Greyson Falls In His First Canal

On Saturday, we took the train back up to the northern part of The Netherlands to visit our other friends Rene and Elaine. They live in a very rural part of the country. It's very quiet and beautiful--lots of flower fields, sheep, cows, and of course windmills. Elaine is a Norwegian Forest Cat breeder. They had 4 adult cats and 6 kittens! Greyson had a blast playing with all of the kittens. They weren't too sure of Greyson at first; but quickly warmed up to him.

Rene took us on small tour of his village. The first stop was to the fields across the canal from his house. His neighbor has a couple of ponies and several sheep. One of the adult sheep had had 2 lambs the night before. They were adorable. So to cross the canal, we had to walk across an anchored row boat. Rene was helping Greyson maneuver across the boat. Rene stepped off the boat into the grass and turned back around to take Greyson's hand and somehow Greyson lost his footing and he went into the canal. The lower part of his body was pretty soaked. Luckily, the canal wasn't too deep!

We also walked down to another canal to see a one lane floating pontoon bridge. I believe there are only 4 remaining in The Netherlands. We watched cars going over the bridge for quite awhile. I never could figure out what determines who has the right of way!

Then we stopped at small neighborhood park, for Greyson to burn some of his energy. It is interesting to watch Greyson and the Dutch children interact (since there is a language barrier.) Luckily, Rene served as a translator. When a little girl found out Greyson was an American, she assumed he was good at basketball. Greyson "played" soccer with 9-year old boy and had fun chasing after him trying to steal the ball! He then asked the boy to shoot the soccer ball into the basketball hoop. I don't think the little boy had ever taken a shot before! Greyson almost made his shot and the other boy couldn't even hit the backboard!

We had a very nice dinner with Rene and Elaine. We spent the night at their house and got up Sunday morning and went to a cat show in Alkmaar. Elaine was showing one of her cats (Delco) at the show. We saw lots of beautiful cats, including our favorite (Maine Coons.) Shortly after lunch, we hopped on a train and headed back to Delft.