Doel: Exploring a Ghost Town

Today I'm sharing more photos from our roadtrip to the abandoned village, Doel. You can see part one right here. There's a lot of beautiful street art that really inspired me to get more creative with my paint and spray paint. Maybe I'll go back to painting this winter. We've explored the streets, some abandoned houses and an old garage.

Photo by Melissa

Photo by Melissa

Photo by Melissa

Recipe: Blueberry Breakfast Muffins

For our roadtrip to Doel, I made these delicious breakfast muffins to take with us in the car. They're super easy to make and really tasty, even after 3 days they're nice and moisty with a crunchy top.

What you need for 10 muffins:

• 2 ripe bananas
• 3 eggs
• 100 grams oats
• 1 tsp (tartaric acid) baking powder
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 vanilla pod
• a pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup blueberries

What you do:

1. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius and put cupcake liners in your baking tray.
2. Put all the ingredients except the blueberries in a blender and blend it until you've got a smooth mixture and divide the mixture between the cups.
3. Push the blueberries into the mixture until they're covered. I've used 4 to 5 blueberries in a muffin. 
4. Finally, put them in the oven for 30 minutes. Make sure they're cooled down when you try them, because when they're a bit warm, they're to sticky to get the paper cups of!

Nom nom, enjoy!

Project Life: Week 25

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Another week in my Project Life album. Can you believe I'm almost halfway there? This week was awesome! We did lots of fun stuff and I set a personal record on friday! I ran the 10 EM in 1.22.30! On sunday the Mister and relaxed in Volendam.

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Full spread

Doel: A Roadtrip to a Ghost Town

On the road!

Lately I've been very interested in abandoned places, so when I learned about Doel, a little ghost village in Belgium, I was sold. I wanted to go there! Just over the border and only a 2,5 hour ride from home. So I contacted my friend Melissa, if she and her boyfriend wanted to go with us on this roadtrip. They did, a date was set and sunday the 13th we went on this adventure. I forgot my camera (left it in a different car, stupid!), so all photos are made with my phone or Melissa's GoPro.

So about Doel. It's a tiny village, scheduled to be completely destroyed to make room for an expanding harbor. Every protest and the incredible street art cannot stop te inevitable destruction. Today there are 25 inhabitants left, who wont leave their house. Meanwhile this village has been transformed into an artistic playground with a post-apocalyptic atmosphere.

We kinda were expecting empty streets and grumpy inhabitants, who are not happy with the 'disaster tourism'. But when we arrived there was a huge sign with all kinds of warning and a poster  announcing a flee market, lol. So we weren't the only ones there.

Photo by Melissa

Photo by Melissa

Snippets of my life #57

Hey there! It's sunday evening already, so time to share some Snippets of my life again. This week was really sunny and warm, which I think is awesome. I went to my work on my bicycle often. I've received more books, did a 9 km interval training in the heat and I went to a local recreation area with my brother and sis in law on my free friday!

On friday the Mister and I celebrated our 2 year 'dating anniversary. He surprised me with a huge bouquet of roses (24 red and one white) and tickets to Boom Chicago. We went out for sushi in Amsterdam and went to the show 'Attack of the Killer Bikes' at Boom Chicago. It was hilarious and I had a super fun night out!

The rest of the weekend was fun too. Chilling in the sunshine, a birthday party from a friend, a 13 km run through the forest of Castricum with my running buddies and relaxing the rest of the day by drinking tea, reading books and eating delicious spelt cookies the Mister bought me. At the end of this sunday we went to my in-laws garden where we chilled some more and had a delicious barbecue.

This week was awesome.

Name Painting: Mandie

20 x 20 cm (8") - Mixed Media

Another name painting! This one I made for my friend Josie, who gave birth to Mandie. I've used the color scheme from the birth announcement card and I've handcut her name. I haven't given it to her yet, so I hope she likes it! I've made one for her son, Jordie too, two years ago.

Run: Grachtenloop Haarlem

My essentials!

Date: Friday, June 27th
Location: Haarlem
Distance: 10 km
Running buddy: Laura, her boyfriend and 3 of her colleagues.

After a days work I went home in a hurry, to get ready for the Grachtenloop (canal run) in Haarlem. I wasn't feeling well for a few days, a lot of coughing and I had a sore throat, but I was looking forward to it anyway.  After a small dinner (pasta!) I packed my things and headed to the station, where I met up with Laura and her boyfriend, Niels. We arrived in Haarlem pretty early, which was good, because we couldn't find the changing rooms, luckily there were a lot of people walking around to help us find it!

When we walked to the start we found 3 colleagues of Laura. I had to make a photo of course! Finally we were ready to start. The first 2 kilometers were very crowded and there wasn't much room to pass people, but after those 2 kilometers it got better and we had enough space to run next to each other. We started pretty fast and we tried to keep up the pace. After the first 5 kilometers we were back where we started, so we began our second round. This time I knew where we were going. I was getting a bit tired from the fast pace, but we kept going and finally finished with a pretty good time and a PR for Laura: 50:31. I was really happy with this time. Especially because I wasn't feeling well. But my throat didn't bother me the entire run and I started coughing again after we finished.

My stats.

Action shots at the finish!

After the run, everybody went for a drink, but I went home so I could rest and quickly get better! It was a fun run and Haarlem is a beautiful city. When I got home I had this delicious bowl of oats with a Smart Bar from Body & Fitshop.