#like the area of maine I live in is really marshy and so it’s interesting to see like

[star-crossed-lizards]

Today I did an airboat ride and it was great it was so fun to blow around in the marsh and we saw alligators and great blue herons and a purple gallinule which I’m especially excited about because I have known of these birds for a while but never seen one in real life until today. And we saw pelicans on the way there which I hadn’t seen either!

[softpine]

@minamill it's actually still the same day as this post!! i know it feels like it's been 10 years jfkjsds but jada was still in the freezer when she had the vision of asa dying. so we'll pick back up with her reaction soon!! alisa will definitely have.... something to say too 👀 if that's not what you meant please let me know because i think i'm misunderstanding you ;-; but don't worry, i never feel rushed!! i love that you're thinking about it 💖💖

awww cute :3 i've seen so many more garter snakes than usual this year!! i like to walk around this marshy area and there's always 1 or 2 snakes on the wooden dock that runs through it, i have to be careful not to step on them because they're not scared of humans at all!

@forgotten-pixels i'm always thinking about what my characters would do in other universes or how they would play games themselves etc. so thank you for indulging me fjksjds

and yes for sure!! i show some of my characters hobbies when they're relevant, but for the most part they're just set pieces (like jada painting while having a conversation). i like to think that stevie climbs trees ALL the time; she was an adventurous kid who never grew out of the habit. but it's nearly impossible to make poses work with trees and they don't look good up close anyway so it's just a hassle to show :( same with swimming, i try to avoid showing that even though they all live close to the ocean & smaller lakes that they frequent. asa spends soooooo much time just laying down somewhere and thinking, which is nearly impossible to show. and i generally have to neglect caroline/beth/danny/mikaela's interests now that they aren't the main focus of the story anymore and are only really relevant in terms of their kids (sad!!!! but that's life 😔). i do have a little more freedom in that sims is a visual medium and i know how to make my own poses and stuff, but there's only so much work i'm willing to put into such small details lmao

i actually have pinterest boards for all my main characters!! here's some from stevie's, because i just happened to look through that one recently 💖

maine was in the path of totality so i assume most of them would have seen it since they wouldn't have to travel further than their own backyard! and at least where i live, people were handing out eclipse glasses for free. but stevie would definitely be the one who gets the most into it, she'd be infodumping about the eclipse to anyone who will listen :') and jada would be really into it from an artist perspective. she'd be painting the cool shadows for sure!! the others i think would just be into it a normal amount lmao

i actually don't use topaz anymore! if i'm looking for a cleaner/smoother look, i use the camera raw filter that comes with more recent photoshop versions and i just mess around with these settings:

@minamill thank youuuuuuu 🥺🥺🥺💖💖💖

[germanicseidr]

Chatti

 The Chatti were a Germanic tribe located in modern day Hesse and southern Saxony, Germany. They were one of the largest and most powerful tribes of Germania, only the Cherusci were as large as the Chatti tribe. I have written a post about this tribe last year but I wanted to add more information and of course this group has gained so many new members since last year, that most probably missed my previous post on this tribe. Also thanks to Netflix’ new show ‘the Barbarians’ the Chatti has gained more attention. Somewhere around 100BC, there was a huge internal conflict in the Chatti tribe, this conflict resulted in the split of the tribe. Two groups of Chatti tribesmen/women migrated towards the lower Rhine area in modern day Netherlands, this is how the Batavi and Cananefates were born.

The meaning of the tribe’s name isn’t 100% certain but most theories lead to the following meaning: ‘the angry’ or ‘the haters’ from the Proto-Germanic word Hataz. If this is the correct meaning of their name, it is quite a curious one. Why would a tribe call themselves like that? It might have something to do with a conflict that they experienced with another tribe or the conflict that caused the tribe to split back in 100BC. Perhaps the tribe’s name isn’t Germanic in origin at all. Another theory suggests that the word Chatti comes from the Proto-Celtic word Cat which means ‘battle’ or ‘fight’. If this is the case, the pronunciation is also different ‘Khatti’. Yet again these are just theories and nothing is 100% certain. The modern day region of Hesse, where the Chatti once lived, has most likely been named after the tribe.

The first written records about this tribe came from Nero Claudius Drusus Germanicus, the stepson of emperor Augustus. After Germanicus was appointed as the governour of Gaul, he launched a series of campaigns into Germania in an attempt to conquer Germania just like how Gaul was conquered and added to the Roman empire. The first of his campaigns started in 12BC and was very succesful for Germanicus. He crossed the Rhine with his army and subjugated the Sicambri tribe. Germanicus was also the first Roman to reach the Weser river in northern Germany, close to modern day Denmark.

During a later campaign in the same year, he also subjugated the Batavi and the Frisii and defeated the Chauci at the river Weser. In the following year, 11BC, Germanicus defeated the Marsii, Bructeri and the Usipetes. From 10-9BC Germanicus also defeated the Chatti, Cherusci and Marcomanni. It seems as though nothing could stop him from conquering all of Germania, he almost succeeded at this until a fall from his horse during his fourth campaign killed him. It is likely that Germania would have become a Roman province if Germanicus didn’t fell off his horse.

It was during Drusus Germanicus’ campaigns that the famous Arminius of the Cherusci was sent to Rome as tribute by his father, together with his brother Flavus. Relationships between the Cherusci and the Romans continued to sour in the following years after their defeat by the Romans during Germanicus’ campaigns. This eventually led to Arminius revolting against the Romans in 9AD. The king of the Chatti, Adgandestrius, was quick to join Arminius. The Chatti also haven’t forgotten Germanicus’ campaigns in Germania. The revolt led to the famous Teutoburgerwald battle during which three Roman legions were completely destroyed

This battle would be the biggest military defeat for Rome. While Germanicus almost succeeded at conquering Germania, this battle led to the abandonment of all plans to expand the Roman empire into Germania. Permanent borders were established along the Rhine river which kept Germania free. Interestingly enough, Adgandestrius turned against Arminius in 19AD. He even went as far as to ask Rome for help in assassinating Arminius with poison. This request was denied by the Romans as they saw this as a dishonourable way to defeat Arminius, the Romans prefered to meet him in battle. Arminius died two years later, betrayed and murdered by his own people who thought that Arminius was getting way too powerful. (Hope I didn’t just spoil the show for you guys, I still haven’t watched it)

Almost half a century later, another conflict broke out, this time between the Chatti and the Hermunduri in 58AD. Both tribes fought for control over a river that was rich in salt that flowed between the two tribes. This whole conflict has been recorded by Tacitus who described that this river was also very religiously important to the Germanic people. It is not certain which river is mentioned by Tacitus, it is either the Rhine or Main (a river connected to the Rhine). The Germanic people believed that this river was closely connected to the realm of the Gods. If you would make a prayer at the banks of the river Rhine, it would be directly received by the Gods. Both tribes also vowed their enemies to Tyr and Wodan before the battle started. This vow meant that the defeated party was sacrificed to Tyr and Wodan, unfortunately for the Chatti, they lost this battle.

Another revolt broke out in 69AD, this time the Batavi revolted against the Roman empire. The Chatti also joined this rebellion, even though the Batavi were once part of the Chatti and left due to a conflict. The Batavi were able to destroy two Roman legions and several Roman fortifications before the revolt was put down. The Chatti laid siege to Mogontiacum, modern day city of Mainz. Even though the Romans lost their trust in the Batavi, they recognized their strong fighting power and are named the strongest of all the Germanic tribes, not in number but in skills.

20 years later in 89AD, the Chatti joined another revolt. This time two Roman legions under Antoninus Saturninus revolted against emperor Dominitan. Unfortunately all documents describing this event are lost or destroyed so we can sadly never know what event led to two Roman legions revolting against their emperor. There is a theory that the revolt was caused by Dominitan’s strict moral policies for the officers of the army. The revolt however failed before it could really begin. It would have been interesting to observe this revolt if it had succeeded, a curious sight Romans and Chatti warriors fighting side by side.

In 98AD Tacitus published his famous work the Germania, in this work he describes the Chatti as following: “Beyond these dwell the Chatti, whose settlements, beginning from the Hercynian forest, are in a tract of country less open and marshy than those which overspread the other states of Germany, for it consists of a continued range of hills, which gradually become more scattered and the Hercynian forest both accompanies and leaves behind, its Chatti.

This nation is distinguished by hardier frames,  compactness of limb, fierceness of countenance, and superior vigor of mind. For Germanics, they have a considerable share of understanding and sagacity, they choose able persons to command, and obey them when chosen, keep their ranks, seize opportunities, restrain impetuous motions, distribute properly the business of the day, intrench themselves against the night, account fortune dubious, and valor only certain, and, what is extremely rare, and only a consequence of discipline, depend more upon the general than the army.

Their force consists entirely in infantry who, besides their arms, are obliged to carry tools and provisions. Other nations appear to go to a battle, the Chatti, to war. Excursions and casual encounters are rare amongst them. It is, indeed, peculiar to cavalry soon to obtain, and soon to yield, the victory. Speed borders upon timidity slow movements are more akin to steady valor.

A custom followed among the other Germanic nations only by a few individuals, of more daring spirit than the rest, is adopted by general consent among the Chatti. From the time they arrive at years of maturity they let their hair and beard grow and do not divest themselves of this votive badge, the promise of valor, till they have slain an enemy. Over blood and spoils they unveil the countenance, and proclaim that they have at length paid the debt of existence, and have proved themselves worthy of their country and parents. The cowardly and effeminate continue in their squalid disguise.

The bravest among them wear also an iron ring (a mark of ignominy in that nation) as a kind of chain, till they have released themselves by the slaughter of a foe. Many of the Chatti assume this distinction, and grow hoary under the mark, conspicuous both to foes and friends. By these, in every engagement, the attack is begun: they compose the front line, presenting a new spectacle of terror. Even in peace they do not relax the sternness of their aspect. They have no house, land, or domestic cares, they are maintained by whomsoever they visit, lavish of another's property, regardless of their own till the debility of age renders them unequal to such a rigid course of military virtue.” – Tacitus

 Not much is further known about the Chatti besides the fact that they raided Roman territory between 160-170AD. Eventually elements of the Chatti, together with the Batavi, Cherusci, Tencteri, Tubantes, Chamavi, Bructeri, Sicambri and the Ampsivarii formed together in a confederation called the Franks. They settled in modern day southern Netherlands and Belgium around 300AD and were first of the Franks who eventually founded modern day France. The remaining Chatti remained in their original location and continued raiding the Romans wherever they could, by 300AD the Roman western borders were severely weakened by internal conflicts.

Eventually the remaining Chatti became the Hessi during the early medieval ages, this was first recorded in 782AD. Hesse itself has a long and rich history but that is not a topic for this group, feel free to explore this topic further if you are interested in Hesse’s history.

Here is a map which shows the location of the Chatti, a map showing Roman campaigns into Germania before the Teutoburgerwald battle and a depiction of Germanic warriors from the game Rome 2 total war.

[hortascountrysidenotes]

Sounds of Summer

The sounds of a Beck Farm summer were complete two days ago with the arrival of the turtle doves - first one purring in a thorn bush below the house and yesterday another in the blackthorn at the top of the garden - the concerted efforts of the Norfolk Wildlife Trust and other organisations are beginning to show a return - rough old thorn habitat is being left - not enough but an improvement, and these beautiful birds are at least hanging on to a few nesting sites.  All we need now is for the mainland European countries to stop persecuting them on migration and they could start to make a real comeback from the brink.  Sometimes a good outbreak of Covid has positive results as I would imagine the Maltese have been locked in during the migration of many warblers and turtle doves!  The other sound to round it all off was the return of the swifts to the roof of Beck Farm and yesterday their wonderful screeching over the garden table was uplifting.  

A beautiful week of weather turned violently the other way this morning - yesterday was shorts weather and 23C with no wind.  Today is about 10, hat back on, and a howling gale from the north blasting the garden (again).  A few weeks ago this same wind wasnt such a bad thing - not great but not catastrophic, but today and tomorrow is a bitter pill when roses are just starting to show colour in their buds, and beautiful young foliage on copper beech and the like is being shredded.  However, these are the vagaries of climate change and will be with us for some time.  It is encouraging though to see the rise of both the general public and companies demanding more environmental improvement measures from the government following the reaction to less human activity.

Beekeeping has been the predominant activity this week - a second and third swarm due to the sudden rise in temperature - the Master beekeeper and his assistant have been very busy, they have manage to re hive one swarm, one got away and the other conveniently went in to the empty stump, that colony having died out in spring.  Honey has been taken - mostly rape honey which solidifies very quickly, but also some lovely comb which we have been relishing every morning.  Master beekeeper also went to help his teacher yesterday afternoon as she (Super Master Beekeeper) has been struggling to keep up with all her hives.  She has a very sick husband, now in hospital and is herself not the most fit of people due to a horrid virus years ago which attacked her balance. Therefore Master Beekeeper was absolutely exhausted and very hot having been in his suit ALL DAY!!!

All goes well in the garden which is marvellous!  The potatoes are mostly through now, the dahlias also and the night time frosts seem to have gone away.  Although still plenty of foes - rolling leaf on the roses, lily beetles still busy, and ants not always doing good, the absence of the main adversary is a good feeling.  Once the wind abates it should be warm enough to plant out the courgettes,  climbing beans,  Cosmos and Nicotianas.  Sweet peas are climbing now - they do require a lot of water to thrive and that is back in short supply. Although it is lightly raining now, I have had to water the veg again and little rain is on the horizon.  The tomatoes have been “set up” in the greenhouse.  Have sown some interesting new things - Lovage and Lemon coriander, and have transplanted the Cumin to the main raised beds - never grown any of these before and it will be both interesting and fun to see if they work.  Lovage of course grows huge so one plant will be enough and it needs a large space to live, but architecturally it is magnificent.  The sowing of seeds in modules to counteract ant destruction seems to work a treat and the beetroot I planted out two weeks ago look spot on.  I may have to do the same with spinach - it must be something to do with that family’s seed that ants just love as they never bother with lettuce or carrots!  Next spring’s purple sprouting broccoli is through as are the leeks so we are already preparing for winter!

The dogs continue to lead a charmed life.  Scout celebrated her 12th birthday yesterday with two lovely walks to the Jubilee wood in the village, followed by a long swim in the pond we cleared out last autumn which is now clean and deep.  She had several whats apps in from her friends and is having a restful Sunday.  Inca is a little lame really from having had too many walks!  She does love to run and run, and always wants to run as fast as she possibly can, somewhat pounding her left shoulder with her lead leg.  She is having a quiet few days to allow it to settle.  The ground being like concrete has not helped.  Mavis is being a darling - she is helping our neighbour to train his rather unruly golden retriever Callie by just being there and walking demurely to heel alongside Callie to teach Callie that other dogs are not always a reason to go mental!  We are beginning to win through and Callie is not pulling on the lead all the time, and is starting to understand rudimentary sit, stay, and retrieving.  We have just been out for a “lesson” and there is a noticeable improvement!  We finished with Mavis having some lovely retrieves which she did beautifully and it was good for Callie to just sit and watch.  Certainly the lockdown has been good for Mavis, her confidence has grown and grown and I am just sorry that we have not been able to do any competitions.  She should come in season within the month, and we now have a list of people interested in 6 bitches and 3 dogs so that will be something to achieve!  

Most aspects of wildlife are good, newts are rising in the ponds, birds are feeding young, butterflies seem to be about though never enough, the moth trap has shown we have a good number of moths in the garden with the Poplar Hawk Moth present two nights ago.  The moonlight has been phenomenal so you can see the bats whizzing about the garden at dusk. The wildflowers too are improving despite the best efforts of farmers still showering margins with glyphosate.  I have just seen some lovely water avens down in a marshy area, together with marsh thistle - these were not here until recently mainly due to heavy handed use of broad leaf weedkiller.  Sadly the Parish Council have just sprayed all the open grass areas between the Jubilee Wood stands of trees apparently for ragwort - this is a bone of contention - read Wilding if you have not already done so, for a more tolerant view of ragwort.  Casualties of this spray include ribwort plantain, ordinary plantain, hawkbits and dandelions - all valuable for pollinators.  Walking the course yesterday also highlighted the fact that most of the ragwort seems untouched!  

Wisteria and Maigold the highlights in the garden this week with Viburnum plicatum Mariesii dripping down over the pond.  Get ready to change your pots from spring to summer bedding - the garden centres will all be open this week just in time.

HORTA

[alianniegould1991]

Grape Plant Drying Up Marvelous Cool Ideas

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Grape Growing Books

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Growing Ornamental Grape Vines

A final word of advice; if nobody grow grapes since they cannot support its weight.Your local nursery where you should avoid while planting grapes on a deck if space is never allowed to grow grapes at home.The internet, books on grapes growing conditions for your pruning under control, just use hand tools.During the first estates to actively grow the grapes.It is important for new grape growers I met don't really need a trellis or a fence.

Why is it for acidity around pH 5 and excellent drainage.It all starts with knowing the two different grape cultivars that are inedible.The trellis system that claims to be able to support your grape growing process.The process is never simple and easy, unless you want to grow well.Concord grapes are rather picky with where they will grow well.

[180abroad]

Day 181: Wind, Wood, and Cheese—A Crash Course Through Dutch Countryside

For our first real day in Amsterdam, Jessica had picked out a half-day tour of the scenic countryside of North Hollands, including the incredibly picturesque Zaanse Schans. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting very much out of the tour beyond some pretty scenery, but I couldn’t have been more pleasantly surprised with how it turned out.

Our Airbnb was a pleasantly short stroll from the train station. As we waited, Nic and I captured a nearby gym in Pokemon Go. Jessica was not amused.

There wasn't anywhere to scan our smartphone tickets when we boarded the train, but we did need them to get out of Amsterdam Central. The meeting point for our tour was just outside the station, and we had given ourselves enough time to pick up some coffee and pastries for breakfast from a station café. Luckily, as it turned out, we got them to go.

When we arrived at the tourist information center that Google Maps had directed us to, there was no one else there. It was still early, and everything was closed. Double-checking our phones, we realized that we were actually supposed to meet at a storefront several blocks away. We chucked our pastries into our bags, speed-walked down the down main street, and got there just a few minutes late.

Everything seemed fine, though. This was a big-bus tour, unlike the smaller group tours that Jessica and I had tried to stick to before. Even though our tickets were timed, it seemed like they were taking people in at the door and sending out new groups every few minutes as they filled up.

Our tour group was split into English and Spanish speaking sections. As we headed north towards the windmills, we learned through a prerecorded audio track about the significance of windmills in Dutch history.

There are a few things I’ve pretty much always known about the Netherlands: It is a small country, much of its land is below sea level, and for centuries it was one of the world’s greatest trading empires. And windmills played a critical role in that story.

Back in the Middle Ages, the Dutch seized upon an ancient technology known as Archimedes' screw. A brilliantly simple device, the screw can drain vast areas of wetland with just three basic ingredients: a pipe, a corkscrew, and a way to keep the corkscrew turning.

That last ingredient had always been the tricky one. Turning such a massive corkscrew was labor-intensive, and it had to be done more-or-less continually in order to keep the drained land from flooding again. A German engineer figured out how to reduce the workload with a more efficient crank mechanism, but it still required human hands and sweat to operate. Hands that had to be paid, and sweat that needed to be replenished.

It was the Dutch, appropriately enough, who came up with a way to get the work done for free. The Netherlands, with its flat plains and reliable wind, had always been prime territory for windmills. When Dutch engineers figured out use the turning of a windmill to power the turning of a water screw, the rest was just a matter of logistics. The water was pumped up into dikes---tall levees with canals running down the middle of them. Water from one dike would be pumped up into a larger and taller dike, until finally it was pumped into an above-sea-level dike that flowed out to the Atlantic.

Using this technology, the Dutch were able to double the size of their country without having to take land from anyone else but the sea (There’s a famous saying in the Netherlands: “God created the earth, but the Dutch created Holland.”)

While electric pumps have now replaced the windmills, the job is still the same. Without continual pumping to keep the land dry, half of the Netherlands would be lost back to the sea. One article I found claimed that if all the pumps stopped, half the country would be underwater within a week.

But that is just the first half of the story. To find out how windmills took a country they had literally created and transformed it into a global trade empire, we had to make our first stop.

Zaanse Schans is a historic neighborhood just north of Amsterdam, just over a mile from our Airbnb. It is one of the most idyllic and iconic places in the Netherlands, with beautiful old homes and windmills. In the 19th century, it attracted painters like Monet. Today, it attracts throngs of tourists.

After passing through a quaint old-timey town, we were given a tour of one of the mills by one of the millers (or rather sawyers) who actually works there.

We learned that in the 1600s, the Dutch invented a new type of gearbox that transformed the rotating movement of a windmill into an up-and-down motion---perfect for attaching wood saws to.

According to our guide, this was the true first step in the Industrial Revolution. With the vast fields of wind-powered saws in the west and dense forests in the east, the Netherlands was perfectly positioned to process lumber at a staggering rate–more than double France and England combined. Within a few decades, they had raised an unparalleled trading fleet that sprawled across every corner of the globe.

The resulting Dutch Golden Age ushered in a century of incredible wealth, art, and culture to the Netherlands.

The windmills were really clever. They even used a winch system that automatically dragged the logs up out of the canals and through the saw blades. (The logs were kept soaking in the canals before cutting in order to minimize splintering.)

Any wood that wasn’t suitable for lumber became firewood, and sawdust was collected and sold for barn flooring and insulation.

At one point, thousands of windmills peppered the fields of Holland. Almost all have been demolished, but a handful have been preserved, restored, or even rebuilt from scratch according to historical specifications.

The sawyer who showed us around the mill explained that it is not just a preserved mill---it is a working mill. They really do cut lumber, and all the lumber they cut is ordered for real construction projects. Windmills are delicate creatures, and they can start to break down after just a week or two of disuse.

One thing I found especially fascinating was that the sails of the windmill were really that---sails. The blades are intentionally designed so that every morning the millers can decide how much or how little cloth to put on them. If the wind is low, full sails are raised on all four blades. If the wind is high, only two or three might be raised. This lets them control how fast the blades turn regardless of how much wind there is.

We also learned that old-fashioned sawyers wore wooden shoes as protection from the saw blades.

Speaking of wooden shoes, that was the theme of our next stop.

After running back to catch our bus, we headed out to the town of Marken. Once an island, it is now connected to mainland Holland by a long, narrow dike. A quaint time-warp village a bit like those in the Cotswolds or the Rhineland, it's the sort of place tourists go to see old-fashioned buildings and people dressed in old-fashioned clothes. One of the main attractions, and the only one we had time to see, is a wooden shoe factory.

Delightfully, we learned that the Dutch word for wooden shoes is “klompen”---as in, clomping around in heavy wooden shoes.)

Again, I was expecting this to be cheesy tourist trap. And, to be fair, it kind of is. But it was also genuinely interesting. We learned that wooden shoes were quite practical in their time. For field hands working in the marshy Dutch soil, wooden shoes were far more protective than cloth shoes. And thanks to the windmill revolution we'd just learned about, wood was far more plentiful than leather.

The way the shoes are produced nowadays is also fascinating. The klompenmakers take two industrial lathes and join them together so that whatever one lathe does, the other one copies it exactly. One lathe is equipped with an ordinary carving tool, while the other is given a harmless blunt tip. The klompenmakers than mount a completed shoe on the blunted lathe and a wooden blank on the sharp lathe. The sharp lathe is then turned on, while the blunted lathe is kept off. By rubbing the blunted lathe around the inside and outside of the completed shoe, the sharp lathe turns the wooden blank into a perfect replica shoe. Then, by switching the lathes to mirror each other instead of paralleling each other, they can create a perfectly matched shoe for the other foot.

All the while, the klompenmaker gave an impressively entertaining monologue, effortlessly jumping between five different languages and joking with individual tourists in each. If there's one stereotype about a European country that I'm still willing to hold onto after these six months, it's that the Dutch are born linguists.

After the presentation was over, we got to try on some clogs. I was pleasantly surprised to find that weren't nearly as uncomfortable as I was expecting. They have no cushioning, so you’d want to wear them with thick woolen socks, but the insides are fairly well contoured to match a typical human foot.

After buying some souvenirs and taking some more pictures of the kitschy clog-related artwork, we were busked onward toward the Marken docks. From there we took a boat ride over to the mainland town of Volendam, a larger but still rustic Dutch port town.

Our first stop was the Cheese Factory Volendam. It was very much like the Chocolate museums in York and Bruges, but with cheese.

It even had dioramas!

After a quick walk through a series of displays showing how Dutch cheese is made, we got to see a live presentation. While Volendam is part of the famous Edam cheese-making region, the Factory focused on Gouda-style cheese, which was fine by me.

After the presentation, we were let loose to wander and taste a wonderful variety of different Goudas. There was a very young cheese, just four weeks old. It was mild, soft, and creamy---very much to my taste. There was also an "extra old" cheese that had been aged for four years. It was stronger and harder---good, but not so much to my taste.

There was also a delicious assortment of seasoned cheeses. There was smoked Gouda, of course, as well as herb Gouda, red pepper Gouda, and even cumin Gouda. I was so impressed with the cumin Gouda that I had to buy a wheel before we left. But possibly even more impressive than the cumin Gouda was the smoked goat's-milk Gouda. I've never been a fan of the tangy character that goat cheese has, but the creaminess and smokiness of this cheese balanced it out spectacularly. If you ever have a chance to try some, even if you don't normally like goat cheese, I would highly recommend it.

After the cheese factory, we had a break for lunch. We followed our guide's recommendation and went over to a nearby restaurant that specialized in kibbeling, a Dutch version of fish and chips. The fish is cut up into smaller pieces before it is fried, and they practically melted in our mouths. As much as I loved our fish and chips in Britain, I would take that kibbeling over any of them.

All the while, we were inundated with a tremendous noise of raucous crowds and blaring music. While Volendam is allegedly a very quiet town most of the time, we happened to come in the middle of a four-day folk festival filled with dawn-to-dusk drinking, singing, and general merry-making. A miniature Dutch Oktoberfest, if you will.

After wandering through the overwhelming crowds for a bit, we rendezvoused with our tour group for our next stop---a bakery specializing stroopwafels.

I'd never heard of stroopwafels before, but now that we're back, I feel like I see them everywhere. Unlike Belgian waffles, these were small, thin, and crunchy. And most importantly, they are filled with caramel! They are traditionally taken with coffee or tea and small enough to place on top of the cup like a lid. The steam from the drink heats and softens the stroopwafel, making it even tastier.

Naturally, we got to see a demonstration of how to make a stroopwafel. The process is as simple as could be: you make a waffle, split it in half with a knife, spread the filling---caramel, honey or chocolate---on the inside of one of the halves, then put the halves back together like a sandwich. One of the other people on our tour got roped into helping the shopkeeper make one in front of us. When called on, his first reaction was to look helplessly down at the bag in his hands and protest: “But I’m holding cheese!”

Before heading upstairs into the shop, we made sure to snap a picture of the original recipe hanging on the wall.

After buying a box or two to take home with us, we walked through the town to meet up with our bus, which took us back to Amsterdam.

Overall, it was a fun tour, and I enjoyed it more than I was expecting to. It was certainly cheesy---in more ways than one---but we also learned a lot without having to do any of the planning work ourselves. Really, what more could we ask for?

We still had most of the afternoon left, so we decided to stroll around for a bit and enjoy the sights of Amsterdam's city center---starting with one of our absolute must-sees.

The Basilica of St. Nicholas is “only” a hundred years old or so, but it is still very beautiful. Thanks to what must have been very clever design, they were able to make it very bright and airy inside despite having relatively few windows.

After leaving Nic's basilica, we walked up and down the main canals of the city center, taking in the sights, sounds, and---yes---smells. We didn’t enter any of the many “coffee shops” that we passed, but judging by our noses, everything everyone says is true.

We didn't quite go into the red light district itself, but we got close enough to find some rather interesting storefronts that certainly wouldn't have passed any public decency regulations back in the States.

At the south end of the city center, we came to the University of Amsterdam. Nic and Jessica had been hoping to buy a university sweatshirt for their dad, but while this campus in the heart of Amsterdam had been the University's original location, the bulk of it is now in a much larger campus on the outskirts. There weren't any university shops on the old campus that we could find, just a lot of sleepy buildings.

Before we headed back up the city's main drag, I insisted on stopping by a pen store---P.W. Akkerman. If you don't already know, I'm a bit of a pen fanatic. There is a P.W. Akkerman store in the Hague that I was dying to visit, but this satellite store in Amsterdam was a nice way to tide myself over. Nic and Jessica were more than happy to let me wander in, but I don't think they understood exactly what they were getting into. After a good long while of perusing the shelves on three different floors, I found them waiting patiently by the door, more than ready for us to continue onward.

The main street running up through the city center is vast and impressive. And the buildings flanking it are also suitably grand for the economic epicenter of a former trade superpower.

Running all the way up the street was a series of ornate street organs playing impressively complex carnival-esque tunes. We also passed a blade juggler trying to convince his modest crowd that it was only fair that they each give him ten Euros for the upcoming performance.

Finally, we made it back to the central train station---a beautiful structure in its own right that we hadn't really had time to appreciate before---and headed back home for a relaxing evening. Tomorrow, we'd be heading back into town for a deep dive into one of our favorite sites in the city: the Maritime Museum.

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