September 12th, 2008: Vlieland

A few weekends ago I went camping on Vlieland, the next island past Texel, since it was nice and sunny. These pictures are in random order since Blogger seems to be assembling them in an order different from the order I'm uploading them in...

When you arrive on Vlieland from Texel, this vehicle takes you across 8km of sand on the southern end of the island, which is used as a military testing range in the non-tourist season.
Bridge from the ferry landing at Vlieland to the yellow truck that takes you across the sand.
The village of Oost-Vlieland.
Yes, the place is actually called "Place to MEAT you"!!!
Random goat statue.


View of Oost Vlieland from the top of a tall dune.


Harbor in Oost Vlieland.



The tires of the yellow truck have a poem written in them - so when the truck drives across the sand it leaves a poem (in Dutch of course). Below is another photo of the poem in the sand.
Tourists arriving on Texel from Vlieland.
A hairy cow! Vlieland has them too! (But interestingly, I didn't see any sheep there...)

September 3rd, 2008: Tall Ships in Den Helder

About two weeks ago the Tall Ships' Races were held in Den Helder. Basically, a lot of boats from all over came to Den Helder and were there for a few days. It was fun to walk around and see them all. Texel was abnormally crowded that weekend - I have no idea how many tourists flocked here to see the Tall Ships, but it was definitely a large number!

For some reason, a bunch of the food stands had this banner with the Statue of Liberty and the American flag in the background... A friend of mine asked one of the vendors why but the person working in the food stand had no idea. Random - but amusing!


I didn't actually see the races- but it was nice to walk around Den Helder and see all of the ships. A bunch of them were sailing and it looked a bit chaotic out there in the water with so many boats sailing around and the ferry to Texel passing through.