It is sunny and windy...the skies are blue and filled with massive white and grey clouds scooting by like great sailing vessels of the 15th and 16th century. As if this painters' idyll wasn't enough, the countryside is ablaze with colour--large and expansive geometric splashes of colour on what might look like a enormous artist's palate when seen from above. It is typical Dutch weather. My b.i.l. had selected a tour published in one of the newspapers. It was a tulip field tour of the Northeast Polder. A polder is land reclaimed from the sea by building a dike out into the sea then completely pumping the seawater back out into the ocean, making the land dry and available for use. We would drive over wind-swept dikes and through the fields utilizing the tiny farmers' roads used mostly for tractor traffic. The trajectory was necessarily irregular as the route took us back and forth along and in-between the fields. The colours and lay-of-the-land was at times so dramatic that we had to stop and take foto's. This foto shows so much that is typically Dutch--the Vermeer sky, a wind mill (technically a wind turbine) and the flatness of our land. In some places the carpet stretched out to the horizon, in other places one could see how the tulip fields are beginning to give way to the encroaching potato acres. The regimented geometry of the spud hills so perfectly groove the earth's crust. We drove and drove, creeping along all the fields almost reaching the point of yawning at the sight of the patchwork fields. Difficult to imagine, but we saw thousands of acres of these tulips. Some had already been decapitated. I began to look for aberrations and deviations from normal. In this next foto, I found it. So many yellow ones, and then plip! -- A red one. Soon there were more red ones to see. Well, after a couple of hours of driving and twisting our heads first left then right....we all felt it--the need for tea and coffee. We thought that actually, what we saw was no better than what we have here where we live. There were tulips of all colours to be sure, but often they were so far away that I couldn't take a good pic to demonstrate. We wanted to buy some tulips for at home, but all the stands were too expensive for us. we did find one place though where we could see trial beds, buy tulips and get some refreshments. "Do it! ", we all shouted in unison. We parked and walked over to the trial beds which were long rows of different beds. Have a look: We could stroll up and down these rows and look and ooh and ahhh to our hearts' content. We split our stroll up and halfway through and opted for the tea and coffee. They also had apple pie....and whipped cream. Dear, oh dear.... Afterwards, we resumed our stroll and I took a few piccies. How to know what to take--there were so many choices. Here then, this one...this bearded wonder: And then there was this group of stiff-petaled ones that looked like a group of green stems topped with nobs of butter. Luscious to see, they were. Finally there were my favourites-- these sharply pointed beauties I found stunning. The foto honestly does not do them justice. Well, after a bit more driving around, the route was completed and as the sun was setting, it was time to head back home across the Bird Dike. The dike separates two huge bodies of water that attract great numbers of migratory birds. It was delightful driving out across the water with birds on the one side and eel nets with their support poles on the other...the colours if the setting sun in the distance...the smeared-out clouds blown smoothly by high wind up in the upper reaches of the atmosphere. It had been a wonderful day
I love tulips but it's been a long while since I lived where I could grow them. I did have some when we lived in Mayer, Az. but they don't last long in the heat. Wish I had a place to plant some here. But, I haven't seen many flowers since we moved here. Not even in the parks. dooley
Oh those tulip fields bring back so many memories. I don't think I've ever seen such a wonderful sight as the fields and fields of these beautiful flowers.
Hey There DOOLEY--So good to hear from you. You need to get some flowers going there where you now live. I'll bet that tulips and and crocuses will do it oké. I was surprised to hear that you had not seen many flowers in your new city. Maybe you can start a trend, eh? Why don't you post some foto's from around where you live...I would like to see how your town looks. I am glad that you liked my posting this time. I thought that you might like the posting, EILEEN--Memories can be like a boquet of tulips, they can fade so that you need to get a new bouquet.
It is just fantastic to see so much of tulips everywhere, wish I were there to see and enjoy it...it's just awesome!!!
KK--Thanks. It is pretty to see, but is so soon over as the flowers are cut odd the plant after a couple of days. PL--Glad you enjoyed the pics. I am surprised that there are no such tours there in the spring.
Pella Iowa has a Tulip Festival each year, but it's nothing like the fields of tulips in your photos.
