association news | HOLLAND
Wilson Tour Group Cruises through Holland and Belgium By Linda Collenberg Bisaccia-Ammerman
Medieval church in Bruge, Belgium
Keukenhof Gardens, Holland
Left: Wilson alumnae visit the Keukenhof Gardens (l—r): Linda Collenberg Bisaccia-Ammerman ’68, Nancy Kostas ’64, Barbara Carton Ward ’63 and Janet Holz Ollivier ’58.
A
lthough spring in the Netherlands might seem like a time of showers, our Wilson alumnae toured with Gohagan Travel and made the rounds of Amsterdam, seeing the Rembrandt’s, van Dyck’s, Memling’s, and many other famous paintings at the Rijksmuseum, passing Anne Frank’s house and the floating flower market (the Bloemenmarkt), going for an Amsterdam canal boat ride throughout the old (“oulde” in Dutch) Amsterdam, while our guide spoke to us about the fascinating history of the city. We also had free time the day of arrival in Amsterdam. My husband and I wandered past the Victorian brick home of the old Heineken brewery, crossing one of the canals that rings the old city. We had a fantastic lunch at Wagamama, a modern glassed walled Japanese noodle house, watching an old Dutchman and an Indian boy play an outdoor chess game with two-foot-high chess pieces surrounded by locals and tourists of all ages and nationalities. Such is the postmodern fabric of Amsterdam. At the end of the first day in Amsterdam, the luxury of the AmaDante, our own small and elegant river boat for the coming week, awaited us at the dock. Before dinner on the boat, my husband and I bought two dozen yellow tulips (about $6) for our stateroom and 34 l Wilson Magazine l Summer 2012
a bottle of French wine, totally unnecessary as our waiters kept everyone’s glasses full each night. The dining room was quite festive as we ate from a European, multicourse a la carte menu and talked. For the hard core gringos, there were always steak, fries, coleslaw, club sandwiches and fresh iced tea. During the week, we visited and learned about fascinating places such as the world’s largest auction for flowers in the third largest building in the world (10.6 million square feet) in Aalsmeer, where we followed a walkway suspended above hundreds of small tractors pulling long chains of open cars moving approximately 19 million of every type of flower imaginable each day. We saw huge amphitheaters of international buyers bent over computers bidding for commodities of blooms, as various flowers, their data and changing price appeared on massive, moviesized screens. We also visited Bruge, the medieval city and chocolate center of Belgium. Oh, the endless small streets of shops of unbelievable chocolates and candy in every form! There we had a canal boat ride past large stone homes, gardens, old churches and convents, with graceful white swans gliding along the canals and nesting on the banks with their babies.
A big draw for our Wilson group was attending the Floriade, the 2012 world horticultural expo held only every 10 years (see floriade.com). In a beautiful park of about 165 acres, the Floriade was an international showcase of flora from around the world, striking landscape architecture, and sustainable architecture using plants both on the exterior structures as well as the interior (both modern as well as ancient traditional styles that work with nature). Five themes were Relax and Heal, Green Engine, Environment, Education and Innovation, and World Stage, and it was an very amazing educational experience. Of course no trip to Holland is complete without a visit to the Keukenhof Gardens, the world’s largest flower gardens and park and the 15th century hunting park for the nearby palace of a Bavarian countess. Over seven million flowers were in full bloom crowning a week of beautiful memories for life for our entire Wilson group. The next Wilson alumnae tour will be in spring 2013 to Prague, capital of the Czech Republic. The group will stay at the fabulous Art Deco Imperial Hotel (www.hotel-imperial. cz/Official and ahitravel.com/). The city is over 1,100 years old and considered the cultural center of central Europe. Learning and fun await!