The Season Starts Again

Although we are officially open from the beginning of April, our renting season normally starts about mid-April and this year was no exception. A gentle start to the season with just one rented out, but now both are full. It is always nice to have people return and both last week’s guests and one couple this week have stayed here before. It is like welcoming friends back again and it is this mix of old and new faces that keeps us enjoying the work we do. My Dutch gets a bit rusty over the winter as Cees is too good to me and speaks mostly English, so I need those chats over a glass of wine with our guests to get me back up to speed.

But last week’s guests always keep us on our toes when they are here. I am exhausted after a week with Henk. He can’t sit still for one minute and he is always looking for things to do. He spotted a pile of logs that were too large for our wood burning stove and which we have miserably failed to split into smaller logs and he found a large axe, and with a quick “do you want these spilt?”, he was away. Just one skilful whack with the axe and these stubborn pieces of oak gave way, leaving us to run around and stack our new ready to burn logs.

It is not only wood chopping, but Henk is a fanatical gardener. He helped me enormously last year to get the vegetable plot into some sort of order and this year, he came to inspect what I had done over the last year. I think he was rather disappointed that I had managed to keep it going as he had little digging to do, but he was kept happy by setting up a new bed for me, making the garden complete, well at least until next time he comes.

After planting a walnut tree, a rose and clematis that will grow through the dead apple tree in the orchard and helping me sort out the wild flower area in the front garden, he was done for this year. He even had time left over for long walks and cycle rides with his wife Gerda. So thank you Henk and Gerda for a most fruitful and enjoyable week. I’d better keep the garden looking nice now in case they come back again.

So I am relaxing after a busy week, feeling charged up for the new season ahead and looking forward to the first campers.

More information about are gites and campsite are here