We drove south to Leiden, the sleepy (literally) town of 122 thousand people is tightly situated inside a canal loop. We struggled to pay for our parking, with my mother (once again) pulling a stranger off the sidewalk to help (and who was painfully useless, not that I expected otherwise). We crossed over the canal and went looking for food.
Maslow's hierarchy of needs is always in full effect when traveling. If you aren't hungry, you have to go to the bathroom, and if you don't need either of those things, you have to sit, or drink, or sleep. A decent amount of the time, you get laser focused on whatever it is that you need the moment, and traveling enhances those needs tenfold. So, I wasn't just hungry - I was starving. To death. And I had to "pee like a Bohemian racehorse" (my mother's charming phrase).
Nothing was open. It was half past 9 and no one is awake. Our interest in the charming town is clouded by our need for food, so once again, my mother pulls a security guard off the street and asks him to point us to breakfast. He leads us all over town, finally landing at VanderWerff, a charming restaurant with patio seating and a bang for your buck breakfast. I set my bags down and tucked into my croissant and toast with eggs, ham and cheese, complete with tiny jars of jam, butter and mice (puffy multicolored sugar sprinkles).
There was a large windmill near our breakfast place, so we wandered up to it. A large flour mill in its day, the Molen De Valk (the Falcon) windmill, originally built from wood, was replaced by a brick structure in 1743. Two families lived in this large home, with a kitchen, living areas, bedrooms and storage rooms. We stepped out on the miller's work space, a giant platform where you needed to walk carefully to avoid being knocked off by the huge turning sails. Not normally one to be afraid of heights, it made me nervous being out there with the quick-turning sails and impressive height. We climbed the 6 ladders to the top of the windmill where we could see the gears and grinding stones that made the mill operational. Check out their website to see details on each floor. Cost is 4 euros to visit.
Our time already up, we rushed back to the car and after several stressful minutes getting our car out of the parking spot, being tightly packed in by the cars around us, and figuring out how to get ourselves to the next city with the navigation system (I miss 3G!), we were on the highway, heading towards a famed windmill city.
After missing a turnoff, sitting in traffic, and agonizing over the incredibly slow speed limit on Holland's highways, we arrived in Zaanse Schans, seeing the half dozen windmills over the bridge we crossed. Then I reached for my mirror and realized it wasn't there. But I knew where it was...on the chair of the VanderWerff restaurant, all the way back in Leiden.
So, we turned around, and did the whole ridiculous drive again. I was dropped off and rushed to the restaurant, people staring at my awkward running as I went. They had it behind their bar, and my video camera was still in it. On the drive out, we noticed all the people that had finally come out of hiding, filling the parks, bars and restaurants which had all decided to open (don't expect things to open until at least 10 am, unless you're royalty and have an advance reservation). The town was beautiful in the midday light - for a second, I wasn't sorry we had come back. But then, we had lost an hour and a half on my mistake, and we had windmills to see.
We paid a ridiculous amount (9 euros) to park at the Zaans Museum and wandered towards the 5 windmills along the Zaans River. My dad purchased a guide ("best euro I ever spent") and I finally found a fresh stroopwafel! I rejoiced in the warm gooey snack. We saw women dressed traditionally, complete with thick wool socks and wooden shoes. My dad told us about how he had worked on a sugarbeet farm northeast of here in Biddinghuizen in 1973, and he wore the socks and wooden shoes in the fields. There were sawmills, oilmills, a mustardmill and a dyemill, with the river in front and fields full of cows behind. Tourists walked the narrow pathway connecting them, taking pictures at the best angles they could manage with the setting sun.
Derek took "senior pictures" on a tree near the river. And he befriended a fancy duck with a purple feather.
We walked among the village buildings and saw a couple taking wedding photos by the river. We found worn wooden shoes hanging in the backyards of people who had used them well in their yards, and sheep and swans in the farm land behind them.
We returned the car and wandered through Vondel Park, watching people enjoy their Friday evenings with food, drinks, music, and plenty of pot. There's no reason to buy the stuff yourself - you can get a contact high just by walking through. Beautiful ponds and statues within and impressive buildings just outside make the walk very pleasant, but avoiding the constant traffic of bikes is difficult.
A large Heineken Bar provided us with refreshment. My parents tried Bitterballen, and my mother's surprise at the inside of the ball was followed immediately with her laughing and spitting out the part she had attempted to consume. We got it on film, don't worry! She wasn't happy with the consistency of the meat, which, as I mentioned in a previous post, is very mushy - not recognizable as meat.
They had been craving the fancy chocolate covered waffles, so we stopped at the first place we found, a chain Ice Bakery, where they quickly became disappointed with the cold, hard waffles. Derek managed to spend an incredible amount of money, completely accidentally, on one of those self-serve yogurt bars...they get you every time!
Sauntering down to the Red Light district, we wandered among the sex, seed, and bong shops, and doorways rimmed in red and lit from within with black lights. Girls in electric white lingerie and bikinis wink from behind their doors, while closed curtains indicate a busy bed, or someone who is still straightening her hair. We're early - things don't get started usually until 10 pm, but we got the feel of the area just fine. Live porno shows complete with photos line the canal, and each alleyway boasts more red light options for the throngs of people who have arrived to gawk. A group of Chinese tourists arrive, following a leader with a flag, and they look...out of place. But then, so are we, and as my dad tells us all the ways that this area is different from when he visited (when he and is friends had a "favorite girl" and they used to time the other men going to visit her - 7 minutes!), when the women were all in prominent windows along the canal, we wonder how many of these visitors are here to pay, and how many are just here to try and see another way of life.
We paid a ridiculous amount (9 euros) to park at the Zaans Museum and wandered towards the 5 windmills along the Zaans River. My dad purchased a guide ("best euro I ever spent") and I finally found a fresh stroopwafel! I rejoiced in the warm gooey snack. We saw women dressed traditionally, complete with thick wool socks and wooden shoes. My dad told us about how he had worked on a sugarbeet farm northeast of here in Biddinghuizen in 1973, and he wore the socks and wooden shoes in the fields. There were sawmills, oilmills, a mustardmill and a dyemill, with the river in front and fields full of cows behind. Tourists walked the narrow pathway connecting them, taking pictures at the best angles they could manage with the setting sun.
Derek took "senior pictures" on a tree near the river. And he befriended a fancy duck with a purple feather.
We walked among the village buildings and saw a couple taking wedding photos by the river. We found worn wooden shoes hanging in the backyards of people who had used them well in their yards, and sheep and swans in the farm land behind them.
We returned the car and wandered through Vondel Park, watching people enjoy their Friday evenings with food, drinks, music, and plenty of pot. There's no reason to buy the stuff yourself - you can get a contact high just by walking through. Beautiful ponds and statues within and impressive buildings just outside make the walk very pleasant, but avoiding the constant traffic of bikes is difficult.
A large Heineken Bar provided us with refreshment. My parents tried Bitterballen, and my mother's surprise at the inside of the ball was followed immediately with her laughing and spitting out the part she had attempted to consume. We got it on film, don't worry! She wasn't happy with the consistency of the meat, which, as I mentioned in a previous post, is very mushy - not recognizable as meat.
They had been craving the fancy chocolate covered waffles, so we stopped at the first place we found, a chain Ice Bakery, where they quickly became disappointed with the cold, hard waffles. Derek managed to spend an incredible amount of money, completely accidentally, on one of those self-serve yogurt bars...they get you every time!
Sauntering down to the Red Light district, we wandered among the sex, seed, and bong shops, and doorways rimmed in red and lit from within with black lights. Girls in electric white lingerie and bikinis wink from behind their doors, while closed curtains indicate a busy bed, or someone who is still straightening her hair. We're early - things don't get started usually until 10 pm, but we got the feel of the area just fine. Live porno shows complete with photos line the canal, and each alleyway boasts more red light options for the throngs of people who have arrived to gawk. A group of Chinese tourists arrive, following a leader with a flag, and they look...out of place. But then, so are we, and as my dad tells us all the ways that this area is different from when he visited (when he and is friends had a "favorite girl" and they used to time the other men going to visit her - 7 minutes!), when the women were all in prominent windows along the canal, we wonder how many of these visitors are here to pay, and how many are just here to try and see another way of life.
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