Escape to the city of Amsterdam

What a week it has been, overload for the senses. I managed to get away with my family for Easter and we chose Amsterdam, as a small easily navigated city. I have been before but not with children but what a great city and totally child friendly (avoiding red lights and drugs of course!).

We discovered the city on bikes and passed some fantastic looking allotments called Nemoland. Behind the big gates I could see little chalets with each plot, some with a hammock! An office type building at the entrance and a real sense of community. The allotments take up much of the Wetserpark, at the top of a very trendy road in the Jordaan. You cycle through busy tiny streets towards an industrial sight of a large chimney puffing out smoke/steam (?). The park used to house an old gas works and now those incredibly creative youths have gone and made it a really cool cultural site with art cinema, cafe's and fashion hubs.

We also made it to the Hortus Botanicus, one of the oldest Botanical gardens in the world c.1600, built for doctors to grow medicinal herbs. My children enjoyed the glasshouses, especially with the cactuses and the butterfly house. It was interesting to see this small green space amongst a bustling city. Outside the gates, hop on a tram and you are in the centre of town in minutes.

Along the canals, the famous Singel in particular, the flower markets throng with tourists and those wanting to buy famous Dutch bulbs. My son liked the look of the enormous Buddha Palm Seeds for sale. A bit of a whopper for our tiny garden!

I didn't make it to Amstelveen to the Heem park and the weather wasn't good enough to invest time and money in Keukenhof with two boys but we crammed in an awful lot into 4 days.

Back to work at Heale and I missed Storm Katie and the damage she had caused over the weekend. One Malus has been damaged and lots of twigs around but not too bad. I had fine weather for my days at work and was able to begin planting out some veg, purple Potatoes (much better for you according to various sources) 

http://news.psu.edu/story/367072/2015/08/26/research/colorful-potatoes-may-pack-powerful-cancer-prevention-punch, Salads, Radish. Such a great start to the growing year. 

Now is the time to be sowing and pricking out and we sow all our veg AND flowers from seed, so that is a lot to be getting on with. I pricked out Zinnia, Lupin, Cosmos, Lettuce.

To end a very busy week, I got to my allotment with my family, planting our own veg and mucking about in the sun.

Just a joy to be out there, lots to come, full of promise.