Winter Wonderland & the Efteling

I'm in Holland again. This is my fifth time visiting - third time in the winter, and I've been here twice during the summer. As much as it's freezing and can be miserable outside, I think I still prefer it during the winter months because it is so breathtakingly beautiful. The snow and ice blanket everything, drip off rooftops and form icicles, settle in tree branches, layer softly atop bird houses, benches, and car roofs and generally paint everything a brilliant shade of white. Even for days after the snowfall stops, the world is white.



Perhaps anyone who lives with snow every year will not see this as romantically as I do - and I can certainly understand. However, I love the fact that I am so inexperienced and unfamiliar with this particular weather phenomenon, because it allows me to appreciate its natural beauty - something people desensitized to it will not allow themselves to do.

Bjorn, his sister Ester, her best friend Kristin (from Germany), and I visited the Dutch fairy-tale theme park Efteling last week. I've been there before, but that was during one of those aforementioned miserable winter days - it was so cold that it COULDN'T snow, and the ice got into my very bones and made the Efteling difficult to enjoy. This time, it was slightly warmer, but I was prepared and bundled up like an eskimo. And it was perfect, because the four of us had more fun than I anticipated.




Along a beautiful stone walk leading through the woodsy part of the park (literally, I felt like I was in a fairy tale.)


View from a scenic ride on a track in the air (not a sky ride, but up off the ground.)


Apparently in the summer, you can hop across those stones - the building on the right is a storybook castle.


Kristin works at the Build A Bear Workshop in Berlin, and she has a stuffed frog from there - his name is Kyle Ribbitt, and he goes with her on all of her adventures, dressed in various outfits from his wardrobe. Kyle accompanied us to the Efteling as well, bundled in his shirt, jeans, sweater, and Converse high-top sneakers. It was ridiculously fun for a group of 20+-year-olds to parade around a children's theme park with a stuffed frog in our midst, but even more fun that the employees humored him so willingly - he met Pardoes (the Efteling mascot), a pair of theatric ice dancers in the night lights show, and a server at the cafe at the popular Fata Morgana ride (much like Pirates of the Caribbean, but with an Asian/jungle theme instead of pirates).

(all pictures courtesy of Kristin Mothes)


That's Kyle.


Kristin, Kyle, and Ester


(notice Kyle walking with us)


They have these huge bonfires throughout the park during the winter, so we can warm up. I LOVE those things!


A real steam-powered locomotive that tours the park.

Story time:
On the ride called Carnaval Festival (like It's A Small World), we had a bit of an adventure trying to get a picture of Ester, Kristin, and Kyle. Bjorn and I were in one carriage, and the other three were in the one in front. The ride is mechanically the same as the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland, so the little carriages run along a track and twist and turn so you can see the props/scenery. Well, Kristin wanted pictures. She got one of Bjorn and me:



...and then she wanted me to take one of Ester, Kyle, and her. So imagine the four of us - Kristin trying to pass me her iPhone while her carriage starts turning, then when she's facing me again, mine starts to turn. So there's a lot of yelling, laughing, stretching, and reaching -- and we're entirely ignoring the ride. Then when I finally get the iPhone, we have to wait for the opportune moment to take the picture - when the carriages are facing each other again. Finally we get the perfect setting, the carriages are facing each other, Kristin, Kyle, and Ester are smiling, I snap the shutter -- and the camera flash won't go off. So I yell, reset the camera, they hurry and re-pose...and the carriage starts turning.

The flash fails again. So then I have to pass the phone back to Kristin to fix the settings (and you guessed it, the carriage starts turning again.) This went on for nearly the entire ride, all the way until the final stretch of singing, dancing puppets, and the ride's automatic camera that takes your picture as you pass in your carriage. Well, the camera phone was back in my hand, and the other three were smiling, the carriages were facing forward, and it was the perfect time to take the picture before the ride ended and it was too late. Then I noticed Bjorn's and my carriage was approaching the ride's camera. Doing some quick thinking and frantic movements in about three seconds, I set the camera, focused the lens on the trio ahead, turned my head, and took the picture as I smiled for the ride's camera.

The results at the photo shop were too good to pass up, and we all have copies.



Definitely a trip to remember.