So Long to The Netherlands... Until Next Time

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After a few intense days in the Netherlands, we thought we would take it fairly easy for the last few days of our visit. So, on January 2, we paid a visit to den Haag (The Hague) and we thoroughly toured through Utrecht the next day.

Getting around in the Netherlands is easy. From Utrecht, we hopped on a train, and about 40 minutes later we found ourselves in den Haag. The Hague is home to the Netherlands Parliament (but is not the capital), and is famous for being home to the International Criminal Court. We however, stumbled across the International Court of Justice, and were confused as to whether that was the same as the International Criminal Court... turns out, it isn't. So, we still haven't been to the International Criminal Court (guess we will have to go back to the Netherlands another time!), but the Peace Palace (which houses the International Court of Justice) is a very beautiful!

By now we were starting to feel a bit peckish, and we just happened to stroll past an English tea shop. So, we decided that we would go in for a tea and a nibble on something tasty. The menu talked at great length about their 'High Tea' service... but that was at a different time. So, we decided that we were having "Low" tea. Then, we placed our order and realized that none of us were having tea at all... so it became "No Tea". Nonetheless, the scones that we had were absolutely amazing. They served them with lemon curd, whipped cream and raspberry jam. Lemon curd is basically the lemon part of lemon merrangue pie. Combine all of these tasty ingredients, and you basically have a taste explosion! So yummy!

On the way to The Hague, our train passed through Gouda, which stimulated our craving for excellent Dutch cheese... so, we also visited a cheese shop! After purchasing a kilogram or so of cheese, we visited Parliament and made our way back to Utrecht. We had a nice dinner, played some Dutch Blitz, and went to bed.

The next day was our last day The Netherlands, so we decided to spend the day in Utrecht touring through the city. It was extremely rainy and windy. Very, very windy. At some points, we almost got blown over!

In the evening, we went out for a nice dinner with Annelie and Sander to cap off our great visit. Tomorrow... we move to London!

Thanks Annelie and Sander for being such wonderful hosts and showing us such a great time!

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Photos

Welcome to den Haag
As is the case with every town we have been to in the Netherlands, The Hague is full of beautiful old canals.

Welcome to den Haag
As it turns out, Mike can also stand in front of the canals...

The Cheese Shop
After purchasing 1kg of cheese (mmm...), the shop owner kindly allowed us to take a quick photo

Building that the Tram drives through
Just imagine living in a building that the local train actually drives through... Fancy that thought? Then you should move here!