Zaanse Schans

Day 26:

I think its fair to say that we are a little intimidated by Amsterdam. Our original plan was to come to the Netherlands to see Amsterdam, when made our reservations, we decided to stay in a town outside the city and travel in to visit. Today was supposed to be that day. But instead, we followed the canal we are on north to an outdoor museum representing traditional Holland in the 17th and 18th centuries. Yes, we mean windmills.

It was overcast today, but that didn't bother us much at all. It was over an hour walk, and parts we passed through were very industrial, so we experience a strange variety of smells... Anyway, we turned our last corner and immediately came upon one of the windmills, sails spinning!

But before we get into those 8 beautiful beasts... history time. Hundreds of years ago, during the Eighty Years' War, the Spanish were basically pulling on the Dutch what the English pulled on the American colonies 200 years later. Taxes, forcing religion, being jerks, etc. So the Dutch started revolting and the Spanish beat them down pretty soundly at first, but in North Holland they stayed feisty. In the Zaan region, they built a series of sconces to slow down the Spanish. Kalver Schans was the one at that location, and was one of the few to never be overrun. There are no remnants of the bastions or any sign of the sconce, other the name of the park. After those times, the region became the first insustrial site in the world, housing over 500 windmills, all serving different purposes.

Now that we're back to the windmills... As modern industry made the windmill all but obsolete, most were taken down and their materials harvested. Starting in the 1960s, remaining windmills from around the region were transported to Zaanse Schans, along with houses from the same era. Some of them still function to this day, others house modern equipment inside, and others are simply preserved models. They all have their own character, history, purpose, and name. On the site they have De Os (1663), Het Klaverblad (2005. Foundation to build, run, and maintain a sawmill in traditional methods), De Huisman (1786), De Gekroonde Poelenburg (1733, kind of), De Kat (1646), De Zoeker (1672), Het Jonge Schaap (replica of 1680) and De Bonte Hen (1693). 3 sawmills, 3 oilmills, a dyemill, and a mustardmill.

We loved the sound they made when the sails would rush by. We put off going into one of the few you can climb up and look around until we saw all of them and picked our favorite. Unfortunately, they all closed by then, so we didn't get to go inside any. Despite that, we are so happy to have been able to see original windmills in Holland!

The houses were small, beautiful, inhabited by people living real lives, and just adorable. There were little "islands" created by the system of streams and canals, some of which had houses, others had sheep, and others had goats. And of course they were all connected by the cutest little bridges. Jason discovered an ability to communicate with sheep. Unfortunately, he scared a lamb who ended up crying to his dad...

There were workshops for different traditional trades in Holland around the museum. We were able to see a demonstration of how clogs are made, which was fascinating. They use wet, young wood, so after he was done carving out the shape he blew air into the shoe and water literally gushed out of the wood and shocked everyone. Another trade respresented was cheesemaking, gouda being the specialty. There was one for chocolate making, where people could sign up for a workshop to make their own chocolate bar! Another was for baking, with a small museum in the back with all sorts of baking tools and recipes, where we got hot stroopwafels! It was great to see people so passionate about traditional trades, producing great products the way they have been made for generations.

On our long journey home, needing something other than the traditional pastries, chocolate and cheese, we stopped at our Egyptian restaurant again. Our server was excited to see us again and wanted us to make friends with his son.

We will definitely sleep well again. Amsterdam tomorrow. For real this time.Read more