Cheesy Amsterdam

Amsterdam, whose name means dam in the Amstel River, isn't one of my favorite cities to visit so it was a much better idea to take a tour outside the city limits on our second day.  That said, just a little about this city of canals, at least 165, and bridges, that some call it the “Venice of the North”.  It actually has even more canals than its Italian counterpart thanks to the canal ring that spreads like a fan around the city.  These were created to keep the sea at bay and are part of what makes Amsterdam a UNESCO World Heritage Site.    

Founded over 700 years ago, Amsterdam was the epicenter of the Dutch Golden Age between about 1575 and 1675 when it was the world’s richest city.  It was part of a time when this spot was the main seaport of the Dutch East India Company whose trading empire stretched from the Caribbean to Indonesia.  Some of the prettiest buildings in the city are from this period. Other structures here hold memories of a much different era, the time when the Nazis occupied Amsterdam for five years during WW2.  Now it’s the world’s capital of alternative lifestyles, what’s common here can be very uncommon elsewhere.  

After walking to Amsterdam Centraal to catch our tour bus we headed to Zaanstad to see the small tourist town of windmills there.

I had never realized before that these machines were really the power source behind the Netherlands Golden Age wealth.  In years past there have been as many of 30,000 windmills dotting the country, pumping water, grinding spices, providing power to cut wood, even creating colored powders for painters.

Netherlands means "low lands", and the only way to make this marshy land productive was to pump the water off of it since most of the country lies below sea level.  Land was reclaimed thanks to the inexhaustible wind power that could turn the sails of the windmills, which would then turn the Archimedes Screw that pulled the water from the ground.

This drawing from sciencefacts.net shows how the Archimedes Screw works, and continues to work today in many of the remaining 1,000 windmills you will find in the Netherlands.  At this 45 degree angle the screw can draw the water from a lower lying area to a higher one, thanks to the wind and sails.  What you see above is exactly what the Dutch engineered, which allowed them to create fertile fields, AFTER buildings dikes to keep the water out and canals to put the water into.

It's easy to see how much water is around and how low lying the country is.

The backs of each smaller windmill has levers to help move it around.

We were wandering on our own in Zaanstad so we opted to go into the Henri Willig cheese store before taking a closer look at the windmills.

Above is one of the vats that are used to create curds and whey, just like Miss Muffet used to like to eat.  We learned later they don't actually use the whey in the cheese production but sell it back to the farmers to feed to their cows, it adds calcium and other nutrients to their diet.

So many kinds of cheeses!  And displayed with such eye appeal, plus the flavors were amazing, the tomato pesto one on the upper left went home with me.  I even almost bought some of the Lavender Goat Cheese on the lower right, and we all know I'm not usually a fan of goat cheese.  Besides the unique flavor the color on that one added a whole new dimension to blue cheeses.  Oh, and don't worry, the cheese is fine unrefrigerated for up to a month as long as you keep it in its vacuum sealed wrap.  The coconut one and the red pesto one aren't going to last long though.

This is more like what I would like to picture the Netherlands as looking like, rather than the dark, marijuana smelling Amsterdam.

The Dutch began using the windmills over 400 years ago to begin reclaiming land, grinding the spices the East India Company's ships brought back, as well as to create textiles.

It was so fascinating to be able to see some in person.

A house and windmill that date back to 1667.

Another industry that exploded with the introduction of windmills were sawmills and shipbuilding.  The abundance of finished lumber allowed ships to be built in three weeks here rather than the three months it had taken previously when wood had to be cut by hand.  This contributed directly to the growth of the Dutch East India Company as well since they could send out more ships.

Canals, streams and rivers are a way of life in this country, so many houses along some sort of waterway.

The thatched roofs on some windmills made for great insulation and could last for 30-80 years.

The smaller canals, like the one on the right will freeze in the winter to become a raceway for speed skaters, a Dutch obsession.

Another thing I didn't know about windmills is that the heads are rotated so that they can take advantage of the direction the wind is blowing.  In fact, they must be rotated at least every two weeks in order that the large bearings that they sit on don't flatten out, which would mean they couldn't be turned.

Mary, Jane and I enjoying the view of these amazing windmills.

Another pose by the wooden clog wall,

and one where the shoes were literally too big for me to fill!

On the bus again we passed fields with goats, sheep and cows, but these were the only Oreo cows I saw.

Next stop was the Klompenmakerij, or the clog maker's.

We like this idea of filling wooden shows with flowers, you may see that at our house when we get back since we have wooden shoes lying around somewhere at home.

While I wouldn't really call this a museum, more of a spot for a quick demo and a place to buy shoes, it was a cute building.

Each shoe starts out as a block of wood, Poplar is the preferred wood as it will absorb water well and to work on the wood without it cracking it needs to be wet.  The young man in the photo on the right demonstrated how shoes can be made on the old steam-powered lathe.

A plastic dummy shape is on the left side and the wood block on the right, within a minute or two, lathe knives will cut the block into the shoe shape as it spins.

Next it's moved to another machine to have the inside hollowed out using the same principle.

Once those phases are completed then the blunt ends are cut off and the shoe is left to hang dry so that it can be sanded and finished.

There were hundreds of finished and unfinished pairs of shoes in the shop.  We're guessing they really don't make them all there anymore and that there's a good chance they came from somewhere in China.  Anyway, they are supposed to be comfortable and great for your posture but they look like sore feet to me.

An interesting use of old shoes.

Even the cow gets clogs here.

We were going to catch a boat to take us across the second largest manmade lake in Europe but we had to take a bit of a walk to get there.  These are a few of the sights from along our walk.

Bikes and lace curtains always catch. my eye.

An actual Dutch door!

Just some pretty Black-eyed Susans, at least that's what I've always called them.

The area here is in the northern Netherlands province of Holland, a place where most of the nation's sailors came from, which led to the misnomer of Holland for the entire country.  When these men were asked where they were from as they sailed around the world they would reply they were from Holland, so people thought that was the name of country, never having heard the word Netherlands.

Decorative house features.

Another of the multitude of canals.

Finally reached our boat in Marken to take us on to Volendam.

A little geography and history seem in order here.  Living on land 15 feet below sea level has multiple challenges when you live next to the sea.  Flooding around the circled area, formerly a shallow saltwater bay of the North Sea known as the Zuiderzee,  became more and more of a problem.  After major flooding of surrounding lands in 1916 it was decided that a dike needed to be constructed to close off the Zuiderzee, enabling the Dutch to control the water in the area.  The 20 mile long Afsluitdijk was completed in 1932, creating what is known as IJsselmeer, or Lake IJsselmeer (eye-sul-mere).  The River IJssel runs into the lake and it quickly flushed out the saltwater leaving a fresh water lake.

The lake is plenty large enough for all sorts of recreational opportunities.

It did however, create issues for the fishermen who lived here who could no longer get out to the open ocean, nor find the fish they were used to in the shallow fresh waters.  Rather than fish they began to harvest eels.

Later on the Ijsselmeer was divided again by another dike to create the Markenmeer, which is what we actually rode across.  The line there in the distance would be a part of a dike, you can see how tall they must be.

Some architecture reminiscent of the Hanseatic League homes of the Baltics here in Volendam.

We visited another cheese shop once we arrived.

I hadn't realized that all cheese pretty much starts out the same, at least the Dutch farm cheeses do.  Baby cheese doesn't have much flavor.  First thing it gets is a salt bath after being molded to start the aging process.

It's the aging, or ripening process that gives cheeses their sharper flavor.

Our lovely Dutch demonstrator shared that they can also add other flavorings, herbs, seeds, pesto, before the ripening process.  This is going to sound crazy but my favorite cheese here was one that was flavored with stinging nettle, trust me, it was delicious.

Obviously the longer the cheese ages the sharper and harder it gets.  A really sharp cheese will have ripened for three years.  We probably would have been better off if we didn't like cheese so much when we were in these shops!

One of the touristy streets of Volendam.  It looked like a fun place to wander for a day or two.

We made Jane's lunchtime dreams come true when we went to the bakery where we had way too many choices for yummy waffles and stroopwafels.

Karl and I were obviously enjoying our choices of

a berry waffle for me, and a cherry and apple one for Karl.  Okay, I wanted a stroopwafel as well, but I didn't eat it then, it was too much sweetness all at once for even my sugary tooth.  I loved the lavender hued cream on mine, pureed berries mixed into whipped cream.  I have to remember that trick!

Heading back to our bus we passed by some of the local homes that sat down below the dike, keeping them safe from floods but without much of a front yard.

Volendam seemed a lovely place to live.

These little cuties were out selling their creations.  I couldn't pass them by without buying a few.

I asked them to pick out five of their favorites for me to buy and these were their selections.  They cost me a whole Euro, about a dollar.  I wished I had just given them the few other coins I had left but didn't think of that until Karl mentioned it when I was back on the bus.  Not sure who's going to to be gifted these.   It's a fun memory.

Back in Amsterdam we walked from Amsterdam Centraal back to the cruise terminal with time to spare before all aboard time.  We'd been in too. much of a hurry the night before to take a photo at the welcome sign to did it on our way back.  It turned out to be a truly lovely day in Amsterdam.