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May 17 Wednesday Rain, sunny, rain 10º C Bicycle touring Holland In the morning, we cycle two kilometres back to Kuekenhof where the world's largest tulip flower show is held. The price they charge to get in is called gouging the tourist. Sharon says we'll average it down with our free camping. Once inside, the food is also outrageously priced, so we go hungry. The displays are fantastic though. Every kind of tulip I could imagine -- except blue. What? No blue tulips! Had a tour of a windmill. We saw two greenhouses filled with tulips, inkalilies and irises. There was a photographic display by a Canadian photographer -- tulips, of course. Quite a few shots were from the Kuekenhof Gardens and also from Canada's capital city, Ottawa. One photo of a red-coated Mountie has him bent over talking to two kids in front of a tulip field. There was no caption. On another wall, I cam upon a photo of tulip beside a sculpture. It has a caption that reads: "When kids love tulips too much the law cannot be far behind!" Hmmm. Seems obvious to me that it is supposed to go with the photo of the kids and the Mountie. I pointed it out to the woman on duty. She says, "But then that one won't have a caption." I had to agree there. "But this caption doesn't make sense for this one, does it?" She agreed, thanked me for my keen observation, asked if I was from Canada (freaking nitpicking Canadians she was thinking, no doubt), and removed the caption. It was by the correct photo when I turned around. There was also an excellent display of this year's tulip cartoon contest. I didn't know they had a tulip cartoon contest. Learn something new every day. I think I may have enjoyed the cartoons more than the flower displays. In a three panel cartoon, a guy with a red nose smells a yellow tulip. When he finishes, the tulip is red and his nose is yellow. Some others: An Englishman smoking a tulip pipe. A guy watering tulips with a steam roller. A guy walking on tulips he has just watered (that would be me). A guy peeing on a building with an onion-shaped top that sprouts a tulip. A bee going into yellow tulips, and when it leaves, the tulip is red. Men looking over a fence at a tulip display. In their minds they see patterns of naked women (that would be me). Van Gogh painting tulips. Wilted tulip wallpaper being replaced with fresh tulip wallpaper. A flood evacuee in a boat along with his tulips. An old man and his wife are standing side by side looking at wilted tulips. A nubile woman walks by and the tulips stand up. It rained a lot. Cold. It's 4º C. The sun came out for a while. I took some pictures of tulips and Dutch girls. We cycled into town and bought sweet bread at a bakery. It turned out to be like a cinnamon bun. The best we've had since our cycle tour across Canada and the US. I went back and bought another round. We ate them while standing under a ledge of a bank building in the rain. Cycled toward the town where Annette's aunt and uncle live. But we didn't make it before it grew too late. We cycle camped in the woods in the pouring rain after Sharon told me it would be impolite to show up at 9 PM without having called first. (They don't speak English.) Of course she is right, but it wasn't a great time weather-wise to turn into Miss Manners. |
