To take a break from all the Coronation hectic and work, I decided on Sunday 7 May 2023 to visit the Groninger Museum in the Dutch city where I live. It was the very last day of the “Gianni Versace Retrospective” exhibition and the display of the Rembrandt painting “De Vaandeldrager“, bought by the Dutch […]
Honestly I had no idea that very close to the borg (a former stronghold or villa in the province of Groningen) that I was going to visit today, there was another one. It turns out Borg Rusthoven in Wirdum is the smallest of the 16 borgen in the Province of Groningen. I only found out […]
Since 1958 once every two years the Koning Willem I-Prijs (King Willem I Award) of the Koning Willem I Stichting (King Willem I Foundation) is being awarded. Nowadays there are three prizes, also called the Oscars of the Dutch business world, which already shows how important they are. The King Willem I Award is the […]
It seems to be the year of the Queen Juliana exhibitions in the Netherlands. After having visited Juliana – A Life in Dolls at the Borg Verhildersum in Leens on 30 April, there is another Juliana-exhibition on my to-do list this year. From Saturday 15 October 2022 to 10 April 2023 the Nieuwe Kerk in […]
After two years alternative King’s Day celebrations, it is finally possible to celebrate again. No mask, no distance … ten thousands of people all over the Netherlands are celebrating the same way as before 2020. The royal family will be present in Maastricht, in the province of Limburg in the south of the Netherlands. As […]
The opening of the Frida Kahlo exhibition in the afternoon of 7 October in Assen by Queen Máxima of the Netherlands would surely have been a more exciting engagement. But with a busy weekend coming, I decided not to go. In the early morning King Willem-Alexander also travelled north, and as the Martini Church in […]
A long time ago the Bobstart and Skeleton World Championships was being held in the city centre of Groningen a few times. At the time the Netherlands had quite a good bobsleigh team, with Arend Glas from Groningen, who was one of the organizers of the event. Unfortunately the event was always held in one […]
It had been quite a while since I saw one of the royals. I had to think! April 2018 King’s Day in Groningen, Princess Laurentien in May 2018 and a visit of King Willem-Alexander to the Groninger Museum and the A-Church in Groningen in June 2018, and the sighting of the three Cambridge kids in […]
For the first time in years the Netherlands was covered with snow last week. And there was even ice, so lots of people went ice skating outside. Not me, but it wasn’t so bad in the Netherlands that you couldn’t walk. So that is what I did a few times. The world looks beautiful in […]
My British royalty-friend Bobby Golden lately sent me a small article about a “royal” visit to my city Groningen in January 1937. A day after the wedding of Princess Juliana and Prince Bernhard in The Hague Major and Lady May Abel Smith headed for Groningen on a mission connected to another big event that year. […]
