Horse Market

---

Geo: 51.8664, 4.66181

The annual Alblassedam horses market is a special event that unites the community. Once a year, residents, ex residents, family, friends and associates from Alblassedam congregate here to meet, catch up and enjoy the day together. It was a nice relaxing day after the exhausting nature of our trip to Amsterdam. We arrived in Alblassedam this morning around 10.30am, first to exploring a typical stall marketplace in the city streets. Its all the standard market bits and pieces; handcrafts, clothes, ingredients, electronics, food and homewares, with one important stock item for sale. The festival traditionally began with and involved the sale of horses. Today, this is still a big part of the market, horses and ponies for sale. We even entered the raffle to win a pony. We tried some Dutch treats here, poffertijes, herrings and olibollen. The latter, taking me back to my childhood when oma made them. Delicious with icing sugar.
In the spirit of the festival, re meeting family and catching up, who would have thought an Australians return to Alblassedam could follow this endeavor. Marielle and Jan Struik surprised us with their presence, especially as they were meant to be on holiday in Germany. It was great seeing them. It was also lovely to see Betts again, mother of Jan V and sister to my Oma. She actually reminds me of Oma a fair bit. It was a bit sad to say goodbye at the end of the day.
The evening was spent sitting in the sun watching bicycle races with the family, Jan and Marielle even found us again. Both Jans and Joke also enjoyed the evening sun, managing to bump into and chat with many old friends.
Tomorrow is our last day with the Vonks, and last full day in Holland for now. We really must book some accommodation in Berlin.

---