MEMORIES FOR LIFE

Working, going on vacation, and doing fun things together as a family?

The Van der Valk family can't get enough of all three. Ineke Luiten-Van der Valk, third generation and already For decades, the catalyst in the family, organizes an annual camp, New Year's dive, and other activities for the family.

TEXT: EVA VAN MEIJL
PHOTOGRAPHY: NOPOINT STUDIO'S

We have been going on camping trips with our family for almost forty years. It is always a great celebration. It started in 1986, when my nephews Rick and Jan Polman saw a brochure about a survival camp at the sports center of Hotel Eindhoven. They thought it would be exciting to go there. Their mother, my sister, said they could only go if Aunt Ineke went with them. I like that kind of thing, so we rounded up some more nephews and nieces and went. It was so much fun that everyone wanted to go again the following year. It became a tradition, with more and more family members joining us. In the early years, we went with an organization, but we soon started organizing it ourselves. Sometimes we went with as many as three groups a year. The primary school children went to the Ardennes and the older ones to the French Alps. When you have a large family, some of whom live abroad, you don't see each other every week. It's great fun to see each other at a camp like this. In those early years, we really went back to basics. Nowadays, we do things a little more luxuriously. You can't expect people over 60 to sleep under a plastic sheet, dig a hole in the ground to use as a toilet, and wash themselves with water from a stream. I personally loved it, and it was also a great experience for the children.

During our family camp, we immerse ourselves in nature with activities such as hiking, canoeing, and climbing. A week without television, cola, and chips, and lots of talking with each other, that is priceless. Such a camp brings everyone together. We create memories that we will never forget. We have experienced the most crazy, fun, and sometimes also unpleasant things, such as burns, deep cuts, lost children, and visits to the hospital. Fortunately, everything always turned out fine in the end. Moreover, suffering together creates a bond. As a group, you support each other through it all. When a child sits crying from tension on a mountain and with the help of another child manages to get past a difficult point, that is a fantastic moment.

It's about helping each other, pushing boundaries, and gaining self-confidence. You see children grow during a week like that, which is wonderful. You also get to know each other better during the camp. That makes it easier to seek each other out later, when working in the hotels. In addition to the survival camp, we have done other fun things together over the years. My brother Jack and his wife Corine have been organizing a Luiten week since 1990. All the families of the Luiten-Van der Valk family go on a trip together. At first, this was during the fall break, but now it has been moved to the summer break and we go on a trip with more than seventy people. Four generations are together, the oldest of whom is now over seventy and the youngest just one year old! Since 2015, we have also been organizing the Tour de Toucan, a combination of a rally and a tour ride. And this year, we are holding a New Year's Day dip for the fifth time. My mother, Ina van der Valk, had her birthday on January 5. I thought it would be nice to do something around that day. As children, we always used to go to the beach at Wassenaarse Slag, near Hotel Bijhorst, which is now called Hotel Den Haag-Wassenaar. That's where I grew up with my brothers and sisters. I chose that spot for our New Year's Day dip. Every year, there are about thirty family members who are just as crazy as I am to jump into the ice-cold water. I just didn't think it could be so cold. The first time, our feet almost froze off. But when you drink hot chocolate together to warm up again, you feel happy and proud. Especially because you're doing this together as a family.