Author Archives: mail@johnriper.nl

Reminiscing

Now it is him who is reminiscing, but later she will surely do that when she is thinking back of those precious moments, looking with her father to the boats…

Anthony van Hoboken turning his back on the fish stall

The statue of Anthony van Hoboken (1756-1852) in the Port District of Rotterdam. Hoboken was one of the Netherlands’ greatest ship-owners. When the VOC (United East-Indies Company) got bankrupt in 1799, Hoboken took over a substantial part of the Dutch sailing activities, mainly on the Dutch East Indies. His statue stands in front of the Nature Historical Museum, which is situated in Villa Dijkzigt, where once Hoboken and his family lived.

Big Brother

A 2006 oldie, taken in Lausanne, Switzerland. Looks like the guy on the PKZ poster is watching carefully what I am doing. I am just making a picture of young people walking over the Escaliers du Marché, if it’s Ok with you, boy!

California Dreaming

Dream a Little Dream of Me… This friendly lady in her Flower Power outfit made me think of the beautiful Cass Elliott, one of the singers of the Mamas and Papas band, who were world famous in the sixties and early seventies of the last century. Although this picture was taken in the Park in Rotterdam, during the 2014 Day of Romantic Music of last August, it could as well have been taken at the Monterey County Fairgrounds, California, during the glorious Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. Those were the days…

Hardrock biker

Really, this one is so much nicer in colour… A happy father with his sons, all with their bikes, in a setting of the Erasmus bridge, the Luxor theatre (left) on the Kop van Zuid (the “Head of South”) and the new jumbo building De Rotterdam (right)

Dreaming of a cruise

Then you’re visiting Rotterdam and see the MS Rotterdam, Holland America Line’s flagship, in the Nieuwe Maas River. How wonderful would it be to make a cruise on that luxury ship over the Atlantic Ocean… Would we ever…?