http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Europe , Netherlands , North Holland , Volendam en-us Thu, 20 Jun 2013 04:34:33 +0000 Thu, 20 Jun 2013 04:34:33 +0000 Today was one of those days in which I finally got some tourist type things done. Vincent check windmills check etc.Did the Vincent museum first can we pronounce it properly first people it's van Gockh not van Goh already. As I had a bus tour at 1pm decided I had better get down there the fastest way possible well sort of tram. I had seen a central conductor booth on one yesterday b http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-537156.html On January 2 the year of 2009 me and Nadia ventured to a farm called Irenehoeve. Its a farm where Gouda cheese is being produced. They revealed all details about cheese making. Thereafter they showed us the process of making clogs or wooden shoes. We got to taste all the 9 different kinds of cheeses with a bit of mustard accompanied by a locally produced berry fruit wine. The guy who worked t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-385862.html 20km northeast of Amsterdam lies the fishing village of Volendam and 12 hour offshore the island of Marken.These villages still exude the charm and tradition of yesteryear and feature the original homes used for hundreds of years by its fisherman inhabitants.Once upon a time the villages were host to men and women dressed in traditional garb the men in balloonshaped black woollen trousers http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-311758.html Having spent so long in France it was time to move on and our next destination was to be Holland. Our plans had changed again somewhat because we had to make a little pit stop in Dover UK to renew the MOT on our van an equivalent of a road worthy test completed annually. So we ended up literally spending one day in Dover thank goodness we passed our MOT. We entered Holland from the south an http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-262428.html Volendam is a very touristy spot on the edge of a large lake north of Amsterdam. It is very popular for its array of traditional Dutch costume wooden clogs and cheeses of all varieties.It was here is Volendam that we encountered a Dutch couple that looked uncannily similar to us the four of us got along very well http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-204734.html Greetings from The Netherlands...errr Holland...where dutch people ride bikes and from what I can guess eat sleep and live. We spent the fourth of July in Amsterdam where we took a Canal Tour and went to the Anne Frank House. All the streets had the mixture of the smell of marijuana body odor stagnant water and every so often pastries. It rained off and on all day but it made the ambience o http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-177684.html It was a remarkably lazy morning. We didn't get going till about 2pm. Irene drove us to a little village called Volendam. Along the way there were lots of windmills and farmland. There were also old windmills that have been turned into houses. In the middle of a conversation Irene burst out laughing because she caught sight of cows running accross the field. It occured to me that I have never http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-89763.html Our first stop is Zaanse Schans. The area was named 'De Zaanse Schans' after a trench was built in 1574 to hold back Spanish troops during the eighty year war between the Netherlands and Spain. Zaanse Schans was built up on dikes. The dikes were probably built as early as the thirteenth century the first villages were built along these at a later date. Until late in the last century these were ty http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-67763.html From Marken we drove to Volendam Edam and finally Heemskerk. In typical Speedy Tour fashion zooming through snapping some pics.. moving on Finding the hotel in Heemskerk was a bit of a chore but made it anyway. Nice place next to and ING training school. http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Volendam/blog-21894.html