Hommel Mangas
We just got back from an Avalon River cruise: “Tulip Time in Holland and Belgium for Garden and Nature Lovers.” It was a 35th Anniversary gift from Dr. Steve — a.k.a. the chiropractor that buys rocks and gardens with me.
Day 1
The half-day visit to Keukenhof after we flew eight hours from Chicago, ate lunch on the ship and jumped on the bus to the gardens was not long enough. But it was oh-so-worth feeling like we were walking in a living and breathing box of crayons — the big 64-count box! We walked, maybe floated, among wonderfully designed gardens filled with 7 million tulips, daffodils and hyacinths.
Interesting facts: Keukenhof is only open two months out of the year. All of the 7 million bulbs are donated by growers, but not saved from one year to the next.
Day 2
Got 15,164 steps in by taking a walking tour of the oldest town in the Netherlands: Nijmegen, built more than 2,000 years ago by the Romans. It still has Roman era ruins but was also damaged in World War II. We also took our own bike tour of the Ooijpolder Nature Reserve. The serene country view, as we rode past a free-roaming cattle farm and ponds, made me reflect and question why my beloved hometown in Johnson County still does not have connecting walking and bike paths throughout the county. It is truly a quality of life deficit.
Interesting facts: We didn’t get to the nearby Airbourne Museum of Hartenstein commemorating the World War II Battle of Arnhem. But we did watch the award-winning 1977 movie “A Bridge Too Far” depicting Operation Market Garden, a failed Allied operation in Nazi-occupied Netherlands during the war, on Steve’s iPad in our cabin as we cruised to Maastrich that night. The movie, which Steve was most familiar with and I had never seen, was a co-production between the United Kingdom and the United States and was shot on location in the Netherlands where many of the historical events actually took place.
Day 4
One of my favorite days was in Namur, Belgium where we visited one of the most beautiful water gardens in Europe — Jardins D’Annevoie, a mixture of French, Italian and English garden styles. It is beyond words in beauty, but anytime you get one design idea that you can actually use in your own home garden, it’s a bonus.
Garden interest: Are there any Carpinus betulus (Hornbeam) or European beech hedges in Johnson County? European Hornbeam and Beech hedges are prominent in Europe, so I was curious.
Namur was also where I realized there was a separate bike trail along the river where you can bike from Belgium to France. We were cruising along the Meuse River when I noticed how flat, safe and separate the bike trails were from the separate distant automobile lanes. I realized later it was part of the 90,000 kilometer-long EuroVelo, that includes 17 routes, each over 1,000 kilometers, or 621 miles, long. I later read and noted that the EuroVelo 15 Rhine Cycle Route (a 1,540 kilometer section) is “suitable for cyclists of all fitness levels and abilities … Easy ride for family with 9 UNESCO sites.” The idea of creating a network of international cycle routes spanning Europe started in 1990, and EuroVelo 15 was added in September of 2011. It’s now on my bucket list, even just a small section of it.
Day 5 to 7
Began with mid-afternoon Belgian waffles before a walking tour of the Liege Botanical Garden housed in its 1840s Victorian style greenhouses, a day later in Antwerp swept us through the glorious Kalmthout Arboretum grounds that started as a tree plantation in 1857, but now is home to over 7,000 plant species from around the world.
But as with all vacations, I loved getting back home to my own little garden.
Janet Hommel Mangas grew up on the east side of Greenwood. The Center Grove area resident and her husband are the parents of three daughters. Send comments to [email protected].
