"as we walk in fields of gold"...

Sting.

Last Tuesday was a Belgian holiday, so we took advantage of dad being off of work and headed to the Meuse River valley. I'd heard of Dinant and had tried to NOT go there yet, anticipating that it would be much more fun to visit during warmer months because of it's position on the river. There are boats to rent and a fun cafe atmosphere all along the river, that indeed makes it much more fun when the sun shining. Well thank goodness our order of sunshine was delivered!

We caravaned with our friends, the Michaels, and don't you know I squealed in excitment when I started seeing these amazing fields of gold! Turns out they're canola fields and are well known in this region, but also around Normandy if you're heading there in the spring. It was breathtaking and of course I had to grab a few shots!

Our first planned destination was the Rail Bikes of Molignee. I'd read about these - there are several around Belgium actually - but with it's proximity to the Meuse, we decided to try this one. It was a lot of fun! I even wore shorts for the first time in 5 months (!), figuring I'd be exercising and working up a sweat, but the kids had so much fun pedaling that my warm up plan didn't go so well :)  But it's a lot of fun and such a unique way to see a sliver of the area. There are longer rides, but we just took a 8k ride total. I'd highly recommend it, but am glad we got up early and hit the first shift, as there were 3x as many people on the 2nd. I suspect they get pretty busy when summer rolls around.
Next up was a stop at the Maredsous Abbye. A friend told me about the Abbye that is famous for their beer and cheese and it didn't dissapoint! There's a great playground that the kids can run wild while you enjoy the culinary delights.
Our last stop was in the picturesque town of Dinant, on a sunny afternoon. We took the cable car up to the citadel on the hill (which has a great playground as well!).. toured the fortress, took all 408 steps back down and had a few treats while we enjoyed the river view. We will definiltey rent the boats on a future trip, although my kids were kind of blasse to the idea after 4 years of having our own ski boat. haha.. The thought of paddling ourselves wasn't sounding too thrilling, I guess! But on a sunny afternoon, it will be just what the doctor ordered.
So, au revior Meuse. I look forward to exploring more of your valley over the next couple of years!

tulips galore in Holland {traveling with kids in Europe}

There are certain seasonal floral wonders on my European wish list:
lavendar in Provence
sunflowers in France
tulips in Holland

I can cross off the latter!

After seeing an amazing display of flowers at Floralia-Brussels a few weeks ago, I wondered if we needed to see the actual fields in Holland. While the gardens of Kukenhof were amazing, I must say Floralia was almost as impressive. The tie-breaker in favor of Holland was certainly the fields with acres and acres of tulips! It was a fun experience and could have only been better had the sun been shining :(  It could have been worse, of course, if it was pouring, or had we not gone at all (!) so voila! Gratitude for being allowed to see God's amazing creation!

We met up with my friend Shayna and her cute crew. You might be seeing a lot more of them in Wheatley adventures as she loves to travel as much as I do!

We left at 6am (I told you I met my match in travel-craziness) so we could pull in around 8:15am when the doors opened. We were rewarded with virtually no crowds and people-free photos. By 9:30-10, it was getting quite packed so go early if you can! The kids endured the rows and rows of flowers and were pleased to find a fun playground and hot chocolate mid-adventure to perk them up. We then climbed into a windmill, discovered a labrynth and petted a few animals in the petting zoo. A good time was had by all!




After the tulips, we headed back to Brussels by way of Gouda! I've got a couple of cheese lovers in my house who were estatic to spend the afternoon with all things cheesy. It's a cute town and I'd recommend it if you're in route from Brussels to Holland. There's an auction on certain days in the summer that would be really fun to see, so we might just have to go back! Queen's Day was the following day, so there was orange everywhere!(their national color) and we could have stayed and seen quite the party! But dad had to work the next day, so we leisurely made our way back with a couple of purchases and yes, had Gouda for dinner ;)
On the way home, we kept seeing wild yellow flowers on the side of the road (more on these tomorrow when I saw the mother of all "fields of gold"). But i had to pull over and snap a few pics. K was done with photos, but my girl and her dad (probably bc they were so giddy over the Gouda) were happy to snap a few. Here's my fave!

Au Revoir Istanbul! {traveling with kids in Europe - and Asia!}

Our last day in Turkey was spent heading out on an early ferry to the Princes' Islands, a popular day trip from Istanbul. After a lot of research, I settled on the pedestrian only island of Buyukada. It was cute, though a little run down. It had glimmers of charm and it's past glory, and we were just delighted to have sunshine and a horse and carriage ride! Officially I don't think I'd recommend it. I'd recommend staying another day so that you have time to go to Ephasus or Cappodiccia. And there's about another 3 weeks of fantastic sites to be seen in Turkey, but alas, the hubs actually has a job, with only a certain amount of vacation days, so 4 days it was!

On the ferry ride over:
On the island itself. First up was the horse and carriage ride which is a must if you do go.. 
Our last fresh fish lunch. Eyeballs and all :) We really enjoyed the food on this trip. Mediterranean influence meant lots of hummus, dolmas and this special puffed pita bread as big as both the kids heads! We have quite an adventureous eater in Miss C, as we've always known, but she really had fun exploring a more exotic menu with her dad (who she gets it from). My picky eater surpised us all when he wanted the fish on this day. He's always been a great meat eater and we decided he's a little more adventurous than we give him credit for. Over the last few months, his "all meat goes attitude" has inlcuded trying duck, rabbit, escargo, scallops, beef tartar, and even this fish with the head and eyeballs in which he was eating the crispy tail like a chip. So, while he still won't eat un-melted cheese and mashed potatoes will make him vomit, he's holding his own! haha...

then, walking off our yummy lunch...

We raced back to the hotel to catch our 7pm flight... I loved  these flags in the trees..
only to discover our flight had been canceled until the next morning. Too bad we couldnt' have stayed in our great hotel that night and enjoyed a relaxing evening.. instead, we were in the airport for many hours, finally going on our own to get an airport hotel which had a shuttle for our 7am flight. The line to get a hotel voucher with the airlines was at least 4 hours long!  So this is how the kids entertained themselves for a few hours in said airport..
See if you can guess what games they were playing!
So, that's finally the end of our Turkish adventure! Thanks for looking and check back for loads of tulips in Holland and more this week!