Wandering Browns

The acrobat I had my first tosti at the cafe in the Speelklok museum. It is basically a grilled cheese sandwich with ham made on a panini grill, but man, it was amazing! Perhaps that was because I ate it in peace with Landon sleeping in the stroller. I wanted to go to the Speelklok museum to see a wide variety of automatic musical instruments. I enjoy anything musical, so I knew I would love it. I was not disappointed. When I arrived, a tour had just started and so I jumped right in. Luckily for me, the tour guide went seamlessly back and forth between English and Dutch. Taking a tour is the only way to hear some of the more rare instruments play, because they do not want people touching them/breaking them. We saw many small music boxes, and then went to the "toy" section. This acrobat music box did lots of tricks, and played music. Wealthy people would buy these to put out on the table after dinner, and before dessert to entertain and impress dinner guests. Above ...

Canal/river in Utrecht Detailed doorway on our way into town Utrecht is a beautiful, old city. It originally built on the banks of the Rhine as a Roman fortress at the edge of the Roman empire. Since then the city has survived Viking raids, being overrun by Germanic people, and many other hardships, but has stood the test of time. As we walked back into town from the railroad museum, we passed over a canal with weeping willows and other trees. So picturesque! The Netherlands is very tourist-friendly. Not only is it flat so from anywhere in town I can find my way to the churches by navigating towards the tall towers, but every so often there are street signs that point in the direction of all the notable sights. I rarely wrote down specific directions in all of our wanderings. So we returned to the Dom Kerk and Dom Tower in Utrecht by pointing ourselves toward the tower. We approached the church from the back, and came first into this beautiful courtyard. There were once t...

The front of the old train station/museum! Landon was so excited for the model train! After taking a tram and two trains, I walked the few kilometers from Utrecht central station to the railroad museum. Landon was so excited to be there that he looked at the ticket counter and surrounding area and ran straight to the end to look at this solitary model. Little did he know what lay ahead. The first building of the museum is the old train station. They had rooms decorated and set up for 1st class, 2nd class, and 3rd class. The 1st class room looked like a fancy formal sitting room! Left luggage from many generations Seeing the artistry of the train station and the nicely decorated sitting rooms made me realize how classy and nice travel used to be. It was reserved for those with the money to do so, and was about making a nice experience as well as getting from point A to point B. Landon and a real-live train The stately old station ...