5

A moving day in many senses of the word, as I bid a sad farewell to my Amsterdam home and headed to stay with relatives in the Rotterdam suburb of Bleiswijk for a couple of days.

But is there a better place to recover from a potent mix of a head cold, moving blues and a bad haircut than your aunt and uncle's house in a great little town?

Bleiswijk (pronounced blayss-wake) is a 1.5 hour commute from Amsterdam, but it might as well be on the other side of the equator. The relaxed, familial pace of this small town stands in sharp contrast to the hectic pace of Holland's capital city.

Here its 10,000 citizens live mainly in quiet streets and a few hofs, small leafy sections of about 10-15 townhomes. There's no hassle in these hofs, however. Neighbours pitch in for upkeep of the area, and the nearby village is filled with locals greeting each other daily at the butcher shop or post office. The area is also home to large industrial-sized greenhouses and Elysium, one of Europe's most popular spa/health centers.

A stroll through the streets and parks brought us to the local tennis club, very typical of small Dutch towns, functioning as a sport and social club.

Here, for the very modest sum of 160 Euros per year, you can play for 12 months on some of the finest clay courts you'll see. Today saw a kids' tournament in full swing, with future Federers and nascent Nadals in action.

The canals fill up with tree stuff (I believe that is the technical term)

A backyard pond stocked with goldfish

Here you can hobnob while you watch Bob lob

Plugged in - Museum Photos

Sitting now in Rotterdam, Netherlands with (finally) a solid Internet connection, after close to 5 days of non-existent or spotty coverage.

There's no getting away from the dependence on the Internet these days - from train tickets to topping up mobile phone minutes to basic blogging, it is sadly pretty vital.

But then there are things like Skype that allow us to connect to parents, grandparents, friends (meeting a great friend's newborn daughter in L.A. while I sit in Montreal or Paris - very cool); booking travel, electronic boarding passes, and so on that make it all quite worthwhile. (P.S. e-mail me if you want to connect via Skype).

Onto some more catch-up. First, some more photos from last week's Musee D'Orsay visit, with a reminder to click on the pictures if you want a closer look.

"Girl Taking a Bath" perhaps. How times have changed; doing a Google search today using the same words yields an entirely different and less artistic result

My personal favorite - lots going on in this painting

You can expect a similar scene when trying to board a train at Gare du Nord

"Early Player" or, for hockey fans, "Ron Duguay" - see below for similar image

From the 1980's collection at "Musee d'Hockey". His chest and stomach topiary is exquisite, non?

(*Note - I'm not sure what cultural karmic wrath I'm incurring by including some of the most masterful art work of our time alongside Ron Duguay posters, but I imagine it won't be pretty.)

One of the "Grand Salles"

This clock is likely 30-35 feet tall - it rests on a bank of windows at one end of Musee D'Orsay, and the photo doesn't do it justice. Amazing stuff.