You wouldn’t know it, but the “Alida Geziena” is well past the age of 100. Before coming into the possession of the current owner, this tjalk had been in use as a floating warehouse for quite a few years. That didn’t do the “Alida Geziena” justice. In fact, the ship had been built in 1888 as a true seagoing vessel and sailed at sea until 1913. In the years that followed, it sailed throughout the Netherlands with all kinds of cargo: linseed, carbide and scrap iron, for example. The current owner has had the ship since 1973. He brought it under sail again and built in an engine.

The “Alida Geziena” was named after Hinderik Willems Niezen’s ship, “Geziena Alida. When he died in 1888, his daughter Aaltje and her husband Harm Brouwer bought a new iron tjalk from the inheritance, which they named “Alida Geziena. This tjalk is a true “Groninger”: sturdily built, with wide hull plates, wide gunwales, a wooden anchor spindle and the typical iron wear strips on the head that somewhat resemble a cat’s whiskers.