So I'm spending these two weeks vacationing in Europe with my daughter. She was planning on this trip anyway as part of her work "recharge" and is taking me along for a first retirement trip.

So, if you're looking for CS Ed content or Emacs come back in a week or two since today is all about travel

We spent the last few days in Utrecht. Why Utrecht? Why not. Also Batya has a friend here that she's only met virtually through a writers group and this was a chance for them to connect in person.

We were of course zonked from the red-eye flight but wandered a bit by one of the canals and managed to stay up until evening.

We were told that pancakes are a thing in The Netherlands so decided on a pancake dinner:

Well, Dosa and Uttapam are pancakes :-). Don't worry, we rectified this yesterday.

The next day started with a bike tour of the city. I've always felt that touring by bike was ideal. Cars move too fast. Even those busses and trolleys with the tour guides. You literally only get a "drive by." On foot is terrific and we walk miles and miles when visiting new places but walking keeps you confined to a small area. By bike you can cover a good amount of ground but you can go slow enough to smell the flowers. Also stopping and starting is trivial.

We got a good feel for the geography of the city, some history, more canals (and a fish doorbell)

We finished the day wandering around. Saw the Stadhuis (city hall) which reminded me of the New Amsterdam Stadhuis ruins under 85 broad.

We also passed a number of places that had New York foods:

I'm always torn when seeing these. On the one hand, I'm curious on a different cultures take on NY foods but I also don't want to waste a meal when I could be getting local stuff.

We got a giant Stroop Waffle instead

The next day we had that pancake meal with Batya's friend and also went to the Speelklock musem which is all about self-playing musical instruments. Very interesting. Other highlights is finding some locally dyed yarn which will later be turned into socks by either Batya or Devorah and a flock of sheep (sans Wallace and Gromit).

Today we visited their train museum. We loved it since it was a train museum but was also reminded of the local history with a sombering train car.

A car used on the rail network in Europe during the Holocaust to transport Jews to the concentration camps.

Yes, it brought us down but we were glad it was there.

More wanderings brought us back to our Airbnb where I'm writing this now.

Tomorrow we head to Brussels to spend a couple of days with an old teaching friend and then to Amsterdam.