the start of the school holidays and towards the latter part of the trip we hit a lot of very busy traffic. So we only had time for exploring the castle, there are quite a few outbuildings with huge collections of vintage cars, motorcycles etc, more than enough to fill a day.

http://www.egeskov.dk/en

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The front of the castle.

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A side view through an arch in the hedge.

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And the back.

I was a bit disappointed that many of the rooms in the castle were not open to the public and that there were no information plaques on any of the furniture as to date, country of origin etc.

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A lovely bed in a bedroom.

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With a wonderful view of the gardens and country side.

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The salon/drawing room.

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The back garden from one of the attic windows.

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On the way out we discovered an exhibition of Victorian fashions, this one was my favorite, I just love the color combination and that it is so feminine.

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I joined up with Elga in Copenhagen after Tune....... We have been on a non stop whirlwind tour of this city from its main sights to back allies, all by bicycle! I sure we'll have more pictures when we get them downloaded.

But now for a small world story..... Last night we were sitting out on the street at a little restaurant on sort of a back street..... And here you do sit out in the street. Anyway a constant stream of people walk by as you sit enjoying perfect weather, food and company. I look up and see a woman walking by alone and think, wow she really does look like someone I have talked to many times at miniature shows, mainly Chicago..... And I think no, it couldn't be..... Maybe she only looks 90% like her..... Well an hour or so later she walked by again with her husband and this time we made eye contact...... Yes it was her. Kathy from Chicago, just strolling the streets of Copenhagen on the way to dinner running into other miniaturists from the US and South Africa....... I guess this miniature thing is a small word after all?

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Copenhagen has been great fun so far, Bill is an excellent tour guide, having been here so many times he knows all the little quiet back streets and interesting places off the normal tourist route. I am heading out to Norway later today to spend a week visiting my brother and his family and should have some time there to post more about the trip. So far the weather has been great, sunny warm days with wonderful blue skies just about every day since I have arrived in Amsterdam almost two weeks ago. Yesterday we went up the round tower in Copenhagen to see the city from the top, here are a few photos of the tower and the magnificent views from the top.

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I'll just add that this tower was finished in 1642, it was built as an observatory. It is an amazing piece of work, there is a spiral ramp inside which you walk up to reach the top..... However Peter the Great rode his horse to the top... Guess he was in a hurry.

Here is more about it....

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rundet%C3%A5rn

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I thoroughly enjoyed my four days in Copenhagen, it is a beautiful city, here are some photos of buildings etc that I took over the few days as we cycled all over the place.

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From Copenhagen I went to Oslo with a night ferry, I way prefer traveling with a ship above being squashed like a sardine into a plane seat :-)

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Oslo as we came into the harbour.

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My brother who lives in Norway picked me up and we went to the Norwegian folk museum in Oslo, some of the buildings were unfortunately closed for some unknown reason. Right at the entrance they had an exhibition of toys, dollhouses and children's furniture. I thought this baby feeding chair must have belonged to a rather wealthy family.

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Buildings built in different styles and materials.

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Pretty South African pink pelargoniums at the museum's cafe.

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A small wooden chest with iron strap work in the museum's bank.

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The next day we went to a small town called Mandal that were buzzing with all the holiday makers that were enjoying the very hot weather in their boats.

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One of the oldest buildings in Mandal.

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Over the weekend we spend some time at a friend of my brother's holiday cabin next to a beautiful lake...mmh, I would love to have a view like this from my workroom!

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Today we went to the natural museum in Kristiansand, I don't think I realized before how big bears can be...I don't ever want to meet a real live one, those claws and teeth look pretty dangerous!

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Next we visited Gimle Gård, a house that were built in the late 1700's and stayed in the same family until 1982 when it became a museum. We weren't allowed to take any photos in the house but I found this link with four pages of photos of the house and some of the history.

http://www.agderkultur.no/Gimle%20nett%20W/Side1.htm

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Thank you Elga.  I especially like the small wooden chest.  How small is it? Wish you had more views of it. Is there a way of locking it?  I also like the Gimle Gard house. Interesting facade with ll the columns.

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Bill, I did take a few more photos as I thought it might be a nice project to do in miniature, it does have a keyhole so it must have locked. Size...I am guessing about 10" wide.

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Thanks for all the pictures.  It looks like a beautiful and fascinating place to visit.  The chest caught my eye too, and I'm sure you can guess why. :)

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