Zaanse Schans _ Windmills, wooden clogs, cheese, clocks and chocolate!

Sunday...they said it would rain, but it wasnt raining...so of course we had to get outside, despite the grey sky. We are quite used to that, so even some misting would not keep us from getting out and doing more exploring. Its always fun to find things that the kids are entertained with and that we can get some exercise doing, its win win for everyone. Our thigns are still not here, so we have time to explore. The housework will come and we will be plenty busy with it once it starts. We are trying to enjoy this time before all of the real settling in begins.

I did some research about places close by (within a 45 min drive) and came up with Zaanse Schans. I cant really tell you all the history about it, but I can tell you its just north of Amsterdam, and in a fun village area (although I think the name of the village might be something different, but anyway...) where you can visit lots of small, mostly free museums that show you in real life how wooden clogs are made, how dutch clocks have evolved (seriously there were some from the 1700's), how chocolate is made (then you can taste it!), a cheese factory, and they even have working windmills. The windmills either, cut wood into lumber, or they power old fashion grinding stones that grind up spices, dyes, flour (the smell of the grinding spices is insane and wonderful), they also had a windmill that crushes peanuts to sell peanut oil. It was fascinating!

My favorite part was watching a piece of wood transform into a wooden clog. They used to be carved by hand and take hours to make, but now they have machines that use a "model" they take far less time. Fresh, "wet" wood is used so that carving is possible. The first machine creates the outer shape, the next hollows out the inside. Then by hand they trim the edges, set the shoe to dry for a few weeks, and then sand it smooth. Its not the old way of doing it, but its incredible to see a chunk of wood turn into a shoe.

It was quite a fun outing, the kids loved it and we have yet another sight in Holland marked off our list to see.

Here are a few pictures. (quick blog post today, sorry for not proofing it...hope it all made sense.)