Borne

After leaving Texel we drove south east to the Afsluitdijk Dike where set up camp for the night with about 20 other campers. The next morning we had pancakes cooked by William with a wooden spoon because we have lost our spatular. They were very nice with a good coat of applemoes and some syrup. Then we drove to Borne and found a farm/campground outside Borne which would be our home for the next few days.


Borne is where our Oma and Opa lived before coming to New Zealand. Our campground is on a farm which grows veal and maize. There is a trampoline and lots of space and we have power hook up so we finally get hot showers. The first family we visited in borne is Dad’s cousin Ellen and her family, her husband Johan and son Stan sadly Judith was on Holiday so we couldn‘t meet her.

Ellen took us on a walking tour of the village and pointed out all the streets and houses where our relatives once lived. We saw the house our great great grandfather built also known as the ‘Knippen Huis- (the ‘pennywise’ family house).We went into a small chapel and lit a candle for Oma.

On our walk we saw small brass memorial plaques in the ground where Jews had lived before they were taken away by the Nazi’s.

After our walk we had a BBQ in the backyard and we had such a good time we didnt leave until 1am it was really nice Thank You so much Ellen, Johan and Stan we really loved meeting you and we had an awesome time.



The next morning we went to the market. We brought cheese, fruit and bread. We had the bread for lunch with butter. It was a very solid loaf loaded with currents it weighed almost 2kg. After lunch we had a we had a nap the went to visit Karen and her partner Rene, Karen is Ellen’s sister.

We had dinner with her on the patio she made a very tasty Lasagne which had about 8 layers of pasta and a surprise layer of Ham. It was a work of art.

On the 22nd we relaxed, William went running, we played with the cats and on the trampoline. That night we had Karen and Ellen and there family over for dinner and had a shortage of cutlery and limited cooking abilities but it was fun apart from the all the flies.

The next day Karen and Rene called round for coffee and we walked into Borne to wish Ellen a happy birthday and  made her cards.

We had a BBQ with Maria’s brothers-Andre and Frans and his partner Hermien. We enjoyed lots delicious Dutch food and hospitality. We watched a movie on Frans’s massive flat screen and surround sound which he said was a hobby.
Thank you, for everything.

On Saturday Mum went shopping with Ellen and discovered what a lot of the weird packages were in the supermarket. Some of us then went looking for a Goat farm but came across a small farm and cheese shop, they had just started making hard cheese and we were really inspired and have some good information and ideas to start something small of our own. We smelt nice roses in the Border Gardens part of the old Estate of Twickel. We went for a nice walk that night around the farms and countryside around Borne and had our first dinner on our own since we arrived.

Sunday, We visited Oma’s cousin Anne and her partner Hans. They live near the Meyarshop, we had a nice time in their garden. Hans was very talented at drawing and funny. He gave us some drawings of Borne. We looked through photo albums and started to understand more dutch. We saw the rock where our Oma used to sit and the church where she got married. Then had an exciting Indonesian dinner with Karen and Rene.

We have had an interesting time discovering where our Grandparents grew-up and meeting new family. We’re intending to leave tomorrow and head off towards Germany but we like it here so much we may never leave.