There's No Place Like Home

Please permit me the pleasure of introducing to you Rita van Wesep and Els Feiken.  On Tuesday we got on an intercity train heading north out of Rotterdam.  In Amersfoort we changed to a smaller "stop (because it stops at the smaller places) train" which took us to the village of Nunspeet.  Neither Els and Rita nor Nancy and I knew what the other twosome looked like, but we agreed we would all look for a couple of older, grey-haired (and in our case, slightly confused) people.  It all worked perfectly.  From the moment we saw them on the train station platform we felt at home, and that feeling only intensified over the days we stayed with them.  Like Aad and Anja, Rita and Els were unfailingly kind and gracious.  In their case the feeling of belonging was increased by the fact that they and we are family.

Ah yes, family.  Just what is the relationship between Rita van Wesep and Gerard van Wesep?  Here you see Rita and Nancy poring over the family tree created by one Isak van Wesep, son of David van Wesep and Grietje Pet.  David, in turn, was the brother of Rita's father Marius who was the nephew of my great-grandfather Hermanus who emigrated to the United States and sired all the U. S. van Weseps.

Here Els is offering some assistance.

There were many Izaks in Rita's family.  Here is her brother Isak.  He was active in the Dutch underground during the German occupation and was betrayed.  He died in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

So, we had a great deal to talk about.

Once we were finished with the family tree, talk turned to other things.  It turns out that both Els and Nancy love to knit.  That gave them much more to talk about.

The next morning they were still at it.

Rita and Els have a seemingly endless reservoir of good humor and good will.  They love to travel.  And they love to eat and drink well.  If we weren't talking and laughing while walking and exploring we were talking and laughing while having coffee or having lunch.  Regardless of what ever else we might be doing, we were talking, and we were having a wonderful time.  After a wonderful lunch (which followed the equally wonderful breakfast) we went to the small fortress city of Elburg.  You see the city plan in the photo below.  It's one of the few old towns platted with the streets rectilinear to each other.  There are pieces of the old wall remaining and the water surrounds it.  If you consult a map you'll see that Elburg was originally (before the Zuider Zee became the Ijssel Meer) on the sea and was a defense against attack from the sea.

The town was charming and the weather, true to form so far, hot and sunny.

Here's a bit of that wall.

These shoes have the names of mom, dad, and the kids.

People have organized to preserve the old fishing boats, the botters.  Here a couple are going out for a cruise.

Rita's pretending she was bad.  Hard to imagine.

We stopped for something to drink where we could watch the boats.

And then resumed our stroll through the town.

These houses are built against the wall.  You can see the wall above the roofs.  I think you might be able to get a table into one, but might have a problem with the chairs.

This path goes along the dike.

Here we're sitting on an old well

where we can look out over the countryside, dotted with cows.

Just inside the wall is the St. Nicolaaskerk.

Next to the church is the former convent, now little houses.  Miracle of miracles, look who lives in the first house!  True, it's van Wezep instead of van Wesep.  But, close enough.

Just down the street from the church we found a wonderful restaurant where we had a great dinner.

Then on to home and a good night's sleep.