Summer in Haarlem

Beautiful sunny weather greeted us this morning and it didn't take long for the restaurants to fill the Grote Markt with tables. It took even less time for the tables to fill up with people.

Today feels like a great day for a nice workout on the bike. If I had the time, I'd do a 2o mile loop through the dunes and along the hard packed surfs-edge of the North Sea at Parnacia. Then on the way back home I'd see if I couldn't find an empty table on the market square to relax and have an ice cold biertje!

Damn! If only I didn't have to work. ;-)

One for Posterity

Two walks tonight. It stays light so late now - almost 10 O’clock before you can even call it dusk. On my second walk I took Sage over to Caprera. For those of you who don’t know, this is the large park on the edge of the dunes. It is heavily wooded and in the evenings is very quiet and peaceful. Usually, anytime after 8:00 PM we have the full 200+ acres to ourselves. We walk the lower loop then head up the hill to a bench overlooking the dunes and the North Sea to enjoy the sunset.

Tonight we ran into Baloo, a gigantic bloodhound and the only other dog that we’ve met in Holland that seems to have a stronger bond with it’s own nose than with his owner. We often see Baloo running in the park and never even see his owner. Baloo just does his own thing.

We met Baloo and his owner the first week that we were in Holland. He is the one who told us about Caprera in the first place and we found it a bit odd that he was stressing so much that the park was completely fenced….now we know why it was so important to him.

We’ve seen them many times since that first week and have often spoken with them in short pleasantries. We still don’t know his name (the person, not the dog of course), and never knew his occupation until this evening.

As I entered the park tonight I was expecting, and looking forward to, the normal solitude that this time of evening brings. Then I saw Baloo and his owner walking up the trail coming out of the darkening woods. A brief pleasantry I thought.

But as I got closer, I sensed that something was different about him tonight. He was unshaven and dark circles hung below his eyes. He looked exhausted, and yet he was beaming. Absolutely glowing with excitement. The “brief pleasantries” lasted only two sentences. He started his tale by justifying that he is now allowed to talk about “it” even though the press event and formal announcement isn’t until June. The patents are filed and technology has been proven. I think he just really needed to share his burden and felt safe handing it off to some American schmuck that he met in the dog park. I’m glad he did.

He had just returned from the Philippines. He’s spent a great deal of time there in the past six months. It seems that his company has discovered a way to convert water into hydrogen. On-demand. By the microgram.

Think about that for a minute. Hydrogen has been one of the most promising, environmentally benign fuel sources for the past 15 or more years. Why hasn’t it caught on yet? One main reason is because of it’s extreme volatility. Storing compressed hydrogen in the back of your car, or near a power plant has been logistically unfeasible. Add in the monopoly that the oil companies have on fuel distribution channels, the government’s lack of investment or interest in breaking that monopoly and you have a floundering, “future” technology.

Until now. With his process, all you have is a water tank. Hydrogen is converted and burned as it’s needed. Need to refill your car? Pour in a gallon of water.

If he’s right, and his enthusiasm indicated that he truly believed that he was, then this will be a discovery found in all future history books. Of course the initial splash won’t be so big. For example, it will not be available for cars right out of the gate. The process currently requires platinum, which is not exactly inexpensive enough for your average family’s Ford minivan. But it will be immediately available for power plants and industry. A power plant running on water. A steel mill or aluminum smelter running on hydrogen (water). The possibilities would impact the world and seem endless in their nature. An end to acid rain? An end to coal mining? An end to nuclear power plants?

Maybe I’m gullible. It’s like the fuel cell announcement 10 years ago, right?. Probably I’m gullible. But his enthusiasm was infectious and you know what? It’s nice to feel hopeful for a change. We’ll find out when they fire up the process in the Philippines on June 21. If it works, and it actually makes the mainstream press, you can say that you saw it here first – all from a guy who I met in a quiet little dog park in Bloemendaal, North Holland. Pretty cool.

If it doesn’t work, well…I guess that I’ll just have to go back and delete this post.

I just thought someone besides me should know.

Carnival

It’s been a slow week or so since Queensday. It seems like everyone drank a bit too much over that 4-day celebration and are now enjoying some much needed down time. Most of the schools have been closed on spring holiday for the past two weeks as well.

So the main excitement is the Kermis (Carnival). It has been running for 3 weeks at 3 different locations in Haarlem. The largest setup was in Zannenpark, which if you don’t know is our neighborhood park where we go each evening to meet our (and Sage’s) friends. While the Kermis is not actually set up IN the park, it completely surrounds it and has shut down several of our local streets. The only ride that was put up in the park was a pretty cool looking little rollercoaster. The one running it this year is a pretty good outfit. They must have had 25-30 rides, all the required junk food booths, 2 gambling halls (yes, gambling halls for the kiddies), and pony rides.

Of course the pony rides in the park are what caused us the most grief. Sage was very “curious” with these little critters and caused the handlers a bit too much concern. Add in the discarded junk food from the fair and the park has been off limits for the past two weeks.

Just yesterday they shut everything down and cleaned up the park. Amazing what these carnies can do in 24 hours. I guess when you do it 10-15 times a year or more you get pretty good at it.

Rosie gets back from Spain this weekend, so we’re really looking forward to some long evenings in the park again.

Hope all is well in your world!

Party boat

Koninginnedag! HUGE party day in The Netherlands. It's a country wide holiday where the themes are drinking, orange, selling junk, orange, outdoor concerts, orange, smoking ;-), orange, and drinking...oh yea, and orange. We biked into Amsterdam with some friends to check out the heart of the celebrations. This is the largest street party that I've ever been to...they say 2 million people on the streets of Amsterdam...I'm guessing it's one of the top 5 in the world - rivaled only by the likes of the Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Bands were playing on every plein and the streets were clogged with partiers. But for me, the highlight was the canals. Holy shit! The canals were packed with party boats. The larger boats had DJ's blasting music and people were dancing and jumping between them. It looked like a bumper boat parade there were so many. The sides of the canals and bridges were lined with many parties of their own and the whole scene was somewhat surreal.

I took these pictures...but it doesn't really do it justice without audio. I have a bit of a crappy video clip from my digital camera if anyone with higher bandwith would like to see it.

Clogged canal

Naptime?

This was not the only person that we saw passed out by 3:00. But most people chose a bit of grass near the music for a nap. This guy (probably a Brit) was lucky not to get tipped into the canal.

Is this really a good idea?

When Beth seems to be the expert reading the map, you know that we're having trouble trying to navigate our way around the jam packed streets of Amsterdam. At least she was wearing "Orange".