My Most Excellent European Adventure, Part 3. Day 8: Tiptoe through the Tulips (and windmills)

Thursday, April 14, 2011
Kinderdijk/ Keukenhof, Amsterdam

Today was another extremely busy but amazing day. We left early (about 9:00) and drove to Kinderdijk in the Netherlands, about a 2 hour drive. This is a town built on a dijk that has 19 windmills.

Creepy Ducth girl in a windmill kitchen

How about these stairs?

After navigating these each day - do you think you'd get use to them??

I particularly enjoyed the groundsworker who took a break to do some texting
(notice the proper wooden shoes!)

Very cool and interesting to see how they work. I didn't know much about the Netherlands before today - or windmills at all. Here are some fun facts:

- 40% of the country is below sea level
- The Dutch lived in the mills
- The workers were called "millers"
- 16 of the 19 mills in Kinderdijk are still inhabited
- The mills were used to pump water out of the dijks when it got too high

It was a gray, cloudy, and cold day to be walking around the mills. Very cool to see. We even got to walk around inside one of them to see how they lived.

After Kinderdijk, we drove about an hour to Keukenhof. This is HUGE tulip/flower garden. This was just beautiful and stunning. So many flowers, colors, arrangements. This was probably one of my favorite things we have done so far. We spent a couple hours there wandering and taking lots of pictures. Here are just a few.

Notice all the professional photographers... They are capturing this area below.

As Betsy and I were trying to catch this shot, we were suddenly surrounded by a hoard of professional photographers and their very fancy, and very big, equipment. Our very small, and very ameteur camers suffered by comparison.

We sadly tore ourselves away since we had an appointment at the Ann Frank house in Amsterdam. We drove the 30 minute drive to our hotel just outside of Amsterdam (appropriately named the Tulip Inn). It's actually pretty nice and more like an American hotel than any of our previous hotels. We rested in the room for about an hour then walked 10 minutes to catch the tram to downtown Amsterdam. We bought a 24 hour pass - and the interesting thing about it is you have to scan it on the tram when you get on and off. It was about a 25 minute ride to Central Amsterdam, walked around a bit to get a feel of a new city. It is a very interesting if not different city than we have seen so far. 

Can you guess the mode of transporation of choice in Amsterdam???

This is the church tower next to Ann Frank's house. We saw this XXX synbol all over the city and were very curious about it.

we made our way to the Ann Frank Haus. We had reserved tickets for 7:45. That was truly amazing to see.

It is unbelievable what she and her family had to go through for almost 2 years in hiding. There wer video clips of some of the people who knew and helped them. Even one of her father speaking which was very touching. Very sad, because she died in the camp just weeks before the liberation not knowing her father was still alive. I can't imagine what it would be like being the sole survivor of my family, especially for a father. I am so glad to I got to see that house and think about that time in history.

After the Ann Frank Huis, we went to dinner just across the street. We all got Dutch pancakes. SOOO yummy!

I got ham and cheese.

And of course a Diet Coke. No ice though...

It was such a cute restaurant and we all enjoyed it very much. We realized it was only the 2nd or 3rd time we sat down to eat with just the four of us at a restaurant on the trip. We have done so much eating on the run. So nice to enjoy the food and atmosphere not being rushed. After dinner we waited a LONG time for our tram in the cold. Finally it came and we made it back to our hotel. Such an interesting and enjoyable city despite its reputation. Although, Heidi did see someone rolling a joint in desperation while we waited fot the train. Don't worry, it's legal here. It's kind of a dirty and trashy city like Vegas but with a lot more charm and history. I love the buildings on the canals. So unique and different than anything we have seen yet. The people seem very nice and friendly and most speak very good English. Very exhausting yet exciting and interesting day.