Holland Day 2: Keukenhof Tulips

I could probably change the name of this post to "Prettiest blog post ever".  I had a hard time narrowing down our pictures.

On Saturday we visited Keukenhof to see the millions of flowers on display.  I'm glad the timing worked out and the tulips were in bloom, because every year's peak is a little different depending on the weather.  Outside the gardens, we saw just a few fields like the one above with rows and rows of flowers, but I'm thinking most of the tulips had already been cut.  Inside the gardens, however, there was no shortage of flowers.

Green fields, with fallen petals in between

So many flowers to see (and smell!)--narcissi, hyacinths, and lots of tulips.  It took me back to the time I took Floral Design in college, and then I realized I'd forgotten almost everything.  Keukenhof is a 79 acre garden. The Netherlands has 92% of the world's flower market.
 

I imagine this place works like Disneyland, where as soon as the gates close at night workers flood out to make it look beautiful.

There are flowers in every color possible.  I didn't know black flowers were even a thing (or maybe they were dark purple?)  

We spent 4 or 5 hours just walking around- and probably still missed areas.  

I'd also never seen flowers like this before--the edges of the tulip petals were ruffled / frayed:

Saturday was also Kings Day--a big holiday in the Netherlands.  (Previously Queens Day.)  We intentionally stayed out of the cities because we didn't want to deal with crowds and craziness.  [When we went into Amsterdam on Sunday, the streets were trashed; someone said it would take them 10 days to clean up the mess.]  For the holiday, everyone wears orange, so Hyrum and Santiago were appropriately dressed.

We found this windmill, so Hyrum is in the shoe imitating a windmill.  (He had to explain that pose to me.)

From the top of the windmill you could see a few flower fields.  That area isn't part of Keukenhof.

I spy: Tiago and I are in the bottom right of that picture above.

 

 While we were walking around, we saw a lot of people doing ridiculous poses in front of flowers.  (See the picture below--top left.)  So I decided to reenact it for Hyrum.  He had a great time taking pictures of me doing cheesy poses.  I hope I was able to entertain at least a few tourists.

   

The pictures below are from my favorite area- flowers everywhere!!  And I loved all the bright colors.  It's amazing that all those colors can appear in nature.  

Some of the flowers were huge--the size of my hand.