Living in a Village
Ann and I are living a village life. Not quite in it, but a bit outside, in the country. That’s what I’ve been saying, and it’s true, but Len wasn’t totally convinced when I posted the photograph below because . . . yes, we live behind a gas station complex (and I do mean complex with a variety of different operations and businesses in warehouse-type buildings, as well as a parking lot for semis on the weekend).
And yes, we live in-between a main highway that goes to Germany (about 10 minutes down the road) and a main road through this part of Gelderland. But believe me when I say, we live in the country.
If you don’t believe me, this was taken a short walking distance from our house.
That not good enough? Well we have goats and chickens in our back yard. (That’s Vinny [short for Vincent van Goat . . . though he’s bossy like a Mafia Boss so . . . Vinny) on the left, Boots on the right. We haven’t named the chickens . . . yet.).
And we have moles in the yard. Wim, our great landlord, tells us it’s because all the farmers do stuff to get rid of them and they migrate to our property. So yes, we live in the country, though in The Netherlands, you’re never really too far from a village.
Our post code is Didam, and it’s a pleasant 1.9 km walk (just over a mile) to get to the town center (the church where the tractor parked next to us). It’s a nice village with a little bit of everything, and competitors for main stuffs (two bakeries, two butchers, a hand-full of restaurants, several grocers).
How about a few numbers to put things into perspective. The greater Eugene area has about 237,000 people now; Springfield has 62,000. Braga was a real city with 193,333 people. Didam? The town has 12,000, the bigger area (including us) is 17,000 people. Zevenaar, about 3.7 miles to the city center (going left from our driveway) has 43,000 people. Duiven, just past Zevenaar on the highway has 25,000 people. However, Duiven has a big shopping area that includes a Media Market (think Best Buy), a gigantic hardware store (think Home Depot) and an Ikea. Strange thing is, the Ikea in Duiven (10 km away) is closer to our house than the Ikea in Braga was to that house. Only it’s 2 towns over. (Duiven is just outside of Arnhem (population 152,000) and I suspect the big shopping development is because there was no land for it in Arnhem). So, we live in a village and more often than not, we turn right (to Didam) to go shopping than left (to Zevenaar).
We’ve gone into Didam just to walk around to check it out on foot. One of the interesting things is that the church is an almost ever present feature, with glimpses of it even when you’re walking around residential neighborhoods.
And, of course, as you enter the village. And if you’re thinking it doesn’t look like any of the roads really fit two cars, well, you’re right. Most barely fit two cars across, but then those will occasionally have a car parked on one side or the other. Some roads share the center lane, and you have to move over into the bike lane for two cars to pass. It’s a village, no need to rush.
Ann and I are getting used to (and enjoying) the pace of life here. One Saturday afternoon we realized we needed a few things and instead of driving into town, we just walked the mile or so and got some bread . . .
. . . and some stew meat. If you haven’t noticed from the coats people are wearing, it’s quite a bit colder up here than in Braga too.
Now that’s Didam. What surrounds us are farm fields interlaced with bike/walking paths. In fact, you can get anywhere in the country via bike paths. Stores have more bike trail maps than maps for automobiles.
In front of our place are, of course bike paths that run along-side the road. A few hundred meters to the left is the entrance to a nice 5-km loop that goes to some woods, and a lake. We’ve taken a couple of different trails through that area already.
As the trail breaks off from the bike path, there’s a historic marker. There are lots of them in The Netherlands. They remember their history, particularly the recent history.
As for farms, a lot of them are horse farms, as well as sheep farms.
And lots and lots of fields. Of course it’s been winter so everything is fallow, but The Netherlands produces a lot of goods. We read that they are the second largest food exporter in the world, and have become a world leader in greenhouse crops (we chose not to consider one lovely house that was surrounded by giant greenhouses).
As one of the trails looped back towards Didam, it passed the obligatory sports park that has, of course, a football field. I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to show off my new home team!
As I said, there’s a small lake not too far away. There was plenty of wildlife here in January/February and we’re looking forward to see what arrives in the spring.
I think as we get settled in and start establishing a normal routine (still not there yet!), we’ll be carrying our cameras with us on our walks. I’m sure there will be opportunities for interesting images.
And have I mentioned how lovely the light can be here. The sun is distinctly lower in the skies here than in Portugal. We can’t wait to see what it’s like in the summer. Maybe we’ll even be able to photograph mid-day with some quality of light remaining. By comparison, Amsterdam is roughly the same latitude as Calgary Canada, a bit farther north than Vancouver.
Now just because we live in a village it doesn’t mean life here is always boring. One word - Carnival. No, perhaps not quite Brazil’s carnival but . . . definitely the Dutch equivalent. Even if it’s cold (read: very cold) and rainy, the Dutch get dressed up and, for lack of a better word, have a community party.
Which includes brain numbing music volumes. Quite a few young children in strollers had ear protection on!
And your obligatory carnival parade.
We had no clue about what was going on, but folks were enjoying themselves. Wolves were a big theme, though somehow I don’t think there are a lot of wolves left here. Wim tells us, however, there is a badger not far from the house.
I’m not sure if this group is the House Cleaners Union or what, but they were . . . having fun spinning around I guess? Call them the Mop Men.
The parade went on and on and folks lined at least two long streets of Didam despite the rainy weather.
And there were, of course, homages to the farmers. And justifiably so around here.
The folks in Didam like to say that this is the real Netherlands, not Amsterdam. Certainly not Amsterdam central.
So for anyone who thinks we don’t live in the countryside, I just have to say we have a million tulip bulbs right next door that say otherwise. Just last week they decided to break the surface and show us green instead of just a brown, plowed field.
Too bad they’re supposed to come into full bloom the week after we head back to the US.
[All of the photographs in this blog post were taken within walking distance of our house, about the same distance we used to walk nearly every morning in Braga.]