Betsy-Tacy Convention 2025, Part 1

On Friday, I flew to Minnesota for a literary convention – a gathering of nearly 200 Betsy-Tacy fans! I think it was my fifth time visiting Deep Valley, legally known as Mankato, Minnesota. The Betsy-Tacy books are based on Maud Hart Lovelace’s childhood and adolescence, and fans have purchased her home and that of her best friend who lived across the street and turned them into living history museums. While it is great to see these houses and to observe whatever enhancements have taken place since one’s last visit, I now primarily attend these events to see friends from all over the country (I don’t think there were any international participants this time but usually there is at least one Canadian and we’re always hoping Sonja from Germany will make it, as she is a favorite listserv member).

A Sunday in London - April 2025

On our Sunday in London, we got up early to attend Mass at my mother’s favorite church, St. Etheldreda. It is a small but beautiful Catholic church that dates from the 13th century. It is dedicated to Etheldreda, the Anglo-Saxon saint who founded the monastery at Ely in 673.

Keukenhof Gardens

On our final full day, the goal was tulips, which was our primary reason for the cruise. Keukenhof is one of the world’s largest flower gardens and consists of 80-acres of tulips, as well as many other flowers, including hyacinths, daffodils, lilies, roses, carnations and irises.

Amsterdam

The morning began with chocolate croissants, potatoes, bacon, and tea (wouldn't it be nice if these magically appeared at home about 7:30 every morning?), followed by an “enrichment talk” on Contemporary Netherlands from a local expert. There are so many cruise ships heading to Amsterdam that they are only allowed to dock for 48 hours, so the Amadeus was moored somewhere on the outskirts of the city (Ijmuiden?) and we took a bus to Oud-Zuid (Old-South), the Museum Quarter neighborhood, and parked in an underground garage, perhaps made for tour buses.  Everyone eagerly clambered onto four canal boats, each with its own guide. The day was chilly and initially gray so we were glad of the partial roof that could completely cover the boat if it began to rain.

Hoorn and Enkhuizen

On Sunday, we woke up in Enkhuizen, an old Dutch harbor town in the province of North Holland with a rich maritime history. We were scheduled to do a walking tour in historic Hoorn, named for its horn-shaped harbor, about 12 miles away, a very short bus ride. The town was founded about 1300 and became an important harbor town, trading with the Baltic and Flanders.

Delft

Our first difficult choice was on Saturday when we had been given the option of going to The Hague and the Mauritshuis Museum, historic Delft and a porcelain museum, or Gouda, the City of Cheese. All three seemed appealing and when I send in my feedback, I’m going to say I would recommend their removing Veere and figuring out a way to let the passengers do more than one of these tours.

Delft is sometimes called "Little Amsterdam"
because of its canals and historic houses

Veere

Friday’s destination was Veere.  After we left by bus for Bruges on Thursday morning, the Amadeus left Belgium and cruised to the Netherlands - specifically, Middelburg, where we rejoined the ship in the afternoon.  There was what is called a “Port Talk” before dinner where the cruise directors (we had four: Nani, Fiona, Carine, and Alan, who reminded me of Mr. O’Farrell in Betsy and the Great World) take turns telling us what is in store for the next day, what time we will leave, not to forget our red voice boxes (one day I accidentally unplugged them to use the hair dryer – I barely got them charged in time for our departure), etc.  Carine described Veere as a little paradise so many times I had to hide my smirk.  I am guessing it was simply the most convenient touristy place to dock between Middelburg and Delft but it was not without appeal.

15th century Town Hall

Bruges

In Dorothy Dunnett’s Niccolò series, the author of the Lymond Chronicles introduced a new hero, Nicholas vander Poele of Bruges, a dyer's apprentice who seems clueless at first but, over several books, connives his way to lead a mercantile empire. Dunnett is my mother’s favorite author so this was part of the impetus for our cruise, which included an excursion to Bruges (about the size of Maryland), in northwest Belgium.

On to Antwerp!

We got up at the ungodly hour of 5 am and walked two blocks over to the St. Pancras Eurostar International Station (the hardest part was getting our suitcases up the stairs at the hotel) and, within a surprisingly reasonable amount of time, we were comfortably seated on the train and on our way to Brussels! It took about two hours and we gained an hour in the process. There wasn’t much to see out the window and we had gone under the Channel so quickly, we barely had time to contemplate it. When we reached Brussels, we wheeled our suitcases up many escalators, admiring the design, and found our way to the local ticket office – so efficiently run – with several people helping travelers of many nationalities buy tickets from a machine. My helper even told me when the next train to Antwerp was and the platform. We found our way without difficulty and had about 20 minutes before our train appeared. It was about 45 minutes and as we couldn’t understand any of the announcements, we just hoped for the best and soon arrived (the gap was so extreme between train and platform, I was grateful to a fellow traveler who came back from his own luggage to help us get ours off the train).

Alas, we barely noticed the elegant station!

More London – April 2025

On Monday, it was time for us to remove to a new neighborhood so we took an Uber to the Princess Hotel near St. Pancras. This was not as nice as our previous venue but extremely well located, which is why I had chosen it. We took the Tube to Marylebone so I could show my mother the University of Westminster dorm that Southern Miss took over for my study abroad three years ago and we visited always-gorgeous Daunt Books, then had tea at a cafe on Paddington Street.

London - April 2025

On the way to our riverboat cruise, my mother and I spent five April days in London and we managed to squeeze in quite a bit of sightseeing. After dropping our luggage at the Charlotte Guest House in West Hampstead (which kindly allowed us into our room at 11 am – it is amazing how much of a difference this makes when you have been on a plane since 8 pm the previous night, then on the Tube for what seems like several hours), we headed to the William Morris Gallery in Walthamstow, in northeast London.

Maine

I am in Maine for a few days with my sister and niece. I am always entranced by the ocean and would be happy to sit with my book and look at the water all day.  But occasionally it is nice to explore the area!  We were staying in Rockport, Maine (which was about a four hour drive from Boston) and one of the things we did was go to nearby Mount Battie.

Six Degrees of Separation – From Frommer's New England to Charlotte's Web

It’s time for #6degrees, inspired by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best. We all start at the same place as other readers, add six books, and see where you end up. This month’s starting point is any travel guide from our bookshelves. I used to work for the publisher of Frommer’s Travel Guides and happened to pull down Frommer’s New England the other day for a friend who was visiting Salem (when you work for a travel publisher, you collect a copy of every book/location you think you might visit or need as a reference in the future).

Visiting Tulsa

The Cities for Financial Empowerment holds two convenings each year for member cities to share best practices to help low-income residents build assets, and this fall's was held in Tulsa, Oklahoma’s second-largest city (population 409,000). Most of the meetings were held at the BMX Hall of Fame and we stayed at a Hyatt, which had the most helpful staff of any hotel I’ve been at in years. In the evenings, we had a chance to see some interesting parts of the city.

Canada 2023 - part 2

We left Niagara-on-the-Lake Sunday morning to visit nearby Niagara Falls, which Andrea and Katherine had never seen. Our friendly waiter the previous evening had suggested we park by the Electric Commission to avoid traffic.  We should have got more precise

instructions as we wound up going through the very commercial town and then had to retrace our steps on foot. But when we saw the Beaux-Arts style Electrical Development Co. building (which operated from 1906 until it was replaced by a newer power station in 1974), we knew it was the right place and snagged a parking place.

O Canada 2023

The Shaw Festival is a theater festival located in Niagara-on-the-Lake (NOTL), Ontario, Canada, and is the second-largest repertory theatre company* in North America. It was founded in 1962 and Queen Elizabeth came in 1973 in honor of its first theater opening at the current location, staying at the charming Prince of Wales Hotel on the corner of King and Queen Streets.

The Prince of Wales Hotel, yards from our temporary home

Cornwall, Part 2

One sign of a successful trip is when you keep eagerly saying or thinking, “When I return . . .”

Overlooking Peel Cove, near Menabilly

Cath had asked what parts of Cornwall I was particularly interested in seeing, and I vaguely thought of artists in St. Ives but said I deferred to her judgment, except that I yearned to see Fowey, the setting of Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (1907-1989).

Cornwall, Part 1

Having read many books set in Cornwall, I was eager to see it for myself and asked my friend Cath of Read-warbler, who grew up there, if she and her husband could spare the time to go there with me, following my month in London. I was delighted when she agreed not only because I knew it would be fun to meet her in real life but also because I knew I would see more of Cornwall with two experts. And I suspected that three book lovers would never run out of things to say!

St. Ives from above

Day 13 – Visiting Green Knowe

It was my friend Kathy Baxter who told me she had visited the house upon which The Children of Green Knowe is based and if I had fully grasped how close it is to Cambridge, my mother and I could have gone there four years ago. After rereading the book in August, I was determined to make the Manor at Hemingford Grey part of this trip. I felt shy about writing to Diana Boston, who is the daughter-in-law of author L.M. Boston (1892-1990) and has lived in the house since she moved in to help Lucy after a stroke, but she responded to my email quickly and invited me to come on Saturday, June 18th when she had two tours already scheduled.

Day 11 – King's College Library

Thursday began with breakfast in Regent’s Park with Desiree and Erin. We walked in from Marylebone Road, then followed signs for a café and wound up next to some tennis courts. I had a chocolate croissant and inspected the books on a community shelf in the back. I found a book by Annie Groves that looked appealing. The others kept on walking but I returned to the dorm only to learn bad news: one of our group had tested positive and been quarantined in her room for five days. Getting Covid is no joke and being confined to one of these claustrophobic rooms as a heat wave is beginning sounded pretty grim. Everyone was somber when we met for the day’s excursion. We asked Dr. Steele what we could do for the victim and she said a second person (my next-door neighbor) also had symptoms and was going to get tested as well. I had been wearing a mask pretty steadily but now everyone from USM was told to wear one. Apparently, the Gothic Studies group has several people sick as well (I feel there is some significance there but am not sure exactly what).