In the Footpaths of the Pilgrim Fathers

The Pilgrim Fathers museum
in the oldest house in Leiden
(built in 1372)

Ask most people round here to name three Dutch cities, and you'll usually get some combination of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Delft and Den Haag (aka the Hague in its anglicised form). This means when I tell people that my parents live in Leiden, the next question is always "where's that?" (It's about 20 minutes south of Amsterdam and east of Den Haag).

To be fair, I didn't know where Leiden was either, until my parents moved there 5 years ago, so I thought it was time to share a little of Leiden's rich history. Leiden is an ancient city at the place where a river splits into three branches. To the extent that any river in this flat land can be said to flow (rather than simply resembling a wide, deep canal), the city is encircled by two branches of the river and the third runs through the middle, facilitating trade. Of course, this means a lot of bridges (engineer's paradise!), some of which can open to allow tall boats through to the markets.

It turns out that one thing Leiden is famous for is the Pilgrim Fathers, who settled in the city between 1609 and 1620 as refugees from England in search of religious freedom for their Puritan faith. Last week we visited a tiny museum behind one of the main shopping streets, housed in the oldest house in Leiden (dated via tree rings in the oak beams to 1372). 

Wildlife on Holiday - Los Angeles

To what extent do geology, wildlife and climate help create culture and a sense of place? Over the last few weeks I've had the chance to explore this question in four cities with very different climates: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle and Vancouver.
In LA, the climate is hot and dry, with the city built within a bowl of mountains between the ocean on one side and desert on the other. Some places like Arizona and Texas embrace the desert as part of who they are, creating gardens of succulents like the Tequila cactus (which I'm told produces a sweet drinkable sap) and hardy arbuto trees with amazing bark which eventually strips off entirely and locust trees. These plants are in evidence on the hillsides next to the freeways, but hardly visible in the city at all. Instead, Los Angeles seems to be a city of dreams: green grass, palm trees and eucalyptus sustained only by sprinkler systems.