This year is a Floriade Year in the Netherlands. I have several friends who are going to make the trip. It’s a world horticultural expo and is held every 10 years. The event happens in the Venlo area in the southeast of the Netherlands very near to the German border.

Every year thousands of tourists do the Dutch Bulb Fields Tour. Keukenhof is probably the most famous Dutch bulb field park.

In Amsterdam we saw tulips everywhere we looked! See my little Flickr tour of Tulip Fever in Amsterdam.

I have no problem when passing through airports like Amsterdam and Zurich. There is always something new to see and experience and lots of tasteful and up-market, if exceedingly expensive, shops in which to browse. Schiphol goes one step further than any other airport I know. In addition to shops they have taken the unusual step of opening a branch of the world famous Rijksmuseum. With all those flowers around the place it’s not surprising I suppose that the little one-room  gallery should have a selection of flower paintings on display.

The Dutch Flowers exhibition currently showing at The Rijksmuseum Schiphol includes 9 stunning paintings worthy of study.   In each of these pictures there is so much detail – not only the flowers but other symbols like the watch shown below and creatures like lizards and snails and butterflies.

Still Life with Flowers and Watch by Abraham Mignon (1640-1679)

Be sure to keep an eye on your watch as it’s easy for the time to pass quickly in this little gallery!

In addition to the Dutch flower paintings on the other wall of the gallery are 7 paintings from the Dutch Golden Age.

Two kinds of Games by Jan Steen (1626 – 1679)

This year I also noticed another novelty just by the staircase to the gallery: an Airport Library! But I didn’t have time to try it out.