Officially this is our second visit to Amsterdam on this trip, but a five hour stay in the Amsterdam airport doesn’t seem very representative. The airport was a very busy place, but so is the city. Our ship docked near Central Station…lots of people, lots of trains, and Greg thinks maybe millions of bikes (maybe only thousands, but there were a lot!).

Our excursion today took us to a touristy place outside of the city. They had a number of working windmills that had been rescued from other places and brought to this park. The windmill we toured is a working sawmill. They have a small log pond out back and an ingenious setup inside…wind power drives both the multiple blades that cut the log into planks and the carriage the pulls the log into the blade. this is not to say no manual labor is needed; they use a block and tackle to lift the log into the carriage, and use wooden levers to get the log lined up properly.

We also saw in another building a demonstration of how wooden shoes are made, although with modern equipment. The craftsman worked very quickly, using a lathe with a jig to form the outside, then a tool and jig to hollow out the inside of the shoe. The wood is green at this point, so it still needs to dry and be sanded and painted.

The ship left port during dinner time rush hour. We stayed up to watch it transit the locks that control the depth of the canals. It’s always impressive to watch the captain maneuver the ship into such a small space. That took us into the North Sea; day five will be a sea day and day six will be our first day in Norway. See you then…