Enjoying a brief spot of sun today, I biked over to Park Clingendael here in the Hague.

For more images, check out the full photo set here.

All photos were taken with a trusty Canon 300D EOS, lens 80-200mm.

Until July 1, 2010 you will be able to download all your flickr.com visitor statistics in .csv or .xls format. These are not as extensive as for instance Google Analytics, but it does provide a good idea of the pages and searches people use & find in your stream.

For me March 4, 2010 is still a "magical" day on flickr.com. For no apparent reason, I all of a sudden had over 550 visits, whereas on a normal day I might have about 30 and on the days where I have just uploaded new photos I'll have about 150-200 visits.

As these March 4 statistics puzzled me, I carefully checked them. Nothing too shocking, about 150 downloads on the large versions of my photos (I hope people enjoy them), but that leaves over 400 visits! I guess someone somewhere must have enjoyed looking through my photos, but I just wish they'd leave a comment!

March 4 2010 Flickr Stats - downloads of Large images March 4 2010 Flickr Stats - full statistics

(Image: Glasnost)

A slightly cold, not always sunny day spent with my friends Ingrid and Bjorn.

I took about 650 photos with my two regular cameras, a (slightly older) Canon 300D EOS and a (still new) Panasonic Lumix FZ-38. Both behaved as they should, the Canon is still brilliant for those stable close-ups and the Lumix gave me ease of use and good optical zoom.

Spending a day with Ingrid and Bjorn is always fun, especially since they are also photographers. They did come equipped with magic and professional tools and lenses!

The Keukenhof, as always, was crowded but pleasant. In my experience over the years, I have found that you should not feel bothered by all the tourists, but you should simply enjoy the tulips on offer!

After a full days walking, my knee did bother me a bit, but that was quickly solved when - at home - I lounged on the couch picking and choosing from the photos I shot. In the end I managed to narrow my choice down to about 36 which I uploaded to my Keukenhof set.

February 14 2009 a cute little puppy was born: Hocks (or as she's known to her kennel: Isis).
April 10 2009 she moved in with my sister and my brother-in-law.

She's adorable and playful and she still has to learn quite a few things!

Today I spent some time with her as my sister was visiting our grandmother (no dogs allowed!). She obviously was a bit confused, missing my sister, but we got along well. A few scrapes and bruises on my arms (war wounds?), but no harm done. I'll be Hocks-sitting again this Saturday, hopefully I'll be able to take some more photos!.

For now, enjoy the whole Hocks Set @ flickr.

With an early Friday break for my Easter weekend, I visited the Keukenhof together with friends Ingrid and Bjorn.

As the three of us (well, some more than others) are quite keen photographers, we were armed with batteries, memory cards and tripods (mine's a monopod), and of course our cameras.

An approximate 450 photos later (my count), we went our way again and headed home. The Keukenhof by now was a very crowded place and I cannot blame the other visitors. The weather was gorgeously hot and the tulips (and other bulbs) were blooming for our enjoyment!

By the next day I had checked and rechecked my photos, of which about 40 made the cut to be placed on flickr: Keukenhof April 10 @ flickr

[related post: Major photo update]

This past weekend I spent in Frankfurt, visiting Katie and joining Judy&Stan for a brief weekend of fun and touristic outings.

As I was lucky to have a Canon 300D with me (and about 6GB of memory cards), I took loads of photos. Tonight (and last night) I downloaded and uploaded the photos to my flickr account, and you can find the best of the approximately 600 photos I took right here: Frankfurt@flickr.

Enjoy!

(and thanks to Katie and Frank for showing us Frankfurt and the Rhine!)

The Loreley (Rhine river)

The Liebfrauenkirche in Oberwesel

Schloß Schönburg

Hildegard von Bingen

A character from 'Der Struwwelpeter'

The Bull at the Exchange

Seems to have the beginning of a running theme here:

http://twitpic.com/1q2uo

and

http://flickr.com/photos/mokblog/3325647813/

[totally forgot to make links clickable]

 ... by others!

Wikipedia > Louis Couperus
Library Thing
: from the original

Schmap Frankfurt > Park & Gardens > Botanical Gardens
: from the original

The things you find on internet!

(though I have to admit, the one on Wikipedia was placed there by myself: totally forgot that!)

While I have been out of a 'blogging' mood, I have been having fun with my camera.

From April 30 till May 5, Katrin and Jana joined me for a short vacation break in the Hague. Together we visited the center of town (of course, as it's only a short walk away), the Keukenhof, the beach at Scheveningen (bordered between the North Sea and the Hague) (try to pronounce it now, Jana!) and Park Clingendael (also situated in the Hague).

You can find all the pictures on my flickr page (link). For the individual pages, go to:

• Keukenhof May 2, 2008
• Scheveningen Beach May 3, 2008
• Park Clingendael, and its Japanese Garden May 4, 2008

I also spent Mother's Day/Pentecoste with my family at the beach, this time at Kijkduin Beach May 11, 2008.

Photo Friday - Misty