2026/44 - Halloween Special

Last week I told you a little about the attitude towards Halloween in my country, right? How Calvinistic beliefs made (and make) a 'pagan' or 'Catholic' festival hard to swallow. But Brielle is not part of our hardcore Bible Belt, and anything that calls folk into our town centre is considered to be A Good Thing. So...Brielle celebrates Halloween.

That pumpkin (photo below) was a gift three years ago. But that's all beside the point. The point being, that we do love a party in my town!

A few days ago there was supposed to be a pumpkin market, but it had to be cancelled due to a gale sweeping across: very high winds and a downpour that made the plants on my balcony beg for snorkels.

There is this ship in the waterway leading to the proper inner town harbour, that goes all out every year, with huge black tarantulas stuck to the bow and in the rigging, and a skeleton for a captain. Brilliant, it never gets old! And this year there was a parade; prizes for the best costumes.

It was great fun, good weather (cold, but dry) and the good folk of Brielle were out in force. I'll give you an impression:

Such fun! We sure love to dress up in this town. 

I hope you'll forgive my excursion this week...Next week it will be back to allotments, plants and all things green, I promise 😘 Have a good week, wherever you are, and enjoy your own Halloween!

Renée Grashoff 

2026/38 - Boats, boats and more boats

 And now for something completely different. I have told you before that Brielle, the historic town I call my home, is very active in Summer, right? Pageants, markets, concerts, cultural events, and on Sat. 12th an Old Working Boats Meet. We are situated on an island, the island of Voorne, and along an old river, the Brielse Maas. Which, by an unlucky decision in the last century, has been dammed off and is now a lake, Brielse Meer.

My favourite time to walk my senior dog Puck is in the early morning, when the sun comes up over the other side of the lake.

I say 'walk', but due to her age (around 12) it is more of a shuffle. I have a dodgy knee, so we shuffle and limp along...

Still, we both love this time of day!

This is the spot where the foot and bycicle ferry crosses the lake to the next island along.

Now, normally there are some old tugs moored to the left of this ferry, but they have sailed into the inner harbour for the day. Where they are joined by many more old tug boats and other working vessels. We Dutch are a seafaring nation at heart, it is in our DNA (even Napoleon acknowledged that; did you know he said 'every Dutch man is a sailor' ? I am currently writing a book about the period when the French occupied my country) 

The entrance to the two inner harbours via the canal from the lake.

Brielle used to be a herring fishing port, and for some time during the 13th century it made it a very rich and important port. Unfortunately the river silted up, making it harder to reach the harbour, and for some reason the herring stayed away as well. In 1572 the Geuzen were still able to reach the town, making it the first liberated town during the 80 year war against the Spanish oppressor. But by then the town was in decline; the huge cathedral was never finished, two arms of the ship are missing.

The merchants still built their posh brick houses though, most of them date from the mid 17th century.

Then, during the 18th century, the French invaded the country under rule by Napoleon Bonaparte, and Brielle (called Den Briel of old) again played an important part, housing the naval ships that were used to keep the English from our shores. Mind you, we preferred the English to the French by then! 

In 1813 Brielle citizens threw out the French occupancy, no doubt inspired by 1572 when they did the same with the Spanish.

There used to be guilds; this building houses two: Zakkendragers (porters) and Kaailopers (dockworkers), both guilds to do with unloading merchant ships.

The canal looking from the inner harbour towards the lake, taken from the Waterpoort (water gate).

The reality along the quays...cars and more cars. The council is trying to get them out of the inner town, but so far no plan has worked.

I hope you have liked my diversion from plants. If so, spread the word. If not, no worries, next week it'll be back to plants.

Have a great week, wherever you are!

Renée Grashoff 

2026/25Extra - Gardens of historical Brielle

 A feature of the gardens of my historical hometown is that most gardens are either walled gardens, or that they are completely enclosed by houses. Hence you don't get to see a lot of them, unless you are invited in. And on Sunday June 14th, we were.

This walled garden at the Raas is one of the oldest surviving in Brielle. The houses date from the early 17th century. The large Catharijne church dates from the 15th century (1417) but was never finished because they ran out of money in 1482. One of the naves and the spire were never built. It was supposed to become the largest church of the country...don't say our citizens weren't ambitious!

As a rose lover, I particularly like that rose scrambling up the tree in the same garden.

There are some modern houses within the ramparts, and this garden is situated in Van Sleenstraat, overlooking the ramparts. A potter/painter couple have created a charming garden here.

This is another corner of the same garden. Gorgeous rose!

Not every garden was to my liking (plastic lawn? No thanks!); but this lovely rose caught my eye in an otherwise utterly uninspiring garden.

Being hemmed in by houses make a lot of the gardens shadow gardens. This one had Feverfew in one of the only sunny spots.

Another corner of the same shadow garden.

The sunny corner of yet another shady garden; this one was surrounded by wooden fencing.

This looks like a jungle, but there were narrow paths from the house.

This is in the same garden, but looking towards the other side.

A good example of the many centuries old walls surrounding the gardens.

Some of the gardens were amazingly large, for a town garden. When you walk the narrow 15th century streets of Brielle, you have no idea that behind the houses are large gardens. And it is wonderful to see that those gardens are loved, and maintained as a garden, whilst there is a huge lack of parking space in Brielle. Sure, some get tarmaced, but many fortunately are not.

Another thing that struck my eye, is that many of the 10 gardens I had the time to visit had the same plants in them. That tells me that those plants are trusted to do well in our soil. The tendency to plant exotics has passed by Brielle so far, all those plants I saw were perhaps not proper natives (roses, Acanthus et such do come from warmer parts of Europe), but they are known to do well here. Especially when they are protected from that ever blowing sea wind over here. But not a palm tree, or citrus tree or huge aloe in sight.

I hope you've enjoyed a little peek at the gardens. Do share my blog address if you have.

Have a good week, wherever you are.

Renée Grashoff 

2026/16 - Murphy's Law in Gardening

 We Dutch don't have an equivalent of Murphy's Law. We do have the saying 'an accident sits in a small corner' (yeah, I know, ponder on that for a while), but having one thing go wrong, and then the rest will go to pot...nope. And yet that is exactly what happened to me this week.

The day started very well. I had planned to go mow my grass paths in Hunky Dory for the first time this year, so had thought to recharge the battery for the trimmer. Preparation is all, right? It would not be the first time that it died on me within a few minutes. Nor the second time, come to that.

So. Freshly charged trimmer, no need to go home again (no electricity on our allotment).

I got as far as my rocking chair, so let's say I had trimmed merrily away for...two minutes? And with a whrrrrrr sound my spool was empty. Now this means a car ride to the next village, to get a full spool plus the strong hands of a guy in the farming equipment shop, as my artrosis fingers will not get the bloody thing undone.

Always looking for the bright side (whilst fuming), will you just look at my Kiwi, which has survived the transplant and the frost?!

The struggling Honeysuckle next to it is sort of alive...but I will have to do something about it. Anyway, I'm hoping the Kiwi will solve the problem for me and cover that fence.

Meanwhile the second thing that could go wrong had already done so. The latest storm (two weeks in a row) had again blown down one of my obelisks, and this time had destroyed the Latyrus it had spared the first time.

In the greenhouse my Rettich had grown well. But so had Monster (read post 15), now totally covering my newly planted Broccoli completely.

I dug up the Broccoli and moved them to a new, better, place. Did I pull out Monster, you ask? I did not. It is about to burst into flower. I know...I'm a pussy.

The bee on the Wallflower was in my balcony garden, totally off topic, but so sweet.

Anyway. I removed the algae from the frog pond, did some other small jobs and then prepared one of my tin beds for the wildflower patch I have decided to grow there.

In the one there are some Tulips, and a mass of just about to come up Monarda.

In the second there is my beloved Desdemona Rose, and there used to be a huge Fennel for three years, but that had blown over by another storm, and passed away.

I had been given a few small bags of wildflower seed, by various people. My experience with these bags is that the result is disappointing. Hunky Dory is definitely 'wild', but mainly because of my tolerance for wild plants that blow in. Wild plants that I sow...hardly ever come up. They are out competed by the real wild ones.

So this time, I decided to give it a go in this bed. If the wildflowers are yet again a disaster, I can always plant something else in it. This soil will not turn into concrete. There are some perennial Nettles and Asters in there, but they can stay.

I promised you my orange Broom. It has been cold this last week, so it has not got very far, but you get the picture. Bear with me, there will be better photos soon. 

The same applies to the Apple blossom. Just about to really show. I pruned very brutally, so I am pleased 3 out of my 4 trees are showing blossoms.

My willow branch planter is falling apart, a total waste of money, but the Raspberry in there is looking good. And that Artichoke, which had been devastated by an autumn storm, is happily doing its best to dominate that corner of the garden again.

Anyway, back to that trimmer and effing Murphy! I got a new spool attached by a nice guy in Oostvoorne, and when I started trimming the grass it broke within the first 5 minutes. This time I swore at it, loudly, and repaired it with duct tape. Sod you, Murphy, you will not beat me!

Here is the proof that duct tape works.

Look me up at my website at Renée Grashoff Schrijft , where my latest blog tells you about the mysterious dicks that appeared all over Brielle on March 31st. Have a good weekend!

Renée Grashoff