Dutch Travel Friends

12/04/2016

FACTS Planetron
• The planetarium was in mid-1989 opened by astronaut Jerry Ross.
• A dome screen with a diameter of 15 meters is equivalent to a surface area of more than 350 square meters.
• The dome has room for 123 visitors. When it gets dark in the hall, there is a realistic starry sky visible to the visitors.
• The telescope of the planetarium is a Wurzburg radar of the Germans in the Second World War. With a diameter of 60 cm by far the largest optical telescope in the Netherlands. The telescope weighs 3500 kg.

18/03/2016

The Dwingelderveld National Park consists not only of heath, but also forests and juniper bushes and villages. The northern part of today's national park has been wooded since the mid-nineteenth century. Resulting in beautiful pine forests like Lheederzand and Lheebroekerzand, There is also a large radio telescope, with on the edge of the area a planetarium (near Dwingeloo).

Trail Telescope - 4 km
This walk goes along the Dwingeloo telescope and along the Smitsveen. Way too beautiful views over the vast heath. Start: P- Town Old Hoogeveensedijk, Lhee. Follow white route.

15/03/2016

Roaming in the National Park Dwingelderveld can give you a unique experience of vast purple plain where vipers are sunbathing next to the bike path, where the shepherd with his flock of grazing sheep wanders around, where the drumming of woodpeckers sounds from the treetops. Despite the fact you encounter other wanderers the landscape can feel as it is steeped in desolation and loneliness.

Scattered across the heath and forest, located about 60 small lakes and ponds. These are the diamonds of the Dwingelderveld.

04/03/2016

Let's go from one nature reserve Weerribben/Wieden to another: National Park Dwingelderveld.
A hundred years ago Drenthe was almost all one big heath plain. In time the landscape changed. Fortunately, we still have the National Park Dwingelderveld. The Dwingelderveld is Europe's largest wet moorland area, with nearly 4000 hectares of heath and woodland, with a virtually uninterrupted horizon.

25/02/2016

As already mentioned is Giethoorn located in the North West of the province Overijssel. Surrounded by the nature reserve Weerribben Wieden, in an area called Waterreijk.

Just get on the bike, in the boat or put on your hiking boots and explore the beautiful woodland, reed and water landscapes. Hear the silence, feel the space, smell the smell and taste. Here you can find the genuine hospitality that is so typical for the region.

20/02/2016

Giethoorn, the region's highlight, is a town with no streets, only canals, walking paths and bike trails. Contrary to most Dutch geography, Giethoorn is built on water crossed by a few bits of land, and farmers even used to move their cows around in row boats filled with hay. Hugely popular in summer, at other times it has an almost mystical charm as you wander its idiosyncratic waterways.

When the tourist hordes get too thick (the site has become a must-visit for Asian tour groups), head to the northern part of the village, which is quieter and quainter.

Read more: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/the-netherlands/giethoorn

15/02/2016

Monopoly maker Hasbro announced on 22 of March 2015 the positions of major cities on the new World Edition board. The World Edition celebrates 80 years since Parker Brothers acquired the rights to the property-trading game.

And the announcement of where 20 major world cities will sit on the board is certain to cause some disagreements. About four million votes have been cast in the two rounds of voting.

Giethoorn, which has a population of less than 3,000, did get more votes than Madrid, Madrid one of the great cultural capitals the other city was also inscribed in the wild card round. The spokeswoman assured, moreover that this is not an early April 1st joke. The Netherlands is the only country with two cities on the board.

10/02/2016

A well know place in the area is Giethoorn, also known as
“the Venice of Holland” or the “Venice of the North”,
Giethoorn is a beautiful village in the Netherlands, located in the Dutch province of Overijssel.

There are no cars or roads here; tourists leave them out of the village and have to travel by water or on foot over the lovely wooden bridges. Giethoorn village is surrounded by a vast natural reservation entitled De Wieden.

The travelers who adventure here are usually mesmerized by the familiar atmosphere, bohemian canals, small wooden bridges, vivid flowers and colorful 200 year old homes. (Source: Tourism on the edge)

06/02/2016

The Netherlands is a very versatile country. We have metropolitan cities like Amsterdam, but also a beautiful and spacious countryside. What do you like the most?

03/02/2016

Looking back on a beautiful winter day at Noordenveld (disabled person's path) in the Dwingelderveld on the morning of the 17th of January at sunrise. Foto: E. Bethlehem (HDR)

Koelevaartsveen

01/02/2016

In the Netherlands the dugout or sod house (Dutch: "plaggenhut") was banned by the housing safety law of 1901. However, in some parts in the east the country, people continued to live in dugouts well into the 1960s. The Dutch dugouts are a huts constructed around a dug out pit with a roof made from heather sods and front and back walls made from slabs of peat. Peat diggers and their families would live in these, in life-shortening conditions of poverty, damp and insect infestation.

A small number of these huts survive, and can be seen in the open air museums of Arnhem, Schoonoord, Barger-Compascuum and Harkema. Modernized dugouts are available as tourist accommodation in several locations.

30/01/2016

Some colonists, particularly younger ones - send or walked away from the colony to tuck settlements in the vicinity of hastily built sod huts and formed the so-called desperado-like colonies in Nijensleek, Vledderveen, Noordwolde-Zuid or Marijenkampen (near Steenwijk).