Alkmaar and the countryside

The last time we were in Holland, I was dissappointed that we weren't able to make it to the cheese market and so we wanted to do that on this trip. The staff of the hotel told us not to take the car as there wouldn't be any place to park and, it's only a 15 minute walk. It took a bit longer than that but we made it. When we got to the center of town, the people were 5 deep around the fences surrounding the cheese market. It took some time to get to the front and get some good pictures. There were hundreds of wheels of cheese on the market's cobblestones. Men dressed in white and wearing straw hats carried 8 wheels around on "flat carts" which hung from shoulder straps. They speed walked/almost ran whenever they were carrying the cheese. They way they swung their arms reminded me of William running. :)

There was an inspector who tasted some of the cheese. As the deals were discussed, the two men would constantly slap their hands together, like a sideways high five, until the deal was sealed and then there was a hand shake. There were 3 guys who threw the wheels of cheese to each other and moved them from A to B. The cheese was then weighed and put into either small boats or trucks to be taken away. The market has operated like this for 100s of years. There's a lot of traditional and what I would consider  a lot of ceremony. It's great to watch but highly ineffeciant.

The number of people was unbelieveable. These were the largest crowds we'd seen since Buckingham Palace. The stalls selling cheese, poffertjes (the really small pancake things I talked about before), and souviners were doing an incredible business. There were several people in traditional Dutch dress. I got a picture with 2 older women who looked great.

At noon we took a one hour river cruise which was really nice. Four bridges over the canal had to be raised so we could get through . It's fun to watch people on the bridge think they can make it over before the bridge starts to rise. Most of the cruise was in the Dutch countryside looking at farmland and windmills from the early 1600s. At one point we were at an intersection of 4 canals that had a sign indicating the direction of 4 different towns. About 95% of the people on the boat spoke Dutch. The tour guide gave long, funny explanations as we went along. He'd talk for 4 minutes. People would laugh. This was followed by the English folks getting one sentence that was not funny at all. At times, the English was half English and half Dutch. By the time we were nearing the end of the cruise, he didn't even bother with English any more. Sigh....

The boat we were on was exactly the same as the boat Dave was on when he was 16 and went to Holland with his family. I have a picture of him in the boat at work. I took the same picture of him today - 37 years later. I said we'd come back in 37 more years (he'll be 90) and take one more.

Today was the coolest yet in Holland - 63 and with some drizzle in the morning. (Still no rain!) We decided to share a sandwich for lunch at an outdoor cafe. The heaters were on and there were blankets on the backs of the chairs. It was warm and cozy there. Our sandwich was a club - smoked chicken, smoked salmon, and egg salad. It was delicious! In this part of Holland everyone eats their sandwiches with a fork and knife - yes, us too.

About 2 pm we headed back to our hotel. At this point in our trip, we've seen enough churches, been in enough shops (not that many really) and walked down enough old, narrow streets. For those who would love to be here, you'll find this hard to believe but at some point no matter how wonderful an experience, you've had your fill (at least for now). A short nap, some reading, and we were ready to head out again. We headed into the countryside and just drove around - in West Friesland. The cows are so healthy and beautiful here. Large fields are filled with cows and sheep - with the odd pig and goat as well. (In Wales/England we saw free range pigs. Werid to see. They each had a little hut and roamed freely in a huge field.) Dave and I have dreams of sheep in our backyard.

The plan was to have Dutch pancakes for supper. This actually happened since we stumbled across a pancake place beside a dyke on the North Sea. I had a pancake with raisins, warm bananas, and chocolate sauce. It was okay. Dave's had bacon in the pancake and on top was a huge pile of vegys smothered in cheese. He said it was excellent. Our table was outside on a canal. The sun had finally come out so it was pleasant to sit there - with coats on of course. We checked the weather at home and it's 25 (or more) degrees warmer than here plus it's humid. I just can't imagine going home to that. That adjustment alone will be huge, not to mention getting up 2 hours earlier everyday, the intense busyness of daily life etc etc. We're already feeling ourselves working on the mental adjustment.

Supper was the earliest we've eaten (6:30) since we got here. We were back in the hotel by 8 (another record) and watched some TV - lots of things in English to watch. Here's how TVworks here. 20 minutes of show, 10 minutes of commercials, 20 minutes of show. It's great during the show part but the commercials last forever. To pass the time we counted them - 22 commercials in one 10 minute period. And timed them - shortest was 10 seconds and longest was 30 seconds. Thus ended another day of our adventures.

Smell is a very powerful thing. It's amazing the memories smells can bring back. Since we've arrived I've had 3 such experiences.
- one reminded me of the university where I did my undergrad work
- one of Dave's mom's house
- one of Oma Rinzema's (that's my dad's mom) house - we were there when I was 12ish

 I've taken 365 picutres so far. We'll have a few hours of editing to get through all of those Amanda. Aunt Elaine wants to see them when we go to Canada in a few weeks.

I found this great page on our blog. Here are some interesting stats. Yesterday, 45 peole looked at the blog. In the last month, 639 have looked at it. These folks are from Canada, the US, Russian, Holland, and Germany. Who knew?!

One thing I learned today: 14 days of vacation is the perfect amount of time.

One new thing I experienced today: Seeing how corn in grown here. Each row is planted with plastic surrounding each plant.

Most powerful moment of the day: Nothing today.

One pleasurable experience:  Floating on a canal through the Dutch countryside.