The Hague

Our day at The Hague was a close second for best day in the Netherlands . We got up early and since it was only 2 hours by train, tram, and walking to get from our hotel to their temple and it’s 6 hours from our house to our nearest temple, we decided we’d better take advantage of it! It was a sweet, small temple with a nod to the famous Delft blue pottery in the stained glass and the exterior had a hint of Mondriaan’s aesthetic.

The rest of the day was spent at the M.C. Escher museum and the Mauritshuis museum. Art museums aren’t M’s most favorite destinations, so I tried to keep them to a minimum on the itinerary, but for pity sake! We were in the homeland of the Flemish and Dutch masters!!! It couldn’t be helped.

I was really into M.C. Escher in my late high school, early college years, but I thought I’d matured, moved on and he’d become a bit passé. Still I did my fair share of geeking over his works that I’d had hanging in my dorm room.

The Mauritshuis houses the royal collection, so literally every painting is a qualified masterpiece…you know, stuff like Vermeer’s Girl With A Pearl Earring, a dozen Rembrandt‘s etc. Dazzling, and again images that were just nice in books and prints were entirely captivating in person.

Back at the hotel that evening M had some stuff to get done on the computer so I left to do a little doodling. I only had about an hour of light and one mechanical pencil to work with. After seeing so many masters’ works this week, I was pretty disappointed with my quick sketches, but I’m glad I got a chance to do them anyway.  Maybe when we are rich and retired I'll spend my summers painting abroad...