Tiel Area

Monday is a day when a lot of "attractions" are closed, so we decided it was a great day to revisit the area around Tiel where the DeHoogh's of Linda's family are from.

The day started with a visit by a local plumber to the apartment to help with getting even water temperature for hot water. We noticed the Griffioen name on his van because that is a name in the family history of Ernie's mom from the French Huguenots. As near as we can tell, he's no relation, but he did tell us that the English form of Griffioen is Gryffindor - so apparently my interest in Harry Potter has some genetic element to it. (Well, it's an interesting idea, anyway.)

The DeHoogh family were farmers in the Tiel area. The farm was known as "de Grote Brug" because it was near the bridge over the river Linge. The bridge still carries that name, but this version is from 1938 and doesn't seem all that "great" or "large". The house on the farm was still standing until 1999, when it was torn down to make way for an "industrial park". So the DHL warehouse now stands approximately where the family farm was.

We've only seen photocopies of photographs which were taken of the old house. As near as we can remember, the farm house might have looked like this.

We also wandered around the towns of Lienden, Ingen, and Maurik. Linda has learned that her great-great grandfather Jerphaas de Hoogh, and her g-g-g gf  Huibert de Hoogh and g-g-g gm Gijseertje de Cok were born or lived in these nearby towns. Huibert lived in the 1700s so the de Hoogh family has deep roots in this region.

Here's some images from these towns.

It's pretty common to find a self-serve produce stand by a driveway. Linda found some great looking pears.

 

 

The Tiel area is one of the major fruit growing areas of the Netherlands, so it's not unusual to see a pear tree growing next to a house or to see rows of trained apple trees.

Moss grows pretty well here as well - at least if you don't move your poor Vanagon for a very long time. I'm amazed the tires aren't flat!

We've also been seeing this billboard all over the country. It translates as "More... of the same". The Dutch have a real thing for the VW bus since Ben Pon (a Dutch VW dealer) designed the first bus on a napkin. It's just too bad that the new generation isn't available to U.S.A. VW bus lovers!