Visitors and artists are attracted by the quaint buildings, some lake dwellings on piles seaward of the dike, and the picturesque traditional costumes of Volendam's fishermen.
The small businesses in the quaint buildings of two or three stories that make up the heart of the business district were either closed, cleaning up or open but understandably distracted.
And despite the many authentic reminders of old Makawao -- the quaint buildings, the absence of traffic lights, the rodeo -- they mourn what they say is the loss of true cowboy life.
When we finally found the real estate office -- in one of those quaint buildings that don't believe in identifying themselves as commercial businesses -- it was practically closing time.
It would be easy, motoring along the California coast, gasping aloud as the two-lane twists of Highway 1 reveal staggering scenes of mountains, ocean, sun and fog, to accelerate through the turn and drive right past the ramshackle collection of quaint buildings tucked into the towering redwoods of Castro Canyon like a miniature Wild West set overgrown with wisteria.
My own concern is that we have already experienced the last picturesque, manageable Winter Games -- the 1994 Games in Norway, with bright sun, frigid air, quaint buildings, rolling farmland under a clean coat of snow, idealistic Norwegians burning candles on the sidewalk for the sister Olympic city of Sarajevo.
Ma sheds no tears for the quaint buildings that have given way to thousands of new structures -- and they aren't all ugly by any means.
But equally fascinating is the Swiss Camera Museum, nestled between similar quaint buildings in Vevey's old town overlooking the Grande Place where aficionados can enjoy all things still and moving photography.
When they embarked upon the hunt, she preferred a quaint prewar building while he gravitated toward something modern.
Ms. Gips, who is 63, has discovered a great thirst for herbal teas in her shop, in a quaint brick building from the 1880s, with demonstration gardens outside.
