Afgelopen december liep ik nog samen met Lorna op de Posbank. Het had ‘s nachts flink gevroren met als gevolg dik berijpte bomen.
Ernst
I use this category to classify my posts that are of a more personal nature. You’ll see some of my hobbies and maybe a bit of the lovely garden.
Garden Spring 2021
Even though the weather is not yet what you would call warm, there are many flowers popping up their heads. Lorna and I collected some photos to share with you. All the daffodils and tulips have finished flowering but the wisteria and aquilegia are in full bloom.
Hoflaan in de sneeuw
Het eerste weekend van februari 2021 bracht eindelijk weer eens een flink pak sneeuw in Dieren. De straat was wit en de daken bogen bijna door onder het dikke pak.
In het midden van de hoflaan staan een vijftal oude villas. Met een dikke laag sneeuw op het dak geeft dat een prachtig winterbeeld.
Met het koude weer bleef de sneeuw mooi liggen op de hekken en struiken in de straat.
Ook de straat zelf was helemaal wit.
Op het dak van Villa Boschwijk schoof een flink pak sneeuw langzaam omlaag.
Aan andere huizen hingen zelfs ijspegels.
En natuurlijk is er aan het eind van al dat winters weer de lente om naar uit te kijken. En dat betekent dat de krokussen hun hoofd boven de sneeuw uitsteken zodra de zon het weer wat warmer maakt.
Mushrooms
It’s that time of year again, autumn and high season for mushrooms. Their variety in colours and size gets me every time. This season started with a walk in a small forest near Apeldoorn.
In the Hof te Dieren there are some beautiful examples of the Amanita muscaria commonly referred to as fly amanita).
And of course there are the mushrooms in our back garden. There used to be some tall conifers and on the bits of wood that are still left in the ground some beautiful colonies of mushrooms have grown.
Also around the compost heap they have sprouted.
Openluchtmuseum
One of our favourite pastimes during the week is a visit to the open air museum in Arnhem. The place has a fantastic collection of old farms, houses, gardens, workshops, etc.
This week we took our new cheap 360° camera to try it out. Turns out it does not store the correct metadata to publish the pictures out of the box, but with the use of the tool exif fixer I managed to get it to be recognised properly.
So I took a photo of the old farm castle from Oud-Beijerland. You can use the mouse to move the view around.
The herbal garden is really amazing as well. The Nasturtium is doing very well this year.
Kröller-Muller museum
A spectacular museum in the hart of the National Park De Hoge Veluwe. It is full of famous pieces of art in a beautiful setting. The sculpture garden is stunning and an excellent destination in a time of keeping distance. The spacious setup is simply ideal for a day of art immersion in corona times.
Right behind the museum the sculpture garden greets you with the beautiful floating sculpture by Marta Pan. Especially on a sunny day the pond shows it off once more for you.
Lorna was mesmerised by the sculpture made of interconnected rocks. The beautifully curved wall indeed echoes the vibrations of life on the Veluwe.
One of those famous installations is the Needle Tower constructed by Kenneth Snelson in 1968. From whichever angle you regard it, its structure does not stop to amaze. See also the museum page: https://krollermuller.nl/en/kenneth-snelson-needle-tower
Another favourite installation is the Jardin d’email by Jean Dubuffet. In the past we have walked on top of it with Lorna’s brother Ken and Wendy. They had to restore it since and it is now visible in all its splendour.
After the sculpture garden we did pop inside to view the Van Gogh gallery. Luckily I managed to stop myself from taking photo’s of every single painting and sculpture. Below are three striking examples.
Burger’s Zoo
This time it was raining and that meant that some animals were inside, but also that others showed some different behaviour. Wildebeests running in the water, flamingos walking straight towards us, wallabies being actually awake.
Following the trail we visited the elephants after the penguins at the entrance to the zoo.
In the Mangrove all the lenses fogged up so no butterfly photos this time. It did give a nice effect to the flamingos though.
The wallabies are always fun as they remind us of our home in Alligator Creek.
The rhinos were absolutely posing for us.
And of course the zebras were lining up as well. The two foals were especially cute.
As the weather wasn’t that great we moved indoors into the desert. The red headed vultures were awake.
The Yellow Grosbeak had something to say. He was not going anywhere until I had taken many, many photos of him.
On the way out we stopped to have a look at the nosebears. Each had a tree to her/himself.
All in all another lovely day. We’ll be going back every week.
Have fun,
Ernst and Lorna
Burger’s Zoo
Lovely day today in the zoo. Plenty of space, but also enough visitors to keep the place going. Highlight of the day was the young sea-cow. It put up quite a show and had its own crowd of groupies swimming around.
Posbank
This morning started with a beautiful walk on the Posbank heath fields. It has been quite hot recently and water levels are low, but the heather is flowering very nicely indeed.
The beautiful purple flowers are tiny and delicate, but a whole field of them turns it into a purple blanket.
Of course the heather fields tend to get overgrown if you leave them alone. To prevent that they need to be grazed. This morning a couple of horses were about.
We were just enjoying the view when they even came trotting upto the fence.
Definitely a good way to start the day.
Have fun,
Ernst