Today we had a tour scheduled which took us to three small villages about 30 minutes from Amsterdam. Each one had a different specialty that we could see demonstrated.

We met at the train station for our tour which began at 8:45 but the tour bus pulled out at 8:27 since all were aboard. The guide said we would have longer to walk around since we were leaving early. The bus was a new bus with an upper and lower part, we chose the upper. As we were boarding the driver handed each of us a set of ear plugs which could be plugged into the board above our seats. Our guide however, was fluent in at least three languages but started off in English.

As we rode to the first village the tour guide would tell us certain things and then everyone could listen to more information in their own language.

The first stop was in a village called Zaanse Schans. This is well known as a windmill village. There are several working windmills there and we were given a tour of one which is now used as a sawmill as well as a tourist stop. The mill was currently working on flooring which involved cutting one millimeter at a time from a huge piece of lumber.

The miller told us that the main purpose of windmills is for water but they are now used for many other purposes such as his. We learned there used to be about 30,000 windmills in The Netherlands but only a few remain. As his windmill provided the power for the saw to cut the wood, he said that the invention of the Archimedes screw, which lifts water from one place to another, cut production time for shipbuilding from 3 months to 3 weeks.

Following some time to tour the village we got back on the bus and went to the village of Marken. This is the home of the only steam powered wooden clog maker in the world. We were shown how a form of a clog is used to turn a piece of wood into a shoe and then a sharp long knife cuts out the inside. The clog maker explained that the best type of wood for a clog is poplar or willow as they are easily molded and dry hard to protect feet from cold and wet.

He also said some clogs were so beautifully painted that they were engagement rings for the feet. He also said they help your posture. We were then given a few minutes to look around or try on clogs.

Our next stop was a village named Vollendam which we journeyed to by boat. Our guide told us that the land in The Netherlands was very soggy because being so low that it was not good for crops but wonderful for cows and milk which produce 700 million kilograms of cheese a year.

We went to a cheese factory where their specialty was Gouda cheese. The worker explained that only 10 percent of the milk is used in making cheese. She demonstrated how they would form the cheese into round forms, press it, add other ingredients and dry and age it. Aging gives the cheese its flavor and also makes it hard. The oldest cheese they had there was three years old.

After her demonstration we were taken upstairs to sample lots of Gouda cheese. Some had pesto added, jam, garlic, spices, even ginger. It all tasted good to us. They even had some samples of what we call cheese straws and they were good too.

We then had about an hour to find lunch, explore the town and meet back for a demonstration of waffle making or stroopwafel. We thought we would have these waffles for lunch but then realized they were basically like thin cookies with a choice of toppings, all being sweet. So we opted for pancakes with apples and cinnamon.

The stroopwafel is made from a sweet dough, placed in a waffle iron and when it cools there are two thin layers. The demonstration used a caramel syrup to place between the layers. We then all met the tour guide for the return to Amsterdam. On the way back we learned about how Amsterdam used to flood so dikes, barriers and canals were all built to prevent flooding.

After getting back to our hotel we showered and went to a Mediterranean restaurant for a light supper of salads. Rick had a chicken salad and Karen had a salmon salad and we were also given bread and olives before the salads and as we were paying the waitress brought us to small bowls of chocolate mousse. The whole meal was wonderful and it was only about a 6 minute walk from our hotel.

After we toured a factory that makes wooden shoes, we were taken to a show room where visitors could try on clogs and buy them. The ones Karen is looking at is about 50 euros. In the second photo Rick is about to eat some green Gouda cheese, which was flavored with pesto. Not my favorite but OK. We sampled numerous cheeses at a cheese factory. The last photo is Karen standing in front of several windmills, all of which work and do different functions, like sawing wood, crushing cocoa beans and pumping water.