Tulips, Tulips, Tulips (Keukenhoff, Part One)

Our Saturday in The Netherlands was all about flowers. Seriously, all. about. flowers! 

Typical view from the train

The friends I travelled with specifically booked this particular weekend to go to Keukenhoff, a famous flower garden, as it is the peak weekend for flower viewing. There was a flower parade (similar to California's Rose Bowl Parade on New Year's Day), flowers, and festivities. The only downside: because it's the premier flower viewing weekend of the year, the visitors seemed to outnumber the flowers on occasion! 

Rows and rows of organized flowers

I had so many flower pictures, I decided to post twice about the Keukenhoff flower show. In this post you will see all of the photos from my iPhone, and the next post will be all photos from my - clears throat - real camera. But in all honesty, iPhones take such good pictures anymore, I often opt not to take my big, heavy DSLR just for ease of getting around. 

A riot of flowers

The colors of the flower gardens were out of this world! The pictures mostly do them justice, but the wafting of their scent made the experience truly spectacular.

Very tall flowers

Not all flowers were this tall, but you can see that there were some beds that stood 2 - 3 feet tall! You can also kind of get the sense of the crowds. The lines at the food carts were long, but the lines for the loos were even longer - up to a 20 minute wait! And if you decided you didn't have to go each time you saw a long line, you eventually ended up waiting in line praying you can hold it long enough to get to a stall. Not saying' that happened to me, but...

Very tiny flowers

I had an amazing Dutch hot dog at one of the stalls. It was paired with some sort of cheesy mustard that came out of a packet much like ketchup and mustard do in the states. I couldn't get the packet to fully open, so I had one of Regine's cousins (who is Dutch and lives in Holland - they came out and spent the day with us) open it for me. She proceeded to squirt the entirety of the packet onto my sausage. I tried to stop her half-way as I wasn't sure I'd like the sauce, but she said, "No, you will like it!" And gosh darn it, she was right! Reg's husband Brian liked the sauce so much he bought a bottle of the stuff at the local store before we flew home! 

Van Gogh in flower form

There was a long line to get onto the viewing platform to see the Van Gogh. Once we arrived on the platform, we took a quick handful of pictures, then got down to keep the line moving along. 

Even more flowers

There was such a varieties of flowers! 

Interesting bell-shaped flowers

I attempted a selfie, but I have determined that my arm simply isn't long enough to get my big head and the background in at the same time. This photo turned out okay, but the yellow flowers went on a lot farther… I couldn't get my chin and the rest of the landscape into the same picture! 

Selfie amongst the flowers

Floral close-up

Flowers, flowers, flowers

There were a number of indoor exhibitions, but we really didn't stay in any of them for too long due to the crowds. I liked the flower arrangement below, and had Reg take a quick photo of me. (Again, not so good with the selfie-taking!) 

An interesting art installation

The outdoor arrangements were really interesting as well. Sometimes a riot of color and size, other times a large bed of one type of flower. Very pretty, all of them.  

More of the really tall flowers

More bell shaped flowers

At one edge of the flower garden (which was acres and acres in size) sat a beautiful, working windmill. Brian and I even went up to the top to see the flowers from up high. A few photos from the top of the windmill will be in my next post. 

Windmill! 

And last, but not least, I stole one of Reg's photos. From the top is Brian (Reg's husband), Lucas (Reg's nephew), and me, all playing photographer! 

Brian, Lucas, and I getting our paparazzi on