De Spitkeet is an open air rural museum near Harkema, Friesland, The Netherlands. A spitkeet was  akind of Earth-house.

The first exhibit you come to is a building called the Mallemolen:-

The Mallemolen acted as a poorhouse. The coldest room, on the northeast, was given to the latest arrivals and when others became available they would move into those:-

The rooms look not too bad though:-

Box beds:-

Near the Mallemolen was a stork’s nest:-

The museum part of Iwema Steenhuis has some industrial relics. A roller press:-

Machine for moulding speculaas biscuits:-

Speculaas and jelly moulds + wicker basket and rolling pins:-

A speculaas pressing machine:-

Stained glass and enamels:-

Colourings:-

Tiles and enamel signs:-

The name literally means Iwema stonehouse. Perhaps stone houses were rare in Groningen Province back in the day. It’s located not far away from Niebert Windmill.

Inside is a kind of museum of local life and community gathering place.

Interior and roof:-

Box bed and cupboard:-

Steps to box bed:-

A cooking range:-

The above is set within a dining room:-

Anlother dining room had a table covered with a rug:-

A fireplace:-

Kitchen stuff:-

Room with old sewing machine and radio:-

Like similar country houses in the UK there wereexhibits of domestic life in Coendersborg.

Box bed + nightshirt:-

and bed pan:-

Wall tiles:-

Coendersborg basement:-

There was a museumy bit at the back of the house with exposed wooden beams:-

Poster of Squirrel. In Dutch a squirrel is an eekhorn. We spotted a red one from the house’s front window:-

Poster of flowers to be found in Coendersborg’s garden:-

Back of house:-

Perth Museum recently relocated to the building which used to be Perth City Hall. It’s slap bang in the middle of the city so a good location.

The new museum’s main attraction is the Stone of Destiny, removed from Edinburgh Castle to be nearer to its spiritual home in Scone a couple of miles north of Perth itself.

Some of the exhibits have been transferred from the old Museum and Art Gallery in George Street, notably the St Madoes stone, which, in its new location, is now lit up to help highlight the carvings:-

Side and back views:-

I particularly liked, though, the illumintaed map of Perth through the ages where different parts were lit up at different times to show the evolution of the town/city:-

Then of course there was this picture of the famous old Pullars of Perth premises a building which verges on Art Deco:-

The Hauntings is a sculpture of a soldier, made from scrap metal. From 1/7/23 to 12/11/23 it was in the grounds of The Black Watch Museum in Perth but has since moved on. (The museum, housed in Balhousie Castle is a regular haunt of ours as it has a very good café.)

The sculpture was commissioned for the centenary of The Great War and made by metal sculpture specialists, Dorset Forge and Fabrication, “a combination of the talents of blacksmith Chris Hannam and artist Martin Galbavy.”

Sculpture with Balhousie Castle in background:-

Side view:-

Reverse view. The memorial in the background here I featured in 2019:-

I noted the jerry can on the soldier’s right hip. Jerry cans were a World War 2 phenomenon. Not that that matters.

On the way up from the ferry back from The Netherlands last year we stopped off to have a look at Huntingdon – a place we hadn’t visited before.

Town Hall in main square:-

Old building also on square:-

All Saints Church lies beside the main square:-

It has nice arched windows glass and statuary in niches.

View from other side:-

Huntingdon was where Oliver Cromwell was born and the constituency he represented in Parliament. A bench in the square (with All Saints church in background) and a rubbish bin seems an odd way to commemorate him though.

But they do have a Cromwell Museum:-

The bench with the yellow heart on it in the first photo of the Church above is a memorial to the victims of Covid:-

One of the oddest things we saw in the Rijksmuseum was this display of woollen hats:-

A unique harpsichord he only surviving one of its type which plays one-fifth above normal pitch. Made by the Ruckers family from Flanders:-

The top floor of the museum is reserved for more modern exhibits. This biplane was designed during the Great War by Dutchman Frits Koolhoven for the British Aeronautical Transport Company:-

There was a chess set whose pieces looked like Great War crested china memorabilia but was designed by German Georg Fuhg “to glorify Nazi Germany’s urge to conquer.” It was shown in the Rijksmuseum in 1941 exhibition Kunst der Front organised by the occupier. The text in the border refers to countrie soccupied by Germany in 1939 and 1940:-

A cloth book for children which, as I recall, was made during the German occupation:-

Plaster model for the sculpture The Destroyed City by Ossip Zadkine, made to commemorate the bombing of Rotterdam in 1940. Zadkine said of it “I have sculpted tears.”:-

One of the downstairs rooms in the Rijksmuseum held paintings that weren’t perhaps as famous as The Night Watch or Vermeer’s Milkmaid.

Two were by by Hendrick Avercamp, both reminiscent of the work of the Breughels.

Ice Entertainment Near a City :-

Winter Landscape with Skaters:-

Self portrait by Betsy Westendorp-Osieck:-

Self Portrait by Emile Bernard:-

van Gogh Self Portrait:-

Therese Schwartze Self Portrait:-

Portrait of Theresia Ansingh (Portret van Sorella) by Therese Schwartze. Also known as Woman Wearing a Hat. A better picture than mine is here:-

The Night School by Gerard Dou. An illustration of depiction of light. (Again better to see here):-

An unusual Mondrian. Painting of a Windmill:-

The centre piece of the Rijksmuseum’s Great Hall is Rembrandt’s masterpiece The Night Watch.

Imagine our disappointment when we entered the room in which it is displayed to see this:-

It was cordoned off and we therefore could not see it properly. Apparently minor air movements make the canvas flex, potentially damaging it, and they were measuring just how large the movements were so that they can prevent any future deterioration.

However there was a painting of a similar subject (well, lots of Dutch burghers) just to The Night Watch’s right as you look at it, which I had to take two photos of to get it all and then stitch:-

Vermeer’s milkmaid was also in the Great Hall but the lighting conditions weren’t good and my photo came out blurry.

Also nearby was this still life. Still Life with Cheese by Floris Claesz Van Dijck:-