Lauren is a bubbly chatty American, with fantastic dutch. She is Dave’s childhood friend and it was lovely to meet her and be welcomed into her and her husband, Loe’s, home. We were greeted by Lauren and her gorgeous dog Pixel, who is part Dachshund and part Collie- a lovely stocky mix. We had a nice time catching up and throwing sticks for Pixel who was loving life! Once Loe was home we went for a walk around the beautiful fields nearby, which are really close to the peaceful residential neighbourhood they live in. The rest of the evening was spent enjoying the sunshine in their garden, relentlessly throwing sticks for Pixel, who just never gets bored, having a tasty dinner and catching up/getting to know them both.
The following morning Loe went to work but we had a leisurely dutch ham/cheese/ bread breakfast and gave Pixel lots of fuss. We headed into Sittard, the town they live in to have a look around. It was very similar to Newark in the UK where we live, cobbled streets, churches and a main market square. We sat in the square basking in the morning sunshine with a coffee, people watching which is apparently a very common dutch pasttime. After this we had a quick wander around the town- admiring some of the old architecture of the old kloister monastery and walking on the city walls, where they are currently redigging the moat. We decided to go back to the terrace for some lunch snacks, where we ended up at a different restaurant trying the dutch delicacy of bitterballern (breadcrumbed beef balls) delicious and some less dutch nachos, complete with some beers. It was a national holiday whilst we were there so every restaurant was packed as it was gorgeous weather and there was a real summer atmosphere. We sat for way too long in the sun where me and Lauren both ended up sunburnt.
In the afternoon we chilled out in the garden, took Pixel out for another walk and Dave then cook us all a BBQ to make the most of the sunshine- he of course was in his element, whilst I spent a long time playing and throwing sticks for Pixel, who was in his element. We spent the rest of the evening just hanging out and chatting.
It was really lovely to get to meet both of them, see their home and meet Pixel. In the morning we were headed off to our house sit near Rotterdam.
Thanks
Alex
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