So where did April go????

I can't believe it's the end of April already. Well I think of it as end April because my pension gets paid today, as the last working day of the month. I know I went away for a few days but I can't believe April has already come and gone all the same!

Since I've been back from Holland (I know I should say the Netherlands as Holland is a region of the Netherlands but ....) it's really weird because when I start watching anything on Youtube I'm consistently seeing ads for the cruise company we travelled with. It's all the more strange to me because we didn't actually book this company - it was done by our local travel agent (GAL Voyages) - so how the algorithm is picking me out for these ads I don't know. That being said, I did pick up their brochure on board and they seem to do some lovely cruises, with the Vietnam and Africa cruises really piquing an interest! But talking of algorithms, lately I've also started getting loads of Youtube video suggestions of hair styling for afro hair which is really odd! I did click on the first video where a stylist was working with ladies suffering some pretty extreme hair loss and working with them to cover it. Okay she used hair extensions and weaves in some cases but the end results were a work of art! One lady who was seriously balding insisted she wanted to use only her own remaining hair, and the stylist created a style for her which was out of this world! And just now I've watched a video of little boy with a huge afro having his hair cut and styled and boy did he look gorgeous by the time the stylist had finished with him (although truth be told, I kinda liked his afro even better)! So maybe there is method to the algorithm's madness as now I'm hooked on afro hair styling videos! That being said, I went to the hairdresser's today to get my decidedly non-afro hair cut and thought I'd come out with my usual little old lady cut, but nope, I'm now sporting a "wonky" cut (although I think the technical word is "asymmetrical") and I love it. Whether I'll be able to keep it up myself remains to be seen (I doubt it), but who knows, maybe I'll go the whole hog and get it dyed green next time (another one of my madcap ideas)! I also finally got round to downloading a VPN onto my computer but I'm not so sure about it. It's supposed to prevent sites from being able to track me (like sites looking to sell you stuff), but it seems to me that it's actually preventing me from checking in on some of my regular reads (and even my email address!!!) unless I disable it, so I reckon I'm gonna have to delete it unless I can figure it out properly!

Anyway, back to our trip. Next stop was the city of Rotterdam and our guide spent some of our travel time telling us more about the Netherlands. One thing that did surprise me a little was that the average wage is not as high as I thought it would be (I always got the impression the Dutch were pretty well off, comparatively speaking). Of course many people make much more than the average wage, but it surprised me nevertheless how relatively low it was - even if it was still higher than France. Another big surprise was that taxation starts at 37% (yeah, I know), but I think there must be an awful lot provided out of that taxation (as in Denmark), like health care, education, etc. Still, that was also a bit of a shock! I must say I enjoyed the boat trip but would not want to go on a big cruise liner. Somehow it's just not my thing, but this boat being small it was easy to hop on and off and I didn't feel so trapped! Maximum capacity was only 180 people, most of whom were French, with about 10 Spaniards also on board, so you can see it wasn't a big boat! 

I don't know what happened but there was yet again a bit of a cock up and we ended up arriving in Rotterdam later than planned so didn't really have time to explore - which is a shame as some of the architecture looked pretty interesting. It must have been heavily bombed during the war because so much of it was modern, but interestingly modern and not boring modern so, as I said, it was a shame we didn't get much chance to visit!

Arriving in Rotterdam!

This is a google pic as mine was rubbish!

Another google pic as I got a large truck front
and centre of my picture!

Early next morning we were up and off to Keukenhof, home of the tulip gardens. Apparently it's only open eight/nine weeks of the year so you can imagine what the car park looked like, but once inside it wasn't bad at all, and there was room to sit and admire the view without feeling like you were in a mass stampede. Not all the flower beds were in bloom yet, but it was still very beautiful, so I'm guessing the rest of this post is likely to be pretty picture heavy!

Keukenhof!

We had the option of buying bulbs at the gardens or just down the road (the place was surrounded by tulip fields), but in the end I picked up a catalogue and will order something when I've had a chance to go through it as there is no way I could make my mind up with so much to choose from. There was also a very colourful exhibition of paintings by Dutch artist Anja Keijzer which was right up my alley. Just remains to be seen if I can afford any of her work!

After that it was back to the boat for the "gala dinner" where the chef and his staff exceeded themselves yet again, after which we hit the sack to get some sleep ahead of our departure for Antwerp (Belgium) the next day!

If I tried that I'd probably end up
having to move house!