Stunning View of Iconic Tulips at Keukenhof Garden

Last month on the 3rd May 2019 at the last day of our tour, 5 of us (my mom, my sisters and my brother-in-law) visited Keukenhof after checking out from our hotel. It's the most exciting place we would like to see, people say the best to see Tulip in mid to end of Apr. Arriving Keukenhof around 09:00 o'clock, the weather was quite cold around 10 degree Celsius, so we wore our coat to protect us from the wind and weather. We had to walk from the parking area to the gate, the bus was not allowed to drop us in front of the entrance. While waiting for our tour leader bought the ticket, we took some pictures on the gate which already had beautiful colorful blossom Tulips. The Tour Leader (TL) only gave us around 2.5 hours to explore the garden, and he informed that the meeting point would be right in front of the gate.

Passing through the entrance one by one I asked a map from the guard, they said that free maps were available in different languages on a stand just a few steps after the entrance. The map was important, it's good to help us to see the whole area allocation, and discover the way during our journey. A beautiful girl with traditional clothes was standing next to the map location, she didn't mind when we asked her to take picture together. The area was quite huge, 32 hectares, while the time was limited, so we had to decide which part to be visited. Our TL suggested to go to the windmill area first by turning to the right direction from the entrance, but my family decided to go the other way (left side) to split from the group, 2 couples were joined us.

The 1st part visited was quite amazing already, so many beautiful tulips planted in the area. It's planted in square for different color and type of Tulips. Some of them already bloomed a lot, such as the "Yellow Sun" Tulip with its beautifully ruffled golden yellow blooms. Deep lilac Passionale tulip was attracted us, its color was stand out among others. Our friend was kind enough to take our family picture. Botanical Tulip (Giuseppe Verdi) were also beautiful with its lovely bright gold, wide red stripes on the inside and carmine stripes on the outside. We spent quite a long time there taking many pictures there, till we realized that there were still many other location to be visited in the garden.

We crossed a white bridge, taking the footpath to continue the journey. On the left side of the path we could see 5 big round pots surrounding a smaller pot, the pots dominated with red, pink, yellow and white color of flowers, very few leaves shown. At the right side we could sit on benches with background of Tulip to enjoy the garden, bi-colors tulip and fringe tulips type planted here. Unfortunately we could not take picture in the middle of the flower such as the previous place, they put ropes to avoid people step on the grass. Wandering the garden here was quite shady as some big trees were sheltering us.

Arriving at "Irene" pavilion, we saw a big organ displayed as the decoration. A small pond with its tree fountain was as the main attraction in this area, beautiful purple prince tulips were planted on a big pot at the edge of the pool. Some of us taking time to go to the restroom as the weather quite mild and we didn't know how long we could find another restroom again in the garden. While waiting for them, we kept taking pictures with beautiful rows of Tulips under the high trees. Queen of Night tulip which its color almost black was found near to the river stream.

We remembered that our TL had mentioned around the big pool is very beautiful view with many Tulips. We were rather lost track as we passed by many big trees with no flowers, we decided to turn and tried to find the shortest path to the big pool as the time keep ticking. After walking for a few minutes... finally we could find the right track. We found so many Tulips surrounding the pool, it made us very excited and speechless. Taking pictures from any angles were beautiful, it needed no photography expert to do it :-) They arranged the garden beautifully decorated with different colors Tulips. Combining with purple small flower (looked like Lavender) on the hilly contour had created an amazing view. We didn't have enough time to go around the big pool with its fountain, as our next destination to Windmill was far at the other side of the pool. I'm very fond of the combination of flower, water and blue sky, it's refreshing our soul.

We passed by small hut with Keukenhof signage, it's beautifully decorated with Tulips at the front, while the background big trees with green and red color such as during fall. Next to it was "Wilhemina" pavilion with a small cafeteria, unfortunately we didn't want to waste our time for drinking or snack time as we still had many places to explore. I wish I could have time to sit down admire the garden while having your coffee or tea, maybe someday I'll be back there with more time to explore the whole garden, not in a rush.

At the edge of the pool we could find some colorful beautiful ducks, unfortunately I didn't have bread to feed them. Near another bridge to pass by, there was a small garden with white horse and its jockey statue. We asked the other visitor's assistance to take our group picture, as we didn't go with our TL who often helped us taking group picture :-) The garden also had a white statue of Tulip bulb as the symbol and decoration. I kept taking many pictures while others kept walking, I was almost always the last in the group then I had to run to catch them.

To cross the pool there were also step stones on the water, close to the fountain. Some people taking this path, actually I would like to try and ask others to take my picture. As I was the last, nobody could help me, so I just took the picture of the view. We still found bunch of Tulips on the way to Willem-Alexander Pavilion. It's an indoor museum where you could find display of Tulips and various flowers other than Tulip. As we ran out of time, we just saw at a glance while we passed, we didn't explore the museum. The museum surrounding by small pool, surrounding by a green field with Tulips. Our young couple friends took a nice picture sitting on the green grass field next to the Tulips.

Finally we reach the windmill area, there was some straw piles as the bench for people to enjoy the park, it's cool, unfortunately all seat had been taken although it's under the sunshine. There's also a high small hut with shelter contains of a person, you had to climb the wooden ladders to sit on it. While taking picture, lucky me there's a straw pile leaving by persons, so I took it over fast to take picture alternately with my sister and my brother-in-law. Some food sellers on the cart were available here. You could shop for souvenirs too in the store next to the windmill. We didn't have a chance to go up to the windmill, anyway taking picture with tulips as foreground and windmill as background was quite satisfying.

Near the windmill there's a boat on the river, you could go by boat trip, no time at all for this. The time given had been finished, so we had to go to the meeting point at the entrance gate. Walking to the entrance we pass through a big green field, picnic area where there's a playground for children. I took some flying pose of my sisters and friends there, while for myself, I ran to the other side of the fields attempted with many colorful Tulips. I took selfie with the Tulips as my background, then a kind woman brought SLR camera was helping me to take my picture using my iphone.

We still stopped by some places to take beautiful pictures. My brother-in-law was able to take a good picture of my sisters on the square long pool with Tulips at the left and right side of the pool. Some cone form trees were also decorated beautifully at the side among Tulips and flowers. Dogs are allowed in Keukenhof as long as they are leashed, we met some dogs with their master. We saw a cute white and grey hairy dog was walking on the garden with her master, we stopped by to greet and caress the cute long fur dog. The dog was very friendly, unfortunately she's quite old, 11 years old already. The dog enjoyed our meeting even her master welcome us to touch the dog.

Running to the exit, we could not find other participant anymore at the entrance gate meeting point, then we checked our WhatsApp group, in fact they were already in the bus at the parking lot, we were the last participants arrived. We still would like to explore more the beautiful scenery and flowers at Keukenhof, unfortunately the time was not enough unless we'll miss the bus. If you visit Netherland in Apr or early May, don't forget to stop by Keukenhof at Lisse, wander the beautiful fields, pavilions and flowers of Keukenhof is very worthy, relaxing and interesting. Weekend is quite crowded, Mon to Wed is less busy while for the hours before 10:30 is better. Free wifi is available around pavilions in the park, you could borrow wheel-chair free of charge (just need deposit which would be returned later) if needed.

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Beautiful & Majestic Plaza de Espana, Sevilla

During my trip to Portugal, Seville was the 1st city we visited, not too long driving by bus from our hotel, we had arrived at the main landmark, Plaza de Espana Seville which was built in 1929. The previous night was very hot, up to 47 degree Celcius, lucky we went to the square in the morning, so it's still around 32 degree Celcius. The place is next to Maria Luisa park, unfortunately we didn't have time to visit the park, the park could not be seen from the square.

Entering the gate, we welcome by beautiful ceramic mosaic wall, it would lead us to the half circle balcony with beautiful big arches where we could see one of the tower from the arc facing to the square. The arc was framing the tower beautifully. From entering the gate, I kept saying very beautiful many times.

We went down through the stairs, to the circle center, there was a canal surrounding the circle, to cross the canal, there is a bridge with beautiful ceramics fence to go to the center of the circle where there was the Vicente Traver fountain, unfortunately the fountain was still off when I was in the middle of the square. Some benches available at the edge or the canal where we could sit on it enjoy the square. Some flowers and trees were planted at the edge of the canal.

I tried to record all of them by taking many pictures. We went to the other side of the circle to look closer to the middle of the half square. We went up to the second floor, then our tour leader was kind enough to take our picture from below, so it could show the fence, arc and the beautiful ceiling and wall as the background.

My sister was interested in fabric fan painted Flamenco dancer and Spain landmark, it cost 10 Euro for 3 pcs, my mom and myself took one of them, so we selected our own choice. Lucky we bought it, as it's cheaper comparing to the souvenir shops we visited during the trip. Finally we enjoyed the tiled Provincial Alcoves along the walls of the Plaza de España, it represented the region during ancient kingdom of Spain. Spanish architect Aníbal González designed the largest and most famous of the buildings, which surrounded the square.

On the way to the entrance, I could see the fountain on, and lucky there was a horse carriage went around the square. I still had time to take some pictures of the beautiful ceramic stairs on the way out, also the ceramic walls. I would like to stay longer, unfortunately we still had some places to be visited on the day. Definitely I would like to visit it again someday.

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Beautiful Schobrunn Palace Garden, Vienna

After a long flight journey from Jakarta, Indonesia, we arrived in Vienna in the morning. We didn't stop to the hotel to save time, directly we went to the tourism places. Schönbrunn Palace as one of the World Cultural Heritage sites, located a few kilometres from central Vienna was our first destination. A baroque summer palace built in 18th century contains the authentically furnished residential & ceremonial rooms of the Imperial Family (Marie Antoinette’s childhood & Empress Maria Teresa). It's very hot almost mid day, we walked through the entrance gate to the huge yard surrounding by long buildings.

Two beautiful fountains were decorated the yard where we could take picture with the palace as the background. As the area coverage so wide, we had difficulty to take the whole scenery, only one side of the building and a fountain could be reached. Under the strong sunshine, we took pictures in front of the fountain which has beautiful statues in the middle of the pool. The fountain was surrounding by fresh green grass, my friend stepped on the grass to sit on the edge of Danube-Inn-Enns statues fountain. The other fountain had Galicia-Volhynia-Translyvania statue.

The tour leader kept calling us to follow the local guide, he said we still had time on the way out to take more picture. Entering the building we had to wait for the local guide to buy tickets and deposit big bags and backpacks as they're not allowed to bring to inside of the palace. There was a souvenir shop that sold souvenirs, snacks and drinks, so we could shop while waiting for the ticket. I put on one of the beautiful cap from the shop which was really matched to my blouse to take picture. My friend bought one of the caps to be worn to avoid the sunshine with “Vienna” picture or letter. The local guide gave us the earphone to enable us hearing her explanation well during the journey, she didn’t need to speak loudly to the group member. Firstly the local guide spoke English, then our tour leader translated to Indonesia as some tour members didn't speak English. As it's taken longer time, I asked the tour leader to stand near the tour members to translate directly to whom didn't understand the explanation.

Unfortunately we were not allowed to take picture at all in the palace, so I could not share you any picture of the rooms, painting, sculpture, statue, furniture and anything inside. Only 40 of the Schönbrunn Palace's 1,441 rooms were open to the public, they were enough to provide visitors with a sense of how magnificent the place. From the window, I could see the beautiful garden, it’s looked very neat and maintained well. The structure of the Baroque park layout was virtually untouched, the ancient techniques were still used for trimming its trees and bushes. I would like to rush to the garden as there was no photo object could be taken in the palace, unfortunately the local guide would like to share a complete story about the history. At the end of exploring the palace, there were some souvenir shops which made my tour friends excited. Actually I prefer to go to explore the garden soon, but I had to wait for the group.

A small rubber wheeled train and horse carriages could bring you around the palace if you don't want to walk. I heard it’s only operated during summer, not enough time for us to ride them. I didn’t know where the transportation route would go, but I passed them went walking on the yard. Maybe they would go to the other part of the palace which’s located crossed the garden. For many tourists, a ride with the two-horse carriage is one of the highlights, it’s called flacker. If you would like to enjoy the journey, you should ask the flacker coach for a "porcelain ride", which is a particularly calm and steady drive, it was provided long ago to transport precious porcelain safely from one place to another.

Walking to the garden was quite far, especially under the sunshine, lucky I was wearing a cap. Sunglasses would help too, unfortunately I didn't bring them. We found the beautiful roses arch aisle as the sunshine shade, the red roses were amazing, it’s very big and layering. My friend took many pictures there with various poses, until I beg them to take my picture. After waiting a few minutes I decided to leave them unless I could not explore the big garden.

The spectacular sculpted garden is called the Great Parterre. Many colorful flowers arranged beautifully on the spacious garden. Most of our tour friends were going back while I went to the garden. Lucky I met our tour guide who helped me to take picture with the palace as the background. He could not take my picture with the garden as it's against the sunshine. I ran to the middle of the garden to be able to take the garden as my background, unfortunately nobody there to help me taking my picture. With my iphone, I tried to do selfie, the result was not too good, because I was not used to it. With both my pocket camera and iphone, I took many pictures to record the wonderful scenery. One of them was posted on the top of this article which shows the beautiful garden with the back of the palace, residence of the Habsburg emperors from 18th century to 1918.
On the other end of the French garden actually was very interesting, I pushed to take the picture although it's too far and against the sun light. I’m happy as the result was quite good to see the garden axis points towards a 60-metre-high hill, which since 1775 has been crowned by the Gloriette structure. I really didn’t have time to walk or even run to the edge of the garden where we could see nearer to the Neptune Fountain and Gloriette in the background. No time for us to exploring other side of the garden such as Roman ruin, palm house, zoo, etc.

A particular pleasure is simply wandering the numerous paths alongside the park's flower beds while trying to spot all 44 of its 18th-century mythological marble sculptures. I took one of the beautiful sculptures displayed “Abduction of Helena”. The tour leader shouted to call me as I was the last one in the garden. Although it's hot, I love staying longer in the garden, I still wanted to take more picture.

I had to run back to gather with our group who had been at the front yard of the palace. On the way back to the gate, I still had a chance to help my friend taking picture in front of the beautiful pool. Near to the entrance gate, there was a 3D steel map of the palace, which described the whole area of the palace, most of them hadn't been explored. While waiting for the bus at the front of the gate, a golden man imitated Mozart was standing on the golden box. He would change pose if we gave him money, my friend put a coin on the golden tin in front of him to take a picture with him. He even kissed my friend’s hand to give honour and also posed gracefully for the photo. It’s very hot, I could not imagine how he could stand under the very strong sunshine covering the whole body with golden paint, wearing thick wardrobes. It must be very suffering, hot and burnt, what's a life.

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Banska Bystrica Historic Town in Slovakia

On the way from Budapest to Krakow, we went through Slovakia. We stopped by a beautiful city call Banska Bystrica as the most important historical, cultural and economic centre of the central Slovakia. The earliest history of Banská Bystrica was connected with the exploitation of its abundant deposits of copper. We walked to the downtown, it's free time around two and a half hours including lunch.

Nobody told us about the history and the beautiful building at downtown, so we just took many pictures surrounding by beautiful buildings. The weather was nice, quite mild and the town was not too crowded, it's perfect to enjoy it. It lies in the the middle of Europe on the banks of the river Hron surrounded by breathtaking scenary of Low Tatras, Kremnické Vrchy and Slovenské Rudohorie mountains.

The slender Hodinová veža tower (The Clock Tower) built in 1552 was dominated and became the central attraction at the main square. In front of the tower was The Plague column of the Virgin Mary. While City Barbican (Banská Bystrica Town Castle) located next to the tower was once formed by several ancient buildings in the central Slovakian metropolis Banská Bystrica. Its task was to protect the income proceedings of copper and silver mining for the royal treasury.

Across City Barbican was St. Francis Xavier Cathedral Built in 1715 on the site of the chapel of St. John the Baptist and on the house called Oberhaus. The church with one nave is the copy of the church " Il Gesù" in Rome. It is a Baroque building, later transformed into the classical style. The dominant twin-towers were built during the renovations in 1844. The church's interior from the first half of the 19th century consist of the Empire main altar, the side altars and the pulpit.

Continue walking we could find the historic Radnica (townhall) of Banská Bystrica then we could find Thurzos house, the social science exposition of the Museum of Central Slovakia. It is formed from two Gothic houses completed with some Renaissance elements. As we didn't notice it at that time, we didn't visit the museum. Many cafes were available along the streets for people to take a rest while they still could enjoy the scenery.

Strolling the lower part of Námestie SNP, the natural center of the city, we found an art fountain and a black Obelisk in Slovak National Uprising Square as the memorial to honor the Soviet soldiers killed during the liberation of the city in 1945.

We stopped by to buy ice cream, before continue exploring the street. So many beautiful small shops selling souvenirs, clothes, handy-craft etc. My friends liked to buy clothes, we spent some minutes in a big shop selling clothes and shoes. I preferred to find souvenirs, many unique souvenirs we could find here, most of them made from woods. Most of the shops didn't accept card, but they didn't mind accepting Euro.

Decided to have lunch at Pizza restaurant, we could get extra bonus using the toilet, it's very clean and auto sensor implemented for the lighting. While waiting for the pizza, it's raining very hard, lucky that we had taken many pictures and got a chance to explore the city. We had to move our chairs to avoid getting wet, the pizza was very delicious & crispy. After finishing lunch, God was kind enough, the rain stopped so we could go back to our bus.

Our bus parked near to The Museum of the Slovak National Uprising (SNP). An architecturally unusual building built in 1969, located in the middle of a park that includes an open-air museum of heavy military equipment. It's quite satisfying visited the nice town on the long way to reach Krakow by bus.

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Famous Mirabell Garden Salzburg, Austria

I really want to visit Salzburg as I saw its beautiful scenery in my favourite musical movie “The Sound of Music”. During my East Europe tour, we visited Salzburg, one of the best-preserved city centers north of the Alps, just for half day.

We arrived at noon after lunch time, Mirabell Garden was the only place that’s scheduled to be visited in the tour itinerary. A bus tour with “The Sound of Music” branding was parked on the parking lot, we took some pictures while waiting for our friends stopped by at the toilet. Entering the garden, we welcome by a woman statue fountain in the middle of an circle pool surrounding by flowers. The Mirabell Gardens were opened to the public by Emperor Franz Joseph in 1854, it becomes a horticultural masterpiece and popular backdrop for photographers.

The next part of the garden was larger, it’s the main garden decorated with beautiful flowers, statues, also a big fountain. As my friends were busy pose and taking many pictures, I had to make myself available for others helping them taking pictures so they could take my picture in return. Otherwise I would only had the scenery without me for documentation. Lucky after quite a long time, they remembered me :-), asked me to go to the middle of the garden to take some pictures behind the flowers with the Mirabell palace as the background. The Baroque masterpiece of Schloss Mirabell Palace was initially built as "Schloß Altenau" under the reign of Prince Archbishop Wolf Dietrich von Raitenau in 1606. It was a present for his concubine Salome Alt and most famous for its splendid garden.

When I’ve returned to Indonesia, I explored Mirabell garden, I've just found and realized, actually Pegasus fountain is one of the landmark beside the palace. Unfortunately we didn’t go through the Pegasus fountain to run down the hedge arcade along the Grand Parterre what Fräulein Maria and the Trapp children did in the movie. It’s quite very short time to visit the beautiful garden, no time to enjoy the scenery by sitting on the available benches for visitors. We left through the gate which was guarded by sporty man statues at the left and right side formed the gate arch.

Our guide brought us to the other side of the city, the Makartsteg, a bridge over the Salzach River in Salzburg′s city centre. It was named after the 19th century Historicist painter Hans Makart, who was born and raised in Salzburg. It’s raining when we crossed the bridge which was full of various padlocks from couple lovers who’re falling in love. Makart became famous as a painter of the Viennese Historicism, providing artwork for many of the pompous buildings of the Ringstraße. The Makartsteg is open for pedestrians and cyclists only.

Continued walking to the old cities to visit Mozart’s house, we went through many small aisles, the guide didn’t allow us to split as there were many people around, he would find difficulty to find the lost one. Finally we reached the house, it’s not too big, you must pay to see inside the house on the 2nd floor which has become a museum now, none of us was interested in it. The guide was giving us free time to explore the area, so many beautiful shops around it, which sold souvenirs, bags, etc. Some restaurants and attractive café design were also available there, we passed by a restaurant which displayed the big size shrimp, bread to attract people.

I visited some souvenir shops to buy small stuffs such as cute magnetic for mom and myself, also visited chocolate stores which sold Mozart (the genius musician who was born in Salzburg) chocolate for gifts. Actually many souvenirs were cute, unfortunately it’s quite expensive when I calculate in IDR, most of the time I cancelled to buy because of the price. Beside that, it’s quite difficult to bring the easy breakable once, such as house miniature, glasses, decorative plate or crystal, clocks, etc. Most of souvenirs I bought was chocolates and magnetic decoration for fridge 

The local guide brought us to the bus stop area went through the same way, including Makarsteg bridge, as now it’s not raining, we could take some beautiful pictures with the padlocks, the river and beautiful mountains as the background. So many tourist buses were parking on the area where we were waiting for our bus, there were benches for us to sit. The city was ready for tourist visit, they kept maintaining well the tourism places which were existed many years even centuries, also provided and arranged well the infrastructure to progress with the modern world. I also like the weather there, although it’s quite cold and windy, we should wearing jacket at least. If you would like to experience “The Sound of Music”, you should at least spend one whole day in Salzburg. You could join the local tour with has short or long hour trips to trace the movie places.

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Unbelievable Spectacular Hallstatt, Austria

In June 2015 I joined East Europe tour from Jakarta, we’ve visited Hallstatt, the amazing village with its tranquil lake surrounding by traditional houses functioned as hotel, restaurant and shops with mountains. The bus just dropped us, it didn’t park there, we’re given 2 hours 45 minutes to stroll around. Hallstatt is known for its production of salt, dating back to prehistoric times, and gave its name to the Hallstatt culture. Recently UNESCO determined a big part of this region as a World Heritage worth to be preserved.

Going down from the bus, the lake was very attempting. The weather was quite cold for us, around 12 degree Celcius, so we wore jacket or long sleeves sweater with scarf to warm our neck. We sat on the edge of the lake, playing around with the beautiful swans which had a black color highlight around their eyes. Some of them even tried to bite my friend’s shoes.

Actually you could ride a boat to go around the lake, unfortunately we didn’t have enough time. An incident happened to a western tourist who sat next to us. Accidentally he dropped his smartphone to the lake, lucky the lake was crystal clear, so he could get back his smartphone although he had to swim and get wet. It must be very chilly, as the temperature was low and windy. I don’t know whether his phone could back to function well. Poor him…

After sitting around 30 minutes on the lake’s edge, we went to the left side not strolling the lake’s edge to the cathedral. It’s very quiet, but we found many beautiful traditional houses with colorful bright flowers. We posed in the middle of the street to get better scenery for the background. One of my friend was really addicted to photos, she would like us to take many shoots with her various pose in a place. She has a good body shape, she’s beautiful very creative to pose, unfortunately we didn’t have much time if we had to follow her desires all the time.

We found the railway up to the mountain which leads to the ancient salt mining. The station was quite near, you could take the panorama funicular to see the mystical area if you ride to the peak. The top was the tunnel mouth to the underground mining which was first dug by hand 3000 years ago. The railway was very steep and long, we took some pictures by jumping and my friend did the headstand (Yoga’s pose) with the path as the background. We had to aware for the traffic as the parking lot just next to it.

One of my friend was starving already, so she stopped at a beautiful restaurant to order pizza and crepes with ice cream, the bonus we could use the restroom/toilet free of charge. The toilet was very clean, and it used movement sensors to turn off/on the light automatically. It’s good to save energy. I bought an ice cream while my other friend bought orange juice. It’s nice to relax in the restaurant surrounding by the beautiful scenery and mild weather.

As time only 30 minutes remaining to return to the bus. We had to hurry, but we kept taking pictures on the way back to the meeting point. A beautiful scenery from a small bridge was attempted us to record the picturesque scenery.

Reaching the meeting point, we saw nobody in the bus, so we went further to the edge of the lake, we still had a chance to take beautiful pictures in front of the fence. Finally we’re the last persons to go into the bus.

In the bus, our friends showed their shopping hunting, beautiful 24K gold plated Austrian crystal ornament with various form such as musical instrument (harp, piano, etc.), angels, animals, etc. It cost around EUR25 for the small one. The shops were available around the picturesque historical market square. We didn’t have time to go there, we spent all hours to take pictures and stop a while for lunch in other direction. Most of our friends walked down the river towards the cathedral.

Time was too short, we should stay overnight there. You should spend your holiday among lovely mountains and lakes. Millions of people have already been photographed against the stunning backdrop, which for many visitors counts as one of the most beautiful motives in Europe.

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