We visited the Amsterdam area for the first time in over 20 years. We stayed with Julian’s cousin, Kitty. She lives on a river in Zaandam, a suburb of Amsterdam. You can see a series of latter-day (electricity-generating) windmills from the windows of her condo. Not quite as picturesque as the original ones, but they serve similar purposes.
A quaint windmill over the harbor in Zaandam.
On our first day, we took a road trip to two of the older towns in the area. The first was Edam (home of the cheese). As with most Dutch towns, Edam is crisscrossed by canals. We visited a small 17th century Protestant church and walked around the downtown area. The second town was Enkhuizen. (Don’t ask me to pronounce this!) This town fronts the IJsselmeer (this is not a misspelling, and I won’t try to pronounce this), a large body of water created by a dam across the Zuider Zee. We had a late lunch in Enkhuizen. I watched the café’s corpulent canine chase bikes on the walk outside while we were eating. A very Dutch scene.
On Saturday we went to Delft for a 150th birthday party. The sum of Kitty’s daughter’s family’s ages is 150. It was quite a crowd in the basement of a tavern. Kitty’s youngest granddaughter, age 10, was helping to tend bar. (In the States, Child Protective Services would take the children away if they were notified of a similar situation.) She did a fantastic job. The best part of the party was meeting some of Julian’s relatives that he’d never met. As most of his US relatives are no longer living, it’s good to know he has family somewhere.
Recent Comments